IndustriALL Renews Global Agreement with German Multinational Parts Supplier Rheinmetall

IndustriALL Global Union has renewed and “strengthened its global framework agreement (GFA) with German auto supply and defense company, Rheinmetall.” In the new agreement, IndustriALL and Rheinmetall commit to “increase cooperation in the years to come.” The original global framework agreement with Rheinmetall was signed in 2003.

The new agreement was signed between Rheinmetall and IndustriALL at the company’s headquarters in Dusseldorf on 12 October 2018. The agreement is said to build on worker and trade union protections across the company’s global supply chain. The agreement comes as European automakers and suppliers are threatened by Brexit chaos and  President Trumps’ desire to punitively tax imported European vehicles at the US border.

IndustriALL is now equal partner to the agreement and it includes improvements such as:

• Strong language on anti-discrimination and mobbing
• Strong language on the responsibility of management regarding the implementation and honoring of the agreement
• A new chapter on sustainable employment
• A new clause on neutrality in the case of union organizing campaigns

The Rheinmetall European Works Council and IndustriALL’s German affiliate, IG Metall, initiated re-negotiation of the GFA more than two years ago, and over the past year there have also been intensive negotiations with IndustriALL.

IndustriALL’s general secretary, Valter Sanches, said, “The renewal of the global framework agreement with Rheinmetall underlines the willingness of both parties to deepen their relationship and intensify efforts to ensure Rheinmetall’s high social standards are adhered to at all their plants worldwide, and across the supply chain.”

Rheinmetall has more than a 125-year history and employs 24,000 people. In 2017, it generated sales of nearly Euros 6 billion and is represented in 39 locations in Germany, a further 39 in Europe (excluding Germany), 13 on the American continent, 17 in Asia, six in Africa and three in Australia.