Tesla Says It Laid Off 4 Percent New York Employees Before Union Campaign

Tesla Inc. announced Wednesday that it had laid off 4 per cent of its employees from the Autopilot labeling group in Buffalo, as part of a performance evaluation cycle every six months.

The automaker replied to a union A complaint was filed against the company claiming that it laid off dozens employees from its Autopilot section at its Buffalo plant, New York. This happened just a day after workers launched a reorganization. campaign To form a union.

According to the company, the affected employees were identified Feb. 3, before the union campaign was announced. “We became aware of organizing activities approximately 10 days later,” The company stated that the layoffs were prior to any union campaign.

Workers at Tesla in New York announced earlier this week that they would join Workers United Upstate New York to give them voice at work.

Workers United Upstate New York union filed a U.S. National Labor Relations Board filing earlier Wednesday accusing the world’s top automaker of retaliating with terminations of some employees “in retaliation for union activity”.

According to the union, more than 30 workers were fired by the company. The union also stated that workers received an email with an updated policy. This prohibits them recording workplace meetings without permission from all participants.

“This policy violates federal labor law and also flouts New York’s one-party consent law to record conversations.”

The company stated that the department’s employee base has increased 54 percent in the past six months to 675 employees, compared with 437 previously.

The workers had requested that the electric carmaker respect their right of organizing a union. They also asked for the Fair Election Principles to be signed by the company, which would stop Tesla from making threats or retaliating towards the workers.

Elon Musk, the Chief Executive Officer, has voiced his opposition to unions in the past. In a 2018 tweet, Musk stated that employees would lose their stock options if formed a union. The NLRB asked him to remove the tweet.

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