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Across Sweden, around 70 automotive mechanics continue to challenge among the globe's richest corporations – the electric vehicle manufacturer. The labor strike at the US carmaker's ten Swedish repair facilities has currently reached two years of duration, with minimal sign of a resolution.

One striking worker has been on the Tesla protest line since October 2023.

"It has been a difficult period," remarks the 39-year-old. And as the nation's chilly seasonal conditions arrives, it is expected to become more challenging.

Janis devotes each Monday alongside a colleague, positioned near an electric vehicle garage on a business district located in southern Sweden. His union, IF Metall, provides shelter via a portable builders' van, as well as coffee & sandwiches.

However it's business as usual across the road, where the service facility appears to be at full capacity.

This industrial action involves an issue that goes to the heart of Scandinavia's labor traditions – the authority for worker organizations to negotiate pay and working terms representing their workforce. This concept of negotiated labor contracts has supported industrial relations across the nation for almost one hundred years.

Currently some seventy percent of Swedish employees are members to labor organizations, and 90% are covered by a collective agreement. Strikes in Sweden occur infrequently.

It's an arrangement welcomed across the board. "We prefer the right to bargain freely with the unions and establish collective agreements," states Mattias Dahl from the Association of Swedish Businesses business organization.

But Tesla has upset the apple cart. Outspoken chief executive the company leader has said he "disagrees" with the concept of unions. "I just don't like anything which creates a sort of hierarchical situation," he told listeners at an event last year. "I think labor groups attempt to generate negativity within businesses."

Tesla came to the Scandinavian market back in the mid-2010s, and IF Metall has for years wanted to secure a collective agreement with the automaker.

"Yet they wouldn't respond," says the union president, the organization's president. "We formed the belief that they tried to hide away or not discuss this with our representatives."

She states the union ultimately found no other option except to announce industrial action, which started on 27 October, last year. "Usually it's enough to issue a warning," comments Ms Nilsson. "The company typically agrees to the contract."

But not on this occasion.

The striking mechanic, who is of Latvian origin, began employment for Tesla several years ago. He claims that pay and work terms frequently dependent on the whim of supervisors.

He recalls a performance review where he states he was refused a salary increase on grounds he was "not reaching company targets". At the same time, a colleague was said to be rejected for increased compensation due to he had the "wrong attitude".

However, some workers participated in the industrial action. Tesla employed approximately one hundred thirty mechanics employed when the strike was called. The union states currently around 70 of their represented workers are on strike.

Tesla has since replaced these with new workers, for which that has not occurred since the era of the Great Depression.

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

"It's not against the law, this being crucial to recognize. However it goes against all traditional norms. But Tesla shows no concern for conventions.

"They aim to be norm breakers. Thus when somebody tells them, hey, you are breaking a norm, they see this as a compliment."

The company's Swedish subsidiary refused attempts for comment via correspondence mentioning "all-time high deliveries".

Indeed, the automaker has given only one media interview during the entire period since the industrial action began.

In March 2024, the Swedish subsidiary's "country lead", Jens Stark, informed a financial publication that it suited the organization more to avoid a union contract, and rather "to collaborate directly with the team and give them the best possible conditions".

The executive rejected that the decision not to enter a collective agreement was determined by US leadership overseas. "We have a mandate to make our own such decisions," he said.

The union is not entirely alone in its fight. The strike has received backing from several of other unions.

Port workers in neighbouring Denmark, Norway & Finland, decline to handle the company's vehicles; rubbish is not removed from Tesla's Scandinavian locations; while newly built charging stations remain linked to power networks across the nation.

Exists an example close to the capital's airport, at which 20 charging units remain unused. However Tibor Blomhäll, the president of an owner's club the Swedish Tesla association, says Tesla owners are unaffected by the labor dispute.

"There exists another charging station 10km from this location," he says. "Plus we are able to continue to purchase vehicles, we can service our vehicles, we can charge our cars."

With consequences significant for all parties, it is difficult to see an end to the stand-off. The union faces the danger of setting a precedent if it concedes the fundamental concept of collective agreement.

"The worry is that this could expand," states the researcher, "and ultimately {erode