General Motors is going to make a major announcement on Monday that will impact its worldwide operations and threatens to close a big vehicle assembly plant located in the province of Ontario, a Canadian union stated on Sunday.
Unifor, which accounts for most unionized autoworkers in Canada, stated it had been informed by GM that there would be no product placed to the plant in Oshawa after December 2019, a development that would impact production at the plant.
The union statement came after a Canadian TV news channel stated the automaker was preparing to shut down all operations at the plant in Oshawa, near Toronto.
A GM spokesman refused to discuss on Sunday evening.
GM has been slashing jobs to deal with decreasing car sales in North America. The company has internally debated for months on ways to address shrinking car demand, a person briefed on the matter stated, and the issue is certain to re-emerge when the automaker holds contract talks next year with the United Auto Workers union.
GM is expected to declare as soon as this week some involuntary salaried layoffs after it did not get enough volunteers to accept buyouts as hoped, the person stated.
GM said on October 31 that about 18,000 of its 50,000 salaried workers in North America are qualified for the buyouts.
