According to news on November 17, as labor disputes continue to escalate, Tesla’s strike crisis in Sweden is escalating. Starting Friday, dockworkers at all Swedish ports will no longer unload Tesla cars, cleaning crews will stop cleaning Tesla showrooms, and mechanics will no longer repair charging piles. The strike was initially started by Tesla mechanics and has now spread. Swedish unions say this is an existential battle between Tesla and fair and efficient practices in the Swedish labor market.
The standoff in Sweden is Tesla's largest union strike action globally. Sweden has no laws regulating minimum wages and working conditions; these are determined through collective labor agreements. A collective labor agreement is a contract that stipulates benefits for employees, such as wages and working hours.
For the past five years, IFMetall, the union representing Tesla mechanics, has been trying to persuade Tesla to sign a collective agreement. But after Tesla refused, the mechanics decided to go on strike at the end of October. They then invited other Swedish unions to join in the strike action.
The Swedish Electricians Union plans to join the strike on Friday. The union's head of negotiations, Mikael Pettersson, said: "Collective agreements are the cornerstone of the Swedish labor market model. For a large company like Tesla, defending the Swedish model becomes particularly important."
Currently, negotiations are at a standstill. IFMetall spokesman Jesper Pettersson said there were no negotiations with Tesla as of last Wednesday. Tesla has not responded to a request for comment.
Some unions involved in the strike are broadening the scope of their actions to be more effective. Dockworkers at four Swedish ports have refused to unload Tesla vehicles since November 7. By Friday, all Swedish ports will have joined the strike action. Jimmy Åsberg, president of the dockworkers branch of the Swedish Transport Union, said: "We will not unload any Tesla cars. We will unload all other cars, but the Tesla cars will remain on the ship."
Asperger hopes Tesla will understand the importance of this issue to Swedish workers. "This is not just about dockworkers, it's about all Swedish workers," he said.
Ombudsman Torbjörn Jonsson said the Swedish construction and maintenance workers' union will also join strike action against Tesla at noon on Friday "simply because IFMetall asked us to do so." He added that the union, which has about 50 members, is responsible for cleaning Tesla facilities. Four of Tesla's showrooms and service centers will be affected, three near Stockholm and one in the city of Umef, and "these facilities will not be cleared."
Three days later, on November 20, the Seko union, which represents postal workers, will stop delivering letters, spare parts and pallets to all Tesla addresses in Sweden. "It is absolutely unacceptable that Tesla is trying to gain a competitive advantage by offering wages and working conditions that are worse than those under the collective agreement," Seko union president Gabriella Lavecchia said in a statement.
It's unclear how the strike will affect Tesla's operations in Sweden, the company's fifth-largest market in Europe. Local media in Sweden reported that new Tesla cars were being unloaded at a Danish port and passing through the border.
The last time Swedish unions clashed with multinationals over working conditions was in 1995, when toy company Toys R Us also refused to negotiate a collective agreement. That three-month strike, which started with retail workers and spread to other unions, eventually forced Toys "R" Us to sign the agreement.
Former Swedish Prime Minister Stefan Löfven said he would refuse to take a taxi if the driver drove a Tesla. He wrote on Facebook: "It should be a given for a company to follow the conventions of the country in which it operates, but Tesla seems intent on ignoring the Swedish labor market model. Tesla, you should be ashamed!"