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Across Sweden, around 70 car mechanics continue to confront among the world's richest corporations – the electric vehicle manufacturer. The labor strike targeting the US carmaker's ten Swedish repair facilities has currently reached its second anniversary, and there is minimal sign of a settlement.

One striking worker has remained at the Tesla picket line since October 2023.

"It has been a tough time," remarks the worker in his late thirties. And as the nation's cold winter weather arrives, it is expected to become more challenging.

The mechanic devotes every start of the week with a colleague, standing near a Tesla garage within an industrial park located in southern Sweden. The labor organization, the Swedish metalworkers' union, provides shelter via a mobile construction vehicle, plus hot beverages and light meals.

But it remains business as usual across the road, at which the service facility seems to be at full capacity.

The strike concerns a matter that goes to the core of Swedish industrial culture – the authority for worker organizations to negotiate pay and conditions on behalf of their members. This concept of negotiated labor contracts has underpinned industrial relations in Sweden for almost a century.

Currently approximately 70% of Scandinavia's employees are members to labor organizations, and 90% fall under under negotiated labor contracts. Strikes in Sweden occur infrequently.

It's an arrangement supported by all parties. "We favor the right to bargain freely with worker representatives and sign collective agreements," says a business representative from the Association of Swedish Businesses business organization.

But Tesla has upset established practices. Vocal chief executive Elon Musk has stated he "opposes" with the idea of labor organizations. "I simply don't like any arrangement which creates a sort of hierarchical sort of thing," he informed listeners at an event in 2023. "I think the unions try to generate conflict in a company."

Tesla entered the Scandinavian market starting in the mid-2010s, while the metalworkers' union has for years sought to establish a collective agreement with the company.

"Yet they did not reply," says the union president, the union's president. "And we got the belief that they tried to avoid or evade discussing the matter with us."

She says the organization eventually saw no alternative than to announce a strike, beginning on 27 October, 2023. "Usually it's enough to make the threat," says Ms Nilsson. "The company typically agrees to the agreement."

But this did not happen on this occasion.

Janis Kuzma, who is of Latvian origin, started working with the automaker in 2021. He asserts that wages & work terms frequently subject to the discretion of managers.

He recalls a performance review at which he states he was denied an annual pay rise because he was "not reaching company targets". At the same time, a colleague was reported to be rejected for increased compensation due to he had the "wrong attitude".

Nevertheless, some workers went out on strike. The company employed approximately one hundred thirty mechanics working at the time the strike was called. IF Metall states currently approximately seventy of their represented workers are on strike.

The automaker has long since substituted the striking workers with replacement staff, a situation there is no precedent since the era of the 1930s.

"Tesla has done it [found replacement staff] openly and systematically," states a labor researcher, an analyst at a research institute, a policy organization financed by Swedish trade unions.

"It's not against the law, this being crucial to recognize. However it violates all traditional norms. But the company doesn't care for conventions.

"They aim to be convention challengers. So if anyone tells them, hey, you are breaking a standard, they perceive this as praise."

The automaker's local division declined requests for comment via correspondence citing "all-time high deliveries".

Indeed, the company has given just a single media interview during the entire period after the industrial action began.

Earlier this year, the local division's "country lead", the executive, told a financial publication that it benefited the company better to avoid a collective agreement, and rather "to collaborate directly with the team and provide workers optimal conditions".

Mr Stark denied that the decision not to enter a labor contract was one made at Tesla headquarters overseas. "Our division possesses authorization to take our own such decisions," he said.

IF Metall is not entirely isolated in this conflict. This industrial action has been supported by a number of labor organizations.

Dockworkers in nearby Scandinavian nations, Nordic countries & Finland, decline to process Teslas; waste is not collected from Tesla's Scandinavian locations; while recently constructed power points remain linked to power networks in the country.

Exists an example near the capital's airport, where 20 chargers remain unused. However a Tesla enthusiast, the leader of an owner's club the Swedish Tesla association, says Tesla owners remain unaffected by the labor dispute.

"There's an alternative power point 10km from here," he comments. "Plus we are able to still purchase vehicles, we can maintain our vehicles, we can power our electric cars."

With consequences high for all parties, it's hard to envision a resolution to the stand-off. IF Metall risks setting a precedent if it concedes the fundamental concept of collective agreement.

"The worry is that that would spread," states Mr Bender, "and eventually {erode