Audio slide show

Matt Gentry | The Roanoke Times

Chants and camaraderie on the Volvo picket line on the day Sen. Jim Webb visited. Click for more photos.

DUBLIN -- Hours before members of United Auto Workers Local 2069 began the fourth week of their strike outside the Volvo Trucks North America plant, U.S. Sen. Jim Webb arrived in Dublin to offer them his support and encouragement.

Dressed in a brown leather jacket and rubbing his hands to keep warm, Webb walked from one Volvo plant entrance to another, greeting pickets, shaking hands and leaving a trail of reporters in his wake.

"We want very much for this to be resolved," Webb said during an impromptu news conference along Cougar Trail Road. "We want it to be resolved in a way where Volvo will be happy to continue working here ... but we also want it to be resolved in a way that can protect the work force here."

Behind Webb, about a half-dozen pickets clutched blue and white signs reading "UAW On Strike Unfair Labor Practice" and solicited honks from passing motorists.

The signs and the union members holding them have been a 24-hour presence around the Volvo plant since UAW Local 2069 began its strike midnight Jan. 31 over what it said were unreasonable proposals and a refusal to provide important health and safety information.

Later Thursday afternoon, Webb told a crowd at another stop at Roanoke College in Salem that America is breaking apart along class lines "in ways we haven't seen in 100 years," adding that much of the problem can be attributed to the plight of the U.S. worker.

"We need companies like Volvo in Virginia," he said. "We also need to make sure workers are taken care of."

In the weeks following the Volvo strike, the union and the company's management have traded barbs regarding exactly what was discussed in contract negotiations, who ended those negotiations and who is willing to resume them.

Both the union and Volvo have said repeatedly that they would be willing to negotiate if and when they were contacted by the other side.

UAW Local 2069 President Lester Hancock said the union contacted the company in the past week offering to return to negotiations after it had received a variety of requested information, but that the company declined the offer.

"It was a disappointment -- we were ready to go back to the table," Hancock said. "Volvo has made several accusations that they're waiting on us, but this is proving we have always been waiting on them."

Volvo spokesman John Mies, however, said UAW negotiator Tim Bressler "has not yet made himself available" to bargain, but that when he did, the company would be happy to cooperate.

Hancock said that simply is not true.

"Tim Bressler has contacted this company and opened the opportunity for this company to go back to work," he said.

Calls for confirmation to the UAW International office in Detroit were not returned.

As both sides continued to point fingers, Webb said it was his hope the strike would end soon.

"The union has said they are willing to come in and go back to the table and to negotiate a fair agreement," he said. "I would hope that Volvo America will come to the table and that we can reach the right kind of resolution, that's good for them and will protect our workers."

While Webb's tone was subdued and conciliatory, the mood outside the union hall Thursday was at times raucous.

Standing at the corner of Alexander Road and Cougar Trail Road about noon, union member Debbie Bolen led about 30 pickets in chants.

"What do we want?" she shouted.

"Contracts!" came the reply.

"When do we want it?" Bolen screamed.

"Now!"

"It gets everybody into it," Newbern resident Ricky Jones said of the boisterous chants. "It gets everybody's spirits up."

Also good for the spirit, union members said, was the senator's visit.

"It just shows that the higher-ups in the state of Virginia are supporting us, you know, not letting these big companies walk all over us," striker Derrick McCraw said.

Raymond and Lena Secrist, a married couple who have worked at Volvo since 2004, said they hoped Webb's public show of support would encourage Volvo to return to contract negotiations.

"Maybe the company will come off some of the things it's holding so strongly to and come back to the table," Raymond Secrist said shortly after shaking Webb's hand.

Staff writer Marquita Brown contributed to this report.