GM to lay off some workers at Michigan plant

DETROIT, Jan 21, 2003; Reuters is reporting that General Motors Corp. said on Tuesday it will lay off an undetermined number of workers at a Detroit-area assembly plant in mid-March as it slows production of some of its luxury sedans.

GM, the world's largest automaker, said it will slow the production line speed to cut output of its Cadillac DeVille, Cadillac Seville and Buick LeSabre sedans at its Detroit-Hamtramck assembly plant.

"There will be some layoffs. The actual number has not yet been determined," GM spokesman Dan Flores said.

He declined to comment on a weekend report in the Detroit Free Press that the production cut would likely result in the layoff of 500 to 600 of the plant's approximately 3,400 hourly workers.

Officials with the United Auto Workers Local 22, which represents employees at the plant, were not available to comment.

U.S. sales for all three of the large sedans fell last year, with Seville falling 15 percent, DeVille by 11 percent and LeSabre by 6.5 percent.

Under the current UAW contract, laid-off hourly workers with at least one year's experience receive about 95 percent of their take-home pay.

The decreased production at the Hamtramck plant is factored in to GM's higher North American vehicle production estimates for the first quarter. GM said last week it expects to produce 1.43 million vehicles in North America in the first quarter, up from 1.353 million in the first quarter last year.