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Brazilian labour confederation CUT today launched a national campaign to ban all forms of asbestos from the country. 
 
The first goal of the campaign is to make union members fully aware of the dangers of asbestos, and CUT has prepared a full range of information material. 
 
Brazil is the world's fifth-largest producer and consumer of asbestos, and did not begin regulating its use until the mid-1980s. In recent years, asbestos use per capita in Brazil has been 14 times the US rate. 
 
The Brazilian government should offer early retirement packages to the country's asbestos miners, the CUT says. It also wants the government to invest in new industries in the mining areas. 
 
The unions believe there is a good chance that Brazil will ban asbestos in the near future. The major asbestos companies Eternit and Brasilit (a Saint-Gobain company) announced on 30 November that they would conduct research into the use of alternative materials. 
 
The CUT hopes that its national campaign will speed up progress towards a ban. 
 
&quot;There is no such thing as safe asbestos,&quot; emphasises the 20-million-strong International Federation of Chemical, Energy, Mine and General Workers' Unions (ICEM). &quot;Attempts to distinguish between 'more' and 'less' hazardous types of asbestos are based on discredited science, and even single exposures to very low doses of fibres can result in harm.&quot;

Brazil Unions Seek Asbestos Ban

Several hundred union members rallied in Melbourne, Australia, today outside the headquarters of BHP, the minerals, metals and oil multinational. 
 
They were protesting over a radical policy shift in BHP's Australian iron ore operations. Management there has abandoned its traditional cooperative approach to industrial relations in favour of a hard-line policy that denies its workers the right to bargain collectively. 
 
BHP issued its 1,000 iron ore workers in the Pilbara, Western Australia, with individual staff contracts, saying it was not prepared to negotiate a new collective agreement. The company had previously operated under a collective agreement negotiated with unions. 
 
The individual staff contracts were delivered to workers' homes on November 11. BHP decreed that workers must either sign the contracts or stay on their expired agreement. Sticking with the expired agreement would mean forgoing wage and superannuation rises and lump-sum sick leave payouts. Under the individual contracts, BHP would be able to impose workplace changes and alter pay scales without having to negotiate with unions. BHP offered workers a bonus of three months' back pay if they signed by December 3. 
 
The Secretary-elect of the Australian Council of Trade Unions, Greg Combet, said the BHP iron ore division had moved sharply away from its successful cooperative approach to industrial relations, and was aping the hard-nosed American-style tactics that characterised its competitor, Rio Tinto. 
&quot;Not only is BHP now displaying great disregard for the right of employees to bargain collectively,&quot; Combet pointed out, &quot;it is adopting discriminatory practices against one section of its workforce. BHP is offering these Pilbara workers 14 percent superannuation only if they sign an individual contract, and yet BHP already pays its steel workers the same amount under a collective agreement negotiated with the unions. 
 
&quot;If BHP Steel can work out a collective agreement,&quot; Combet asked, &quot;why can't BHP Iron Ore do the same? Unions and their members in the Pilbara are more than willing to talk about efficiencies and flexibility to boost BHP's domestic and international competitiveness in iron ore.&quot; 
 
BHP's individual staff contract offer came just weeks after conservative lawyers and journalists published articles in the Australian financial press urging the company to drop &quot;its union culture&quot;. Some industrial relations experts are tipping that the move by BHP is a forerunner of similar forays into other areas, such as the coal and steel divisions.

BHP&#039;s Anti-Bargaining Stance Sparks Australian Protests

&nbsp;The government in South Korea has at last legally recognised the Korean Confederation of Trade Unions (KCTU). The labour ministry decision on 23 November came after no less than four previous rejections of KCTU bids to obtain full legal status. 
Announcing the legal recognition at a press conference, KCTU President Dan Byung-ho said the Confederation would base its future action on &quot;the principles of independence, democracy, struggle and moral strength kept alive by so many pioneers who gave their lives in the course of our struggle&quot;. 
 
The 20-million-strong International Federation of Chemical, Energy, Mine and General Workers' Unions (ICEM) has congratulated the KCTU and all Korean workers on their achievement. 
 
&quot;The Korean government has finally recognised the long-standing truth that the KCTU is widely representative of the Korean working class and is no longer a force that can be marginalised from negotiations over social and industrial issues,&quot; commented ICEM General Secretary Fred Higgs. &quot;The courage and perseverance of Korean workers over the past years have been an inspiration to the labour movement worldwide.&quot; 
 
ICEM member unions include affiliates both of the KCTU and of the Federation of Korean Trade Unions (FKTU), which was already legally recognised. 
 
In a statement, the KCTU paid tribute to the many thousands of Korean trade unionists imprisoned and dismissed from their jobs during the struggle for recognition. The new ruling &quot;is also a victory for the international trade union movement and the vindication of the standard-setting and supervisory vigilance of the International Labour Organisation,&quot; the KCTU said. 
 
But it warned that full freedom of association is still not guaranteed in the Republic of Korea. &quot;Some one million government employees are still denied the right and freedom to form or join trade unions,&quot; the KCTU pointed out. Also, &quot;many millions of workers remain outside the trade unions&quot;. And more than 50 percent of Korean workers are employed in &quot;non-standard&quot; jobs which often put them beyond the protection of current labour laws. &quot;70 percent of employed women workers are found in this category,&quot; the KCTU said. It has resolved to &quot;reach out to these workers&quot;. 
 

The KCTU will also campaign next year for the Korean statutory working week to be cut to 40 hours. 
 
And it plans to &quot;transform the current union structure, from enterprise unionism to industrial unionism&quot;. This will be &quot;a vital requirement in the KCTU's effort to reach out to a wider range of workers and to undertake its campaigns more effectively&quot;. But &quot;it may - unless the government and employers acknowledge the inevitability of the change - require continued difficult struggle on the part of the KCTU&quot;.

Korea Legalises Union Confederation

South Africa has signed up to a key international mining safety standard. 
 
The country's Labour Minister Membathisi Mdladlana announced the good news in a fax received today by the 20-million-strong International Federation of Chemical, Energy, Mine and General Workers' Unions (ICEM). 
 
ILO Convention 176 on safety and health in mines has now been ratified by the South African parliament, Mdladlana told the ICEM. Parliament also approved the accompanying Recommendation 183. 
 
On 4 November, the ICEM asked South Africa's President Thabo Mbeki to promote South African ratification of Convention 176. President Mbeki, who was the guest speaker at the ICEM World Congress in Durban, promised to raise the matter at the next meeting of the South African cabinet. 
 
Approved by the world's government, trade union and employer representatives within the ILO, Convention 176 sets out international standards for ensuring health and safety in mines. The ICEM played a major role in its drafting and adoption. 
 
The Convention came into force in 1995 and had already been ratified by 12 countries. Ratification by South Africa, one of the world's biggest mining nations, will send an important signal to mining countries worldwide. 
 
ILO Conventions are ratifiable by states and binding upon them. The related ILO Recommendations set out further detail on implementation of the Conventions. 
 
&quot;We wish to thank you for raising this issue with us,&quot; Labour Minister Mdladlana wrote to the ICEM, &quot;and to assure you that we indeed take the matter of health and safety of all workers, including those in mines, very seriously.&quot;

South Africa Signs World Mining Safety Norms

The NUM has settled strikes at two of the world&rsquo;s largest platinum producers, Anglo Platinum and Impala Platinum. The pay disputes were settled for increases between 7.75% and 9.5%, depending on job grades, and cycle shift workers who work on public holidays won added improvements.

NUM in South Africa Settles Two Platinum Strikes

South African affiliate NUM sees no harmony, only dishevel in the hostile takeover of Goldfields by smaller gold-mining company Harmony. In a statement, NUM said that considering the high gold price, companies should be investing in development and job growth rather than consolidation and shrinkage. Both South African companies have retrenched numerous workers this year alone. NUM is calling for dialogue between the two companies instead of hostile &ldquo;approaches that send jitters into the market and economy,&rdquo; in the words of Gen. Sec. Gwede Mantashe. NUM is also opposed to a Goldfields preferred deal with Canada&rsquo;s Imagold and said the mining industry in South Africa suffers an &ldquo;anti-patriotic spirit&rdquo; in terms of abandoning national investment.

South Africa’s NUM Chastises Harmony’s Takeover Bid

20 October will go down as a day of death in China&rsquo;s coal mines. Four disasters found 123 dead, including&mdash;at last count&mdash;77 miners of state-owned Zhengzhou Group at Xinmi, Henan province, the worst mine catastrophe in recent years. At the weekend, 71 are still missing from the 20 October gas explosion that tore through several shafts at one of Zhengzhou&rsquo;s larger coalmines. Two other gas blasts added to the death count. Five were killed, 8 still missing at a blast in the southern province of Guizhou and near the southwestern Chinese city of Chongquing, another 12 perished in a natural gas explosion. The fourth 20 October disaster occurred at the Desheng coal mine in Wu&rsquo;an, Hebei province, when flooding cased the deaths of 29 miners.

Day of Death in Chinese Coal Mines, 20 October 2004

Nigeria&rsquo;s House of Representatives will carefully scrutinize an already amended Labour Reform Bill passed by the Senate. The measure, introduced by President Olusegun Obasanjo to punish NLC and trade unions for opposing past fuel price hikes with strikes, did have &ldquo;no strike&rdquo; language removed by the Senate before passage, but other restrictive measures that would weaken the NLC and trade unions remain. House leaders promise comprehensive hearings to ensure Nigerian people are heard on the legislation. Further amendments are likely.

Nigerian Labour Seeks to Further Weaken Labour Reform Bill

Leaders from the Botswana Mining Workers&rsquo; Union face continued legal harassment by Debswana, the diamond-mining joint venture between DeBeers and the government of Botswana. The union faces a 15 October deadline to file affidavits on why leaders should not face jail terms. Debswana is seeking jail sentences of the leaders over a two-week strike staged by some union members at Debswana despite a BMWU plea to continue bargaining. Debswana had received a positive ruling from a Botswana&rsquo;s Industrial Court in early August declaring any strike illegal. The ruling came at the peak of a bitter wage dispute.

Debswana Taking Hard Line Against Botswana’s Miners

Malaysian ICEM affiliates together with national center MTUC conducted nationwide pickets on 28 September protesting the government&rsquo;s lack of response over complaints on failure to implement ILO Convention 87. Malaysian unions have been beset by undue court delays over union recognition and collective bargaining cases, and by ministerial delays over trade union disputes that include worker discharge cases. The government has ignored the calls for response and instead has introduced further restrictions on trade union activity.

Malaysian Unions Protest Government’s Labor Rights Abuses

Archive

Brazil Unions Seek Asbestos Ban

BHP's Anti-Bargaining Stance Sparks Australian Protests

Korea Legalises Union Confederation

South Africa Signs World Mining Safety Norms

NUM in South Africa Settles Two Platinum Strikes

South Africa’s NUM Chastises Harmony’s Takeover Bid

Day of Death in Chinese Coal Mines, 20 October 2004

Nigerian Labour Seeks to Further Weaken Labour Reform Bill

Debswana Taking Hard Line Against Botswana’s Miners

Malaysian Unions Protest Government’s Labor Rights Abuses

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