About 2,300 Workers To Lose Job With Planned Closure On Daimler Facilities In Ontario, Oregon

Toronto, Ontario (AHN) - Daimler's decision to stop producing Sterling brand vehicles will lead to the closure in March of its factory at St. Thomas, Ontario. The move will also result in the shuttering of another Sterling facility in Portland, Oregon. It would cost 2,300 Daimler employees their jobs.

The 2,300 affected staff includes 720 who will become unemployed beginning November after the St. Thomas plant removes its second shift. Over 600 car makers were laid off last year at the facility when the third shift was taken away.

Other Daimler workers numbering 1,200, who are salaried staff at Daimler Trucks North America, also stand to lose their jobs. More than 50 percent of them have tasks related to the Sterling brand. Daimler's timetable is to close its Oregon plant by June 2010.

The shuttering of the two plants is due to the low demand for vehicles and structural changes in Daimler's core markets. The closure of the Toronto plan coincides with the end of its contact with the Canadian Auto Workers union.

Bob Hammersley, general manager of the Ontario plant, said the soon-to-be laid-off Daimler workers are studying their options for employment with other production firms, particularly in the aircraft and rail manufacturing sectors.

But the firm will open in February a new truck factory in Saltillo, Mexico, where labor cost will be lower. The Mexican factory will make its new Cascadia model. The layoffs and shift to Mexico will cost Daimler $600 million, but it is expected to add $900 million to the firm's income by 2011.