Auto parts maker Magna to welcome unions: reports

MONTREAL (Reuters) - Magna International Inc (MGa.TO: Quote, Profile, Research, Stock Buzz) (MGa.TO: Quote, Profile, Research, Stock Buzz) is set to unveil on Monday an agreement that would open the big auto parts maker to organizing drives by the Canadian Auto Workers union, according to reports published on Friday.

Stories posted on the Internet Web sites of the Globe and Mail and Financial Post said the agreement would be announced at Magna's headquarters in Aurora, Ontario by the company's chairman, Frank Stronach.

Magna, which generates much of its $24 billion of annual revenues from the Big Three automakers, has some 21,000 employees in Canada and the vast majority are not represented by unions. It employs another 18,000 in the United States.

Magna officials could not be immediately reached for comment.

In a statement released on Friday night, the CAW said union president Buzz Hargrove would not be available to comment "on any relationship with Magna until after Monday afternoon."

Shannon Devine, a spokeswoman for the CAW, said there would probably be a meeting held just outside Toronto on Monday afternoon, but she declined to confirm or deny the reports on a deal between Magna and the CAW. Aurora is located just outside Toronto.

The Globe and Mail, citing sources familiar with the matter, said that a key part of the deal is that Magna's management will be neutral during organizing drives by the CAW at the company's 61 manufacturing facilities Canada.

At Magna's annual meeting in May 2006, Stronach first suggested such a deal could be envisaged and that he had been in discussions with the CAW's Hargrove.

At the time, Magna senior executives said the possibility of unionizing the company's 141 locations throughout North America had been contemplated.