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In Sweden, around 70 car mechanics continue to confront among the world's wealthiest corporations – the electric vehicle manufacturer. This industrial action at the American carmaker's ten Scandinavian repair facilities has now entered two years of duration, and there is minimal sign for a settlement.

One striking worker has remained at the electric car company's picket line since October 2023.

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

The mechanic spends each Monday with a colleague, standing near a Tesla garage within a business district located in southern Sweden. The labor organization, IF Metall, provides accommodation via a portable builders' van, as well as coffee & sandwiches.

However it's operations continue normally nearby, where the service facility seems to be in full swing.

This industrial action involves a matter that reaches to the heart of Scandinavia's labor traditions – the authority for worker organizations to bargain for wages and working terms on behalf of their workforce. This concept of collective agreement has underpinned labor dynamics in Sweden for almost one hundred years.

Currently approximately seventy percent of Swedish workers are members of a trade union, and 90% are covered under negotiated labor contracts. Strikes across the nation are rare.

It's an arrangement welcomed across the board. "We prefer the ability to bargain directly with worker representatives and establish collective agreements," says a business representative from the Association of Swedish Enterprise business organization.

But the electric car company has upset established practices. Vocal chief executive the company leader has stated he "disagrees" with the idea of unions. "I simply don't like anything that establishes a kind of hierarchical situation," he told an audience in New York last year. "I think labor groups attempt to generate negativity within businesses."

Tesla came to the Scandinavian market starting in 2014, and IF Metall has long sought to establish a collective agreement with the automaker.

"But they did not reply," says Marie Nilsson, the organization's leader. "And we got the impression that they attempted to avoid or evade discussing the matter with us."

She says the union eventually saw no other option except to call a strike, which started on 27 October, 2023. "Usually it's enough to issue a warning," says Ms Nilsson. "The company typically agrees to the agreement."

However not in this case.

The striking mechanic, originally of Latvian origin, began employment for Tesla several years ago. He asserts that pay and work terms frequently dependent on the whim of managers.

He remembers a performance review at which he states he was denied a salary increase because he was "not reaching Tesla's goals". Meanwhile, a colleague was said to be rejected for a pay rise due to he had an "inappropriate demeanor".

Nevertheless, not everyone participated on strike. The company employed some one hundred thirty technicians employed at the time the strike was called. IF Metall says that today around 70 of their represented workers are on strike.

The automaker has since substituted the striking workers with new workers, for which there is not occurred since the 1930s.

"The company has done it [found replacement staff] openly and systematically," states German Bender, a researcher at a research institute, a think tank financed by Scandinavian labor organizations.

"It's not against the law, which is crucial to understand. However it violates all traditional practices. Yet the company shows no concern for conventions.

"They aim to become norm breakers. So if somebody tells them, listen, you are violating a standard, they perceive this as praise."

The company's local division refused requests for interview via correspondence mentioning "record deliveries".

In fact, the company has given just a single press discussion in the two years after the strike began.

In March 2024, the Swedish subsidiary's "country lead", Jens Stark, informed a financial publication that it benefited the company better not to have a union contract, and instead "to work closely with employees and provide them the best possible terms".

Mr Stark rejected that the decision to avoid a labor contract was determined by US leadership in the US. "Our division possesses a mandate to make our own such decisions," he stated.

The union is not completely alone in its fight. The strike has received backing from several of labor organizations.

Dockworkers in nearby Scandinavian nations, Nordic countries & Finland, decline to handle the company's vehicles; waste is no longer collected from the automaker's Swedish facilities; while recently constructed power points remain linked to the grid across the nation.

Exists an example close to Stockholm Arlanda Airport, where twenty charging units stand idle. However Tibor Blomhäll, the president of enthusiasts group Tesla Club Sweden, states Tesla owners remain unaffected by the labor dispute.

"There's another charging station six miles from this location," he says. "Plus we are able to still buy our cars, we can service our cars, we can charge our cars."

With consequences high for all parties, it is difficult to see a resolution to the stand-off. The union risks establishing a pattern if it concedes the principle of collective agreement.

"The worry is that that would spread," says the researcher, "and eventually {erode