GM to slash 1,100 jobs at Oshawa pickup plant

By John McCrank

TORONTO (Reuters) - General Motors of Canada (GM.N) will cut about 1,100 jobs at a truck plant in Ontario amid slumping pickup sales, the company said on Thursday.

That comes on top of recently announced cuts to overtime in the plant.

GM said it will cut production of Chevrolet Silverado and GMC Sierra pickup trucks in Oshawa, Ontario, from three shifts to two, starting in January.

"What we are doing basically, is planning to make sure that our production's disciplined and in line with where we see the market demand," David Paterson, vice-president of GM Canada, said in an interview.

"The pickup truck segment has been veering down for a variety of different reasons, so we need to balance our production to the supply."

Paterson said a softer U.S. housing market, higher gas prices and a move to smaller vehicles have all hit pickup sales.

GM has five plants in North America producing pickup trucks, and the Oshawa plant was the only one that had three shifts, whereas the others have two, so the decision was made to cut back in Oshawa, he said.

"They shocked the living hell out of us, quite frankly. We had not anticipated any announcement of layoffs," Buzz Hargrove, president of the Canadian Auto Workers Union, told a news conference on Thursday.

Less than a week ago, GM said it would eliminate previously scheduled overtime through the rest of the year at plants producing pickups in Oshawa; Arlington, Texas; Janesville, Wisconsin; Silao, Mexico; Fort Wayne, Indiana; and Flint, Michigan as inventories were too high.

"We thought the eliminating of the overtime would be enough to help control the inventories," said Hargrove.

After losing more than $12 billion in the past two years, GM is in the middle of slashing more than 34,000 jobs and closing twelve plants in North America. Paterson said the latest Oshawa job cuts were not included in previous announcements.