Canada’s largest private sector union is calling on Ottawa to keep its 100 per cent surtax on electric vehicles imported from China, warning that removing it would threaten auto jobs across the country.

Unifor submitted its position to the federal government’s Section 53 review of the tariff, saying Chinese automakers enjoy unfair advantages through state subsidies, weak labour standards and carbon-intensive production.

“Lifting tariffs on China will make a bad situation far worse, if Canada becomes a dumping ground for cheap, unfairly subsidized imports,” said Unifor national president Lana Payne. “It would be nothing short of a self-inflicted wound at a time when one-third of our members at Detroit Three facilities in Canada are on layoff, with three automobile assembly plants sitting idle.”

The union said lifting the surtax now would risk undoing recent investments in vehicle assembly, battery production and critical minerals. It is asking Ottawa to extend the surtax for at least 24 months, broaden it to include EV and battery components, and reinstate federal EV rebates restricted to Canadian and North American-built vehicles. The union also wants stronger enforcement against goods made with forced labour.

Unifor said Canada should align its approach with the United States and Mexico. The U.S. has combined tariffs of 127.5 per cent on Chinese EVs and plans to restrict connected car technology by 2027, while Mexico raised its EV import tariffs to 50 per cent this year after Chinese vehicles surged to 70 per cent of its market.

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[–] avidamoeba@lemmy.ca 6 points 3 days ago

I get the frustration but unions are generally on our side of economic issues. Unifor doesn't care what autos we produce, EVs, big or small. Or whether their members produce autos at all. They care about Unifor members having well paying jobs through getting a larger share of the corporate profits they generate. This is in the majority of Canadians' interest. That money is recycled throughout the economy and it lifts other wages too.

Whenever the interest of a particular union in an industry comes in contradiction with the rest of us, it's important to keep in mind that those workers interest isn't the same as the corporatiom they work for, and that if we throw them under the bus because they aren't unionized, they'd make their anger known at the election polls. This is where considering their interest being distinct from their bosses is useful. We can and should take care of workers whose industries harm the rest of us. Unions can actually be allies in this. If we make workers whole, through concrete programs of retraining, retirement, we'd face a lot less resistance to tackling harmful industries. We could even get productive cooperation and spare us the backlash come election time. Of course that requires dialing down free market fundamentalism a few notches.