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The UAW has been plagued with corruption and scandals throughout their history. A Few months back I mentioned that Rory Gamble was the first UAW President in many years to step down from the post without any charges being brought against him. Keep in mind he only held the office for two years. The two previous presidents were convicted along with many other high ranking UAW officials for embezzlement and many of them are still currently spending time in prison. After this complete embarrassment, the court appointed an independent monitor to oversee the UAW. Neil Barofsky, a former federal prosecutor, was assigned the position and told media this week that the UAW had “fallen short” on their reform efforts to rid corruption in the organization. Mr. Barofsky disclosed that he had 15 new open investigations into foul play and just this morning there was a 16th announced. The latest one being against Tim Edmonds, the former financial secretary at UAW Local 412 in Warren Michigan, who allegedly stole around $2 million from the union. Barofsky states the UAW needs to, “take more affirmative measures to fully eradicate the strong remnants of the toxic culture that characterized its recent past and still remain present today”. An investigation into current UAW president Ray Curry was just closed without charges being filed. It was looking into Mr. Curry using football tickets the UAW had obtained through a vendor contract for himself personally. Instead of bringing charges, Mr Barrofsky decided to turn him into the union’s ethics committee. It seems to me that the UAW is a fallen organization if you are telling me there are so many problems that when a President uses UAW resources for personal gain, as long as it is only a few thousand dollars worth, is only a slap on the wrist. With the culture of this corrupt organization, I think this only further allows criminal activity to be emboldened and makes people much more likely to embezzle as long as it is just small amounts at a time. I can’t believe people still pay their union dues to this organization that has so obviously used its power and influence to make a few people at the top very wealthy and also allows the auto manufacturers to bribe just a few people on their way to better labor contracts. I am completely disgusted by this organization and think it should be dissolved.
GM and Toyota are looking to get even more of their production back on track as GM announces it will be resuming production of Silverado pickups in Canada after the plant has had extended downtime. Toyota is claiming that in December all of their production lines in Japan will be running normally for the first time in 7 months. Although in my opinion, the American manufacturers are still slow playing the parts shortage in hope to get federal money to subsidise their transition to electric vehicles. Biden is scheduled to go to Michigan to the launch of GM’s Factory Zero. This is a $2.2 billion facility made to build the next generation of electric vehicles. This launch came right after GM CEO Mary Barra released the company’s third-quarter numbers which are down almost 40% and GM fleet customers are being told it may be years before they get the replacement vehicles that they need. Am I the only person who thinks this sounds crazy?
Ford Pro, Ford’s commercial division run by Ted Cannis, announced that they will be giving complimentary services to EV fleet owners to track and manage their electric fleet. Most of these tools are telematics systems that allow the owners to track service, maintenance, charge levels, driving speed and location in hopes to help companies increase productivity. Both the E-Transit and Ford Lightning, the commercial EV that Ford has recently announced will come with 3 years of this service for free. As most commercial fleets do track telematics data I see this as a nice addition and could allow fleet managers to save a little money on third party services as long as the Ford services are up to pair.
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