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UK mobilisation in front of a second wave of Unilever strikes to begin on 17 January occurs tomorrow when three affiliates of the ICEM and the International Union of Food and Agricultural Workers&rsquo; Association (IUF) protest in front of Unilever&rsquo;s London headquarters at 100 Victoria Embankment. 
 
Unite the Union, the Union of Shop, Distributive and Allied Workers (USDAW), and GMB will conduct the rally beginning at 12 noon on 10 January over the food and consumer products company&rsquo;s insistence on scrapping the final pension scheme for 7,000 workers. Unilever&rsquo;s proposal would gut between 20-40% of pension earnings for one-third of its UK workforce. 
<img alt="" src="" width="241" height="160" />
Unite Battle Bus
Unite will dispatch its &ldquo;battle bus&rdquo; to Unilever&rsquo;s corporate offices tomorrow. It will leave Unite&rsquo;s Holborn Street building at 10h30. The action comes four days after a joint union delegates&rsquo; conference of Unilever worksite leaders met in Liverpool and decided to unleash a second set of strike actions to begin 17 January and to run 12 days. 
 
On 9 December, some 5,000 union members staged a 24-hour work stoppage at 11 Unilever plants in the UK, the first industrial action in UK history at the Anglo-Dutch multinational. The lawful strike saw Unilever bosses retaliate with the petty act of cancelling staff Christmas parties and withdrawing a &pound;15 holiday gift voucher to strikers. 
 
Unilever&rsquo;s gutting of the pension scheme for active workers is further insult by the company, which in 2008 eliminating the pension scheme for new hires. The company and unions negotiated late last week but there was no sign that Unilever would accept a union compromise on the pension scheme. 
<img alt="" src="" width="141" height="159" />
Unite's Jennie Formby
Unite National Officer Jennie Formby said, &ldquo;Our members have dedicated their time and hard work to help Unilever build leading brands. We have shown the company that there is no need to destroy the reputation of a blue chip company because there is a solution on the table if they will talk with the union.&rdquo; 
 
Unilever&rsquo;s factories where strike actions have occurred and where workers will again strike on 17 January are located in Purfleet, Warrington, Trafford Park, Port Sunlight, Wirral, Manchester, Leeds, Glocester, Burton-on-Trent, Chester, and Crumlin. 
 
Unilever produces Dove soap, Marmite, PG Tips, Pot Noodle, Hellman&rsquo;s mayonnaise, and several other consumer products at these plants.

UK Unions Hold Key Unilever Manifestation Before Second Strike Wave 17 January

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ICEM&rsquo;s two affiliated oil workers&rsquo; unions &ndash; the white-collar Petroleum and Natural Gas Senior Staff Association of Nigeria (PENGASSAN) and the National Union of Petroleum and Natural Gas Workers (NUPENG) &ndash; joined the call of Nigeria&rsquo;s two labour federations in a nationwide strike today over the government&rsquo;s sudden 1 January removal of consumer fuel subsidies. 
 
The indefinite strike by Nigerian workers in all sectors was authorized last week by the executive boards of both the Trade Union Congress (TUC) and the Nigeria Labour Congress (NLC). NUPENG&rsquo;s board approved today&rsquo;s walkout at a meeting of union leaders yesterday, while PENGASSAN&rsquo;s National Executive Council (NEC) gave strike approval on 5 January. 
 
In a statement issued after the NEC meeting in Lagos, PENGASSAN President Babatunde Ogun called government&rsquo;s fuel subsidy removal &ldquo;illegal, hasty, without consultation, and lacking of transparency.&rdquo; The union challenged the government of President Goodluck Jonathan to work on behalf of Nigerian people rather than for the International Monetary Fund and World Bank. 
<img alt="" src="" width="100" height="103" />&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp; <img alt="" src="" width="98" height="103" />
Both PENGASSAN and NUPENG called on the government to rescind the New Year&rsquo;s Day elimination, roll back fuel prices to 2011 levels, and then engage the unions of Nigeria in honest dialogue. 
 
The lifting of subsidies immediately shot fuel prices up as much as 225% one week ago. It also sparked a price rise in food and transport costs across Nigeria. Many human rights groups and civil liberty organizations began protests last week. Petrol filling stations in many states were blockaded and protests spilled into many roads across the country, blocking traffic. 
 
Even though Nigeria produces about 2.4 million barrels of crude oil, the government is forced to import roughly 70% of its gasoline supply because of inadequate and run down refineries. The country of 160 million people depends on only three operable refineries for retail consumption. 
 
Jonathan acted on the recommendation of the Petroleum Products Pricing Regulatory Agency (PPPRA), a body notorious for irregularities and one that has paid billions of naira to so-called &ldquo;brief-case companies&rdquo; and middle men in import subsidies. 
 
Nigeria&rsquo;s National Industrial Court ruled on 6 January that Labour&rsquo;s indefinite strike would be illegal but similarly to a mass national strike in 2003 when a previous government attempted to lift remove fuel subsidies, strikes across the country went ahead today and are expected to continue throughout the week.

Nigerian Oil Workers’ Unions Strike in Fuel Subsidy Removals

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The ICEM CAL Mini Guide to Dealing with CAL is available in English, French, Spanish, Portuguese, Hindi and Bahasa Indonesian. 
 
The guide gives an overview of what the ICEM and its affiliates around the world are doing to promote permanent, direct employment and at the same time to promote better conditions for CAL workers. It also suggests ways in which unions can build relations with CAL workers, for example by creating a dedicated precarious workers&rsquo; section or rep, or considering the introduction of different membership fee levels and/or an alternate method of dues collection. ICEM affiliates are encouraged to initiate a discussion on CAL within their own unions, and the Guide suggests a number of questions which may help to get these discussions started. 
 
The <a href="http://cal.icem.org/images/documents/ICEM%20Mini%20Guide%20CAL%20HQ.pdf">CAL Mini Guide in English</a> is available here. 
 
The <a href="http://cal.icem.org/images/documents/ICEM%20Mini%20Guide%20CAL%20French.pdf">CAL Mini Guide in French</a> is available here. 
 
The <a href="http://cal.icem.org/images/documents/ICEM%20Mini%20Guide%20Spanish%20HQP.pdf">CAL Mini Guide in Spanish</a> is available here. 
 
The <a href="http://cal.icem.org/images/documents/ICEM%20Mini%20Guide%20CAL%20Portuguese.pdf">CAL Mini Guide in Portuguese</a> is available here. 
 
The <a href="http://cal.icem.org/images/documents/ICEM%20Mini%20Guide%20CAL%20Hindi.pdf">CAL Mini Guide in Hindi</a> is available here. 
 
The <a href="http://cal.icem.org/images/documents/ICEM%20Mini%20Guide%20CAL%20Bahasa.pdf">CAL Mini Guide in Bahasa Indonesian</a> is available here.

ICEM Mini Guide to Dealing with CAL Available in Multiple Languages

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From International Metalworkers&rsquo; Federation 
 
At the ILO Global Dialogue Forum on private employment agencies, unions put on record their experiences of employment through agencies being used to drive down wages and prevent agency workers from joining a union and bargaining collectively. 
 
On 18-19 October, representatives of governments, private employment agencies, and trade unions exchanged views on the role of agencies in promoting decent work. The discussions revealed that unions and agencies have completely different views on the impact of the growth of agency labour on employment. 
 
The agencies repeatedly insisted that agency work is decent work, that it creates jobs and that it is never used to undermine or replace open-ended, direct employment. All of these claims were rejected by trade union representatives, who presented a catalogue of situations from a variety of industries around the world that demonstrate that agency employment is being used to systematically replace permanent jobs, lower wages and work conditions and leaving workers with no social protections and no possibility of joining a union or bargaining collectively with their employer. 
 
Worker delegates insisted that triangular employment relationships by their very nature make collective bargaining virtually impossible. 
 
It rapidly became clear that the representatives of private employment agencies were using the meeting to seek legitimacy for their industry, to grow their markets and to be recognized as the sole counterpart for collective bargaining, at the exclusion of user enterprises. 
 
For their part, unions were seeking equal treatment for agency workers and restrictions on the circumstances under which agency employment is permissible, its duration and extent. Unions also wanted action to strengthen freedom of association and collective bargaining for agency workers which included user enterprises and unions representing workers in user enterprises. 
 
At the end of the meeting, a very limited number of potential consensus points were put forward for discussion, but finally the meeting ended with no conclusions when labour hire representatives showed that they are not ready to negotiate in order to reach agreement. 
 
Unions will continue to work within the framework of the ILO to ensure greater protection for agency workers and to limit the spread of agency work and triangular employment relationships.

ILO Meeting on Labour Agencies Exposes Abuses, No Consensus Reached

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The devastating floods which killed more than 600 people in Thailand have had a serious impact on the livelihoods of CAL workers. Many agency workers were not paid as plants have been shut down since the crisis began in October 2011. As the flooding continued in November and December, hundreds of thousands of agency workers were laid off. 
 
The electronic sector, which employs a high proportion of precarious workers, has been amongst the hardest hit by the flooding. In the Ayutthaya and Pathumthani provinces, north of Bangkok, thousands of electronic factories located across several industrial estates remain swamped by more than two metres of water. Several companies have announced lay-offs and plans to relocate production facilities from Ayuttaya to Malaysia. 
<img alt="" src="" width="150" height="69" />
The Thai government is providing a package to assist companies to retain their workforces. Companies that commit to a policy of no lay-offs, maintain the same level of worker benefits, and pay workers no less than 75% of their wages are eligible for this relief package. 
 
Some unionised companies have continued to pay wages &ndash; from 100% of wages in the first month, to 75% and 50% for November and December. The Goodyear Tyre company paid full wages to both regular and fixed-term workers since its only plant in Rangsit, north of Bangkok, was hit by the floods on 21 October. 
 
Production has not yet resumed at the plant but management and the union are working hand in hand in the recovery process. Workers on fixed term workers at Goodyear whose contracts came to an end on 30th November 2011 did not have their contracts renewed. 
 
At the same time, several companies in the eastern seaboard which were not directly affected by the flood have used the flood as an excuse to delay CBA negotiations or to avoid implementing CBAs.

Flooding in Thailand has devastating impact on CAL workers

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An ICEM report has found that the rights of workers in the cement industries of the Philippines, Indonesia, Thailand, Malaysia and India are being routinely violated through the use of precarious forms of employment. 
 
In many of the plants covered by the research, Contract and Agency Labour (CAL) is being used to restrict or prevent workers from exercising their right to freedom of association. Lafarge in the Philippines, for example, has been using CAL workers to fill permanent positions ever since workers took part in industrial actions as far back as 2000. At one Lafarge plant in Indonesia, all permanent workers are union members, whereas none of the CAL workers are. In India, contract workers at Holcim were dismissed after they joined the union. To make it worse, the company started criminalising the union leaders. 
 
ILO Conventions 87 and 98 apply to all workers, as explicitly stated in the 350th report of the ILO Committee on Freedom of Association: &ldquo;The Committee emphasizes that all workers, without distinction whatsoever, whether they are employed on a permanent basis, for a fixed term or as contract employees, should have the right to establish and join organizations of their own choosing.&rdquo; 
<img alt="" src="" width="150" height="46" />&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp; <img alt="" src="" width="150" height="64" />
The report further specifies that the non-renewal of a contract for anti-union reasons constitutes a prejudicial act within the meaning of Article 1 of Convention 98. 
 
In all five countries covered by the research, CAL workers earn less than permanent workers &ndash; despite performing work of equal value &ndash; and are denied access to many of the benefits enjoyed by their permanent counterparts. 
 
In both the Philippines and Thailand, permanent workers are increasingly being used only in supervisory roles. This division of responsibilities highlights the fact that it is often contract and agency workers who are performing core labour tasks. 
 
CAL workers in many cement plants live with the burden of uncertainty. As one interviewee explained, he felt his job would continue only &ldquo;as long as I will cooperate.&rdquo; In the Philippines, some CAL workers reported that they do not even have written contracts. In many cases and countries, CAL workers are also not clear who is responsible for their welfare. In Thailand, agency workers are the most likely to suffer workplace accidents, yet in many plants they are denied the same health care benefits as permanent workers. 
 
The ICEM decries these exploitative practices, and demands that multinational cement companies such as Lafarge and Holcim that operate in Asia guarantee equal rights for CAL workers and take urgent steps to bring their practices in line with not only the various applicable national legislations, but also with all existing international labour standards - including ILO Conventions 87 and 98 and the Employment Relationship Recommendation 198. 
 
Cement companies must also act to ensure that they meet their obligations under the OECD Guidelines for MNEs and the United Nations Guiding Principles on Business and Human Rights. 
 
The <a href="http://cal.icem.org/images/documents/Cement%20Report.pdf">CAL Cement Report</a> is available here.

ICEM Report Exposes Asian Cement’s CAL Practices

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From the International Metalworkers&rsquo; Federation 

In a unanimous vote, the 300-member Central Committee of the International Metalworkers&rsquo; Federation (IMF) moved to convene an extraordinary Congress in June 2012 to create a new global union for industrial workers. The action occurred on the second day of the Central Committee&rsquo;s meeting in Jakarta on 8 December. 

The new global union organization will unite workers of metal, mining, chemicals, energy and textile industries, and will bring the IMF together with the ICEM and the International Textile, Garment, Leathers Workers&rsquo; Federation (ITGLWF). The new global union, which will represent 50 million workers in 140 countries, will be launched on 18-20 June 2012 in Copenhagen, Denmark. 

Introducing the discussion on creation of the new global union, IMF President Berthold Huber said: &ldquo;Many of our members are working in companies that cut across different industrial sectors. We need to bundle up our forces to speak with a single voice of workers in the manufacturing industries.&rdquo;
<img alt="" src="" width="142" height="158" />
Berthold Huber
In a lively debate, delegates expressed hope about building a stronger counter-power to transnational corporations, and more focus and resources for organizing, fighting precarious work and defending trade union rights. Speakers emphasized the need to further improve gender balance in the different structures, including a 30% minimum share of women on statutory bodies and other forums. 

The Central Committee returned the proposal on presidents of IMF&rsquo;s industrial departments back to the Executive Committee in order to find a better gender and north-south balance.

IMF Central Committee Moves on Dissolution, Merger Congresses

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Like past years, the Communications, Energy, Paperworkers (CEP) Union of Canada held its bi-annual Women&rsquo;s Conference in the days around National Day of Remembrance and Action on Violence Against Women in Canada on 6 December, the fateful date in 1989 when 14 young women were massacred at &Eacute;cole Polytechnique in Montreal in an anti-feminist rage. 
 
Some 350 women attended the CEP&rsquo;s 9th Women&rsquo;s Conference in Canada&rsquo;s national capital, Ottawa, from 4-6 December. The conference, entitled &ldquo;Imagine,&rdquo; included workshops on cyberstalking, gun registry, and street-proofing as deterrent for crime and violence against women.
<img alt="" src="" width="204" height="160" />
CEP Women&nbsp; 
 

On the morning of the conference&rsquo;s final day, former Governor General of Canada Micha&euml;lle Jean spoke and told of battered women&rsquo;s shelters in Quebec and the urgent need to engage young Canadians on the degradation that violence against women brings on societies. Following her address, delegates marched from the Westin Hotel in Ottawa to Parliament Hill, where a mass demonstration was occurring for gun control in Canada and the National Day of Remembrance of the Montreal Massacre. 
 
&ldquo;The gun control law is a monument erected in the memory of our daughters,&rdquo; said Suzanne Laplante-Edward, mother of Anne-Marie, who was slain at &Eacute;cole Polytechnique by a lone gunman. The CEP&rsquo;s Western Region Administrative Vice President, Wendy Sol, also spoke at the Parliament Hill manifestation. 
 
In an ICEM letter to delegates at the opening of the CEP&rsquo;s Women&rsquo;s Conference, the federation reminded Canadian women that the Montreal Massacre is rightfully marked in global observance of &ldquo;16 Days Against Gender Violence,&rdquo; as designated by the Global Campaign for Human Rights. Those 16 days began on 25 November with the UN International Day for the Elimination of Violence Against Women, and continued across World Aids Day (1 December), the Montreal Massacre (6 December), and finally International Human Rights Day (10 December). 
 
The ICEM letter read: &ldquo;With the CEP Women&rsquo;s Conference occurring within these globally recognized 16 days, please tell your delegates that the ICEM is using this time frame and indeed, the entire new year, to remind all that gender equity will remain a major global priority.&rdquo;

CEP Holds 9th Women’s Conference in Ottawa, Canada

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US-based Cooper Tire and Rubber surprised rubber workers and their union, the United Steelworkers (USW), by rejecting good-faith efforts to extend a labour agreement and locking 1,050 USW members off their jobs at a tyre factory in Findlay, Ohio. 
 
The lockout against USW Local 207L started on 28 November after workers rejected a concession-laden three-year proposal by a 606-305 vote the day before. The USW then offered to extend the agreement that had expired on 31 October, but Cooper responded by imposing the lockout. 
 
At the weekend, the company said it intended to take 30 days to re-start production using managers and temporary replacement workers. A senior manager of the US&rsquo;s fourth largest tyre-maker predicted full production in Findlay by then. The company statement is seen as a direct affront to unionized rubber workers at another US Cooper&rsquo;s tyre plant, in Texarkana, Texas. 
<img src="" width="200" height="112" alt="" />
USW Local 752L in Texarkana currently is in bargaining with Cooper over a labour agreement that expires early in 2012. The 1,500 workers there have given union leaders a strike mandate through a vote. Bargaining in Findlay saw USW Local 207L not take a strike vote, making last week&rsquo;s lockout unprovoked and a harmful retaliatory action by Cooper. 
 
The lockout is also a bitter stab at USW&rsquo;s rubber workers who assisted the company in gaining US trade Section 421 protections against dumping of tyre imports into the US by China. In 2008, in the midst of the US debt crisis that crippled American manufacturing, Local 207L members granted US$30 million in contract concessions to Cooper to keep it operating. 
 
The ICEM condemns the lockout for these reasons, and the fact that it now seeks more givebacks from Findlay&rsquo;s steelworkers at a time when it has resumed bonuses to executives. Cooper operates seven manufacturing plants, including former Avon Tyre factories in the UK, and start-up plants in Mexico and joint ventures in China.

Cooper Tire and Rubber Locks Out Steelworkers at Ohio Factory

<img src="" width="100" height="39" alt="" />
Some 6,000 members of the Pascagoula Metal Trades Council &ndash; four US union organisations &ndash; have an early three-year contract extension with shipbuilder Huntington Ingalls Industries at work-yards in the state of Mississippi. That came off because of a 60% ratification vote by unionised workers on 1 December. 
 
Huntington Ingalls, a spin-off of major US defense contractor Northrup Grumman, builds and maintains the US Navy&rsquo;s surface combatant fleet at Pascagoula, a coastal city on the Gulf of Mexico. 
 
The agreement covers workers who are members of the International Brotherhood of Electrical Workers (IBEW), the International Association of Machinists &amp; Aerospace Workers (IAM), the Office Professional Employees Union (OPEIU), and a security workers&rsquo; union, and comes four months before the March 2012 expiry of the current agreement. 
 
Journeymen workers will see a US$.60-per-hour rise in their base wage on 9 January 2013, with another US$.60 coming a short two months later on 11 March. Effective 10 March 2014, a US$.70-per-hour increase will occur. 
 
Workers will receive a one-off US$1,000 payment early in 2012 to forego a 2012 cost-of-living adjustment but the COLA will return in the other years. Workers will absorb some increases in their health care insurance coverage in the new pact. 
 
Huntington Ingalls is a major contractor to the US Navy and Coast Guard and besides Pascagoula, where it is responsible for 70% of US surface fleet, it operates the Newport News, Virginia, shipyards, where it builds both nuclear and non-nuclear ships and submarines for the US government. It also controls AMSEC LLD and Continental Maritime of San Diego (CMSD). 
 
Huntington Ingalls is currently partnering in Newport News with French nuclear specialist Areva in building a US$360 million facility for construction of heavy components used in nuclear reactors.

Shipbuilders at Pascagoula, US Mississippi, Ratify 3-Year Contract Extension

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