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<img style="margin-right: 7px" src="" alt="" width="225" height="325" align="left" /> The fourth annual Geneva Labour Film Shorts Festival -- by, for and about unions and working people -- tells workers' stories of confronting the challenges caused by the extreme imbalance in power between the transnational corporate elite and working people.Among other issues, the current financial crisis takes centre stage in this year's line-up of 15 shorts, primarily focusing on the voices of workers and their unions: their struggles and triumphs. From the conditions of ship-breaking workers in Bangladesh and the atrocities afflicted on farm workers in Zimbabwe, to the struggle of independent truck drivers in the United States, the programme includes a diverse blend of film shorts. The festival brings into view compelling stories of workers from around the world, occasionally using comedy or tragedy to grab the attention of viewers. This event is organized by the Global Union Communicator's Task Force, representing all global union federations, the International Trade Union Confederation and TUAC. WHAT: Geneva Labour Film Shorts Festival WHERE: Grütli Theatre, Rue du General-Dufour 16, Geneva WHEN: June 15 from 20h00 to 22h00, open reception at 19h00Subtitles in English and French Admission is free. ________________________________ The programme for the Geneva Labour Film Shorts Festival 2010 features:<table border="0"><tbody><tr><td><img src="" alt="" title="The Man Behind the Labour Film Movement" width="200" height="135" align="left" /></td><td><a href="http://www.goiam.org/index.php/news/latest-videos/6921-the-man-behind-the-labor-film-movement">THE MAN BEHIND THE LABOUR FILM MOVEMENT</a>IAM, USA, February 2010, (00:02:45)As economic troubles continue in the U.S., Chris Garlock a Washington, DC-based labour activist is pursuing his passion by operating a film festival that showcases movies about the crisis, the union movement and the daily life of working-class people. This film was produced by the International Association of Machinists for its online news network.</td></tr><tr><td><img src="" alt="" title="HF6" width="200" height="135" align="left" /></td><td><a href="http://www.far.be/hf6/">HF6 </a>Yannik Bovy, Frederik Tihon, Gérald Jamsin-Leclercq, FGTB, Belgium, 2009, (00:00:20)A short teaser of a documentary about the revival of blast furnace number six at a plant of the global steel group ArcelorMittal in Seraing, Liège, Belgium.</td></tr><tr><td><img src="" alt="" width="200" height="135" align="left" /></td><td><a href="http://www.youtube.com/user/sustainlabour#p/u/3/PvTrg1nkjdA">A CALL TO ACTION</a>Sustain Labour/ITUC, Global, 2009, (00:01:44)A teaser and short film in its own right from the 20 minute film &quot;Time to Tackle Climate Change&quot;, which was first launched at the COP15 meeting in Copenhagen in December 2009. The video showcases trade unions' commitments for action on climate change around the world.</td></tr><tr><td><img src="" alt="" width="200" height="135" align="left" /></td><td><a href="http://www.youtube.com/user/nlcnet#p/u/8/fxUGONR9pQw">WHERE SHIPS AND WORKERS GO TO DIE</a>NLC, USA, 2009, (00:09:22)Produced by the U.S.-based National Labor Committee, this moving documentary exposes the harsh, slave like conditions of workers in the ship breaking yards in Bangladesh. U.S. labour activists call on the G20 to put an end to the exploitation.</td></tr><tr><td><img src="" alt="" width="200" height="135" align="left" /></td><td><a href="http://www.oseo.ch/index.cfm?ID=D76999D9-EBD6-F6C2-D73CE44A89C6CABC">REPORT: FAIR GAMES FAIR PLAY</a>OSEO, Switzerland/South Africa, 2009, (00:08:38)A short film reporting on the Fair Games Fair Play campaign led by South African unions and supported by others including the Swiss workers' organization OSEO, producer of this film. Preparing for the world cup workers fight for better working conditions and better pay.</td></tr><tr><td><img src="" alt="" width="200" height="135" align="left" /></td><td><a href="http://www.manicstudios.tv/portfolio.htm">WHAT HAVE UNIONS EVER DONE FOR US?</a>Manic Studios, Australia, 2009, 00:02:09WINNER OF LABOUR START'S VIDEO OF THE YEAR With unions getting a bad wrap from big business, web video designers Manic Studios ask the biting question, what have the unions ever done for us?</td></tr><tr><td><img src="" alt="" width="200" height="135" align="left" /></td><td><a href="http://cms.iuf.org/?q=node/282">HOUSE OF JUSTICE</a>GAPWUZ, Zimbabwe, 2009, (00:26:05)A chilling documentary on the atrocities conducted by Zimbabwean government in defiance of the Southern African Development Community (SADC) treaty. Accounts of torture, vandalism and violence on Zimbabwean farm owners and workers as they fight for their rights in the face of the land reform program issued by President Mugabe.</td></tr><tr><td><img src="" alt="" width="200" height="135" align="left" /></td><td><a href="http://www.youtube.com/user/CWUTV#p/u/4/e1vouvGNqXY">WARNING SIGNS</a>Flawless Media, UK, 2009, (00:00:60)Produced by Flawless Media for the Communication Workers' Union (CWU), this entry to the Trades Union Congress' 60 second short film contest in 2009 highlights workplace &quot;warning signs&quot; of when it is time to call for help from a union.</td></tr><tr><td><img src="" alt="" width="200" height="135" align="left" /></td><td><a href="http://www.youtube.com/user/UnionYouthUkraine">FUTURE BY OWN HANDS</a>UBWU, Ukraine, 2009, (00:10:02)A short movie that recognizes the important and difficult role that young people play in the life of the Ukrainian Building Workers' Union. Young unionists from UBWU fight to make their life better. This short film features organizing efforts and the struggle for humane conditions of living and safe and healthy jobs.</td></tr><tr><td><img src="" alt="" width="200" height="135" align="left" /></td><td><a href="http://www.youtube.com/user/gamedifacket">JOIN THE UNION</a>LO, Sweden, 2010, (00:00:40)Landsorganisationen, a Swedish trade union confederation, used this advertisement as part of its organizing campaign. The main purpose of the film is to show how employers often tell workers not to organize, while they themselves have all the help they need in case of a dispute or a conflict.</td></tr><tr><td><img src="" alt="" width="200" height="135" align="left" /></td><td>RACE TO THE BOTTOMJonathan King, 2008, USA, (00:05:00)A short online version of a 20 minute documentary film about truck drivers working at the Port of Oakland, where over 2,000 independent truck drivers operate every day. The film looks into the lives of the drivers, as we learn about their struggles to earn a living wage, support their families and stay healthy as they do their jobs, transporting goods in and out of the Port.</td></tr><tr><td><img src="" alt="" width="200" height="135" align="left" /></td><td><a href="http://www.youtube.com/user/NZAEPMU#p/u/19/TCypSIoITaw">CRUNCH TIME EPMU</a>Unreal Films, New Zealand, 2009, (00:13:42)New Zealand is entering an economic crunch unlike anything seen before in our life time. Prominent economists and trade union leaders discuss what is happening, why, and what workers can do about it. This is an Unreal Films production for the Engineering, Printing and Manufacturing Union (EPMU). </td></tr><tr><td><img src="" alt="" width="200" height="135" align="left" /></td><td><a href="http://www.youtube.com/user/sustainlabour#p/u/1/ajT4NzMhNYI">UNION OF GREEN</a>Sustain Labour/ITUC, Global, 2009, (00:01:56)A teaser and short film taken from &quot;Time to Tackle Climate Change&quot;, which was first launched at the COP15 meeting in Copenhagen in December 2009. The video showcases trade unions' concrete experiences, challenges, opportunities and commitments for action on climate change.</td></tr><tr><td><img src="" alt="" width="200" height="135" align="left" /></td><td><a href="http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=DAB6eGzOnIs">ROBONURSE</a>Frances Underwood, Australia, 2009, (00:03:39)This film takes a look at the &quot;cost&quot; of nursing care and what strategies may be introduced by employers or health administrators to reduce nursing costs in the future. Winner of the NSW's first Labour Film Shorts Festival in 2009. </td></tr><tr><td><img src="" alt="" width="200" height="150" align="left" /></td><td><a href="http://www.youtube.com/user/johninnit#p/u/1/LLGoKqPAhSk">JUST ANOTHER COG IN THE MACHINE</a>John Wood, UK, 2009, (00:01:01)A union can make a big difference to people's experiences in a workplace. This movie was screened at the Canadian International Film Festival in 2009.</td></tr><tr><td><img src="" alt="" width="200" height="135" align="left" /></td><td>TCO AND FACKET FÖRÄNDRASAcne Advertising, Sweden, 2009, (00:02:42) A campaign of Swedish trade unions federations aimed at graduates explaining the value of a collective agreement, which among other things sees workers earn on average 80,000 kronor (CHF11,500) more than workers without a collective agreement. </td></tr><tr><td><img src="" alt="" width="200" height="135" /></td><td>Feature Presentation : Like a Bird in a Cage (Kafesteki Kuş Gibiydik)Directed by Güliz Sağlam and Feryal Saygılıgil, Turkey, 2009, (00:30:00) Fired for her trade union activities, Emine Arslan, a Turkish female textile worker at Desa Safaköy factory, inspired the resistance of other women workers at the factory. The film tells of the women's hopes, expectations and relationship with the union.</td></tr></tbody></table>

Geneva Labour Film Shorts Festival 2010

Text / Alex IvanouTrade union activist Yolanda Morín, 33, is the international secretary at the Confederación Sindical de Comisiones Obreras (CC.OO), one of IMF's affiliates in Spain, and currently a substitute member of the IMF Executive Committee. In this capacity Yolanda Morín will attend her first IMF Executive Committee meeting in Frankfurt on June 10 and 11, 2010.Yolanda joined the CC.OO national headquarters only two years ago. However she is not new to the trade union movement. Graduated as a teacher at the age of 21 in Madrid, Yolanda moved to Catalan-speaking Barcelona, where she started her career as a teacher. Soon she found that due to linguistic problems it was difficult to continue. Living in an industrial area Yolanda decided to change her work profile and embarked on a different job in small industrial metalworking enterprises. Notably it was here that she first faced the reality of precarious employment with poor working conditions and a bad system of protection of health and safety.In a bid to change this reality Yolanda joined a union and made contact with the union world. In the beginning, she worked in the morning at the factory and on free afternoons at the local union, where she volunteered to work with the training department. Soon after that Yolanda was offered a permanent job in the union as a technical assistant responsible for studies of the labour market and workers' inclusion programs. Yolanda's activism and interest in participating in collective bargaining led to her becoming a member of the Bosch works council and member of its negotiating team. Later, based on her experience, Yolanda was contacted by Comisiones Obreras and offered a job in Madrid first with responsibility for industrial relations observatories and now as the international secretary.In her daily work Yolanda is involved in union cooperation projects, she maintains contacts with European works councils and with colleagues in different companies, both in Europe and globally. In terms of her expectations from her current and future activities with the IMF, Yolanda believes one should be ambitious about what can be done in conjunction with the IMF, while at the same time finding a balance between the available human and financial resources.Yolanda believes that IMF, together with its affiliates, should fight to oblige companies to implement socially responsible practices, since she is assured they do have responsibilities vis-à-vis their workers and society; companies have significant influence on finances, economic systems and also on governments and their policies. Yolanda believes that, &quot;the aim should be to change the rules of the game, it is clear that the IMF cannot do that alone, nevertheless we should put pressure on governments and different institutions where unions are involved to seek to change the rules of the game. The present rules have given us the financial and economic crisis. And the brunt of this has been paid by workers and has translated into a loss of basic rights for workers in collective bargaining and negotiations. It has also resulted in an increase of industrial accidents due to the lack of respect by the companies of health and safety regulations.&quot; &quot;Companies do design and evaluate their strategies by communicating within and between themselves; therefore union cooperation is also key. Unions should be in a position to communicate, to set up and evaluate their own strategies,&quot; she argues, adding, &quot;therefore there is a clear need to set up global workers' and trade union networks.&quot;NB: The IMF Working Group on Trade Union Networks in TNCs, met in Geneva in May and will report to the IMF Executive Committee in June 2010.

Yolanda Morín strongly believes the IMF should develop trade union networks to protect workers' rights all over the world.

The rules of the game should be changed

The International Labour Organization potentially has a significant role to play in bringing companies, trade unions and governments together to bring about improvements to working conditions, starting with improving recognition of the right to freedom of association. In March 2009 the ILO Governing Body decided to develop activities that build capacity of trade unions and employers to participate in social dialogue in the electronics industry at country level. It also agreed to encourage the tripartite constituents at country level to develop agreed mechanisms to reduce the amount of temporary and contract employment in the industry. Importantly, given their key role in promoting labour standards down their supply chains and their capacity to contribute to creating conditions for long-term employment relationships, the ILO is encouraging participation by brand-name companies in these activities which are scheduled to commence in 2010.

Organizing electronics workers

Employment

Threats to workers' rights

Barriers to organizing

The way forward

The role of the ILO

Speaking at the IMF conference, Anne Lindsay of CAFOD (Catholic Agency for Overseas Development), which along with IMF is one of the founding members of the GoodElectronics network (www.goodelectronics.org), stressed the importance of trade unions and Non-Governmental Organizations working together to compel companies to improve conditions in their supply chains. Through GoodElectronics, unions and NGOs concerned with labour rights in the industry can strengthen their relationship and put a consistent message to the companies that they need to improve their approach to freedom of association and enter into direct dialogue with trade unions. The ensuing discussion identified several more principles for dealing with supply chain labour abuses. Responses must be speedy and specific to the particular circumstances. One potential danger to guard against is that multinationals do not sever the supply chain relationship, and thus put workers' jobs at risk, without making all possible efforts first to remedy the situation. Trade unions in the multinational's home country have a particular responsibility to hold the company to respecting labour standards in their own relationship.An important strategy is to improve dialogue with companies, including discussions towards International Framework Agreements (IFAs). The IMF has entered into a number of IFAs with multinational companies, though none in the electronics sector. Such agreements commit companies to respecting at least the key ILO Conventions on freedom of association and the right to collective bargaining, discrimination, child labour and forced labour. Most importantly, in signing an IFA with the IMF, the multinational company undertakes to pressure its suppliers to uphold the same standards.Such an agreement in the electronics industry, besides avoiding the pitfalls inherent in unilateral codes, would provide a useful tool for enabling dialogue between companies and trade unions at the international level that could eventually lead to workers participating in monitoring labour conditions in their own factories.In concluding the conference, IMF General Secretary Jyrki Raina highlighted areas for future IMF work. This will include:<ul><li>Supporting organizing and union building in the Asia-Pacific, prioritizing Indonesia, Thailand, Vietnam, and the Philippines;</li><li>Organizing in industrialized countries;</li><li>Spreading good examples of organizing non-manual workers, women, young people and migrant workers;</li><li>Cooperation with NGOs to create public pressure on governments, companies and investors;</li><li>Working with NGOs, including continued participation in the GoodElectronics network;</li><li>Taking action against precarious work; and</li><li>Developing trade union networks in TNCs and supply chains.</li></ul>

There is entrenched resistance in the electronics industry to unionization. For some of the dominant U.S. brands, this dates back to their early days in Silicon Valley. Despite having an established presence in certain European-based companies such as Philips and Nokia, unions have never been able to gain sufficient toehold in the industry on which to build organizing efforts. Consequently, when electronics manufacturing went through its massive period of growth in the 1990s, unions were not in a position to be able to organize the hundreds of thousands of new electronics workers. Today, only a handful of contract manufacturing plants worldwide have any union presence. Reports abound of workers losing their jobs and being put on an employment 'black list' for attempting to organize or being told not to join a union or engage in any union activity. In Mexico, employment agencies routinely screen jobseekers for family ties to trade unionists and companies expressly prohibit workers from joining trade unions. Export Processing Zones or EPZs, where electronics manufacturing is increasingly located, are notorious for guaranteeing employers a union-free environment and enforcing it by preventing union organizers' access to workers and creating a climate of fear that deters workers from unionizing. Governments contribute by failing to enforce labour laws in the EPZs, either through lack of resources or from a misguided assumption that union-free EPZs will attract more foreign investment. Precarious temporary and agency contracts that proliferate in the sector are another obstacle to electronics workers forming unions: temporary workers have no guarantee of remaining in the workplace for an extended period (although many in fact do); agency workers have an indirect employment relationship with the company they work for; legislation or union statutes prevent contract workers from joining the same unions as the permanent workforce; unions find it hard to make contact with such workers who are likely to be on different pay and conditions from the permanent workforce; and, perhaps the biggest barrier of all, workers' fear of losing their current or future employment.A significant characteristic of electronics manufacturing, from an organizing perspective, is that it is increasingly being done by women and migrant workers. This presents a very large organizing challenge to metal unions that have historically catered to a predominantly male membership. The biggest obstacles to organizing migrant workers are that they may be afraid to join a union and may not be aware of their rights. Language and cultural barriers also need to be overcome. Non-manual workers, which in some parts of the sector make up a high proportion of the workforce, are likely to have their own specific demands of trade unions.Far from being discouraged by these challenges, unions attending the IMF's ICT, Electrical and Electronics conference determined that unions need to continue to develop specific strategies to organize different groups of workers, including women, young people, non-manual workers and precarious workers. Reasserting their commitment to organizing electronics workers, delegates declared that while unionization rates in the electronics industry remain so low, organizing must remain the top priority to improve wages and working conditions and restrict the ever increasing spread of precarious work.

Not surprisingly, the race to drive down labour costs has given rise to reports of widespread abuse of international labour standards, both in the CM companies themselves and further down the supply chain. Typical conditions include below subsistence wages, excessive working hours, forced overtime, temporary contracts, no job security, unsafe working conditions and degrading treatment. The practice of contracting out manufacturing and workforces enables major brand-name companies to distance themselves from the substandard working conditions experienced by the people manufacturing their products. But these companies are coming under increasing pressure to clean up the abuses in their supply chains. A series of high-profile consumer campaigns coupled with pressure from shareholders via responsible investment groups has increased awareness of the vulnerability of high profile brands to negative public perceptions of working conditions in their supply chains. Yet most companies respond only by encouraging, with differing levels of enthusiasm, their suppliers to abide by their own unilaterally developed codes of conduct. This company-driven CSR approach has proven inadequate both to raising standards and sustaining them. Workers have no involvement in monitoring or implementing labour standards as collective labour relations are virtually non-existent. Most significantly, there is no evidence of implementation of company codes successfully addressing breaches of freedom of association or promoting a climate that is less hostile to workers wanting to join a union. There are strong arguments in favour of taking an industry approach to improving labour rights including freedom of association. Supply chains are complex with a high degree of overlap - in many cases a range of brand name companies are supplied by the same factory.This makes it practically impossible for a single company to successfully implement its code of conduct in a factory supplying multiple companies. Accordingly, many of the major companies have joined the Electronic Industry Citizenship Coalition (EICC), which has improving social and environmental conditions across the supply chain as a goal. Unfortunately, the industry code agreed by EICC members does not meet the ILO standard on freedom of association, nor does it include any right to bargain collectively.

Threats to workers&#039; rights

The ILO estimates total employment in the manufacture of electrical and electronic products worldwide at over 18 million. The majority of workers are highly concentrated in some 20 countries which together account for nearly 87 per cent of the world total. Employment growth this century has been led by China which in 2004 had a share of some 35 per cent of global employment. Conversely, between 1997 and 2004 employment in the United States declined by some 550,000 (30 per cent of the workforce), in Japan by 400,000 (20 per cent) and in Germany by 100,000 (14 per cent). Women's share of employment in the sector has risen from 38.7 per cent in 1997 to over 40 per cent with the share in different countries and industry branches ranging from five per cent to 87 per cent.In Europe and North America, new ICT jobs are primarily being created in the service parts of the sector, while in Asia employment is growing not only in lower wage production jobs, but in research and development and other highly skilled jobs. There is still a lot of movement in the sector, with a high rate of mergers, acquisitions and attendant plant closures.Up to 75 per cent of global electronics production has now been outsourced from brand-name companies such as Hewlett Packard, Dell and Apple, to contract manufacturers (CMs). At this level there is significant market concentration, with five major CMs producing electronic products for all the major brands: Hon Hai (Foxconn), Flextronics, Sanmina SCI, Jabil Circuit and Celestica.Despite being for the most part unknown to the general public, the largest CMs are themselves major multinational companies that have seen extraordinary growth. Flextronics increased its sales by a factor of ten between 1997 and 2005, while the largest CM, Hon Hai, employs over 486,000 workers, the majority of them in China. Its turnover for 2009 topped $56 billion.Some of the rapid changes that are occurring in the sector can be seen in the table on page 21, which compares revenues and profits of the leading technology companies in 2009 with 2007.A major element of the CM strategy to attract business from brand-name companies is to locate in countries where wage costs are lower: Flextronics claims to save its clients 75 per cent on labour costs. Consequently, the search for low cost manufacturing locations has led the CMs and other manufacturers away from North America and Western Europe, where there have been numerous plant closures and job losses, towards countries in Eastern Europe and Asia. In 2006, China overtook the European Union in hi-tech exports for the first time.

The persecution of unions in Russia gives little cause for optimism. Interference by the authorities in the activities of workers' organizations is becoming more frequent and systematic. A particularly ominous trend has emerged of treating the unions as &quot;extremist&quot; groups, involving not only the procurator's office and the Ministry of Internal Affairs, but even the intelligence agencies. In this period of a financial crisis the state has been reducing rather than extending the protection of workers and union activists. While the employers have been increasingly aggressive in pushing for &quot;flexible&quot; employment relationships and deregulation of the labour market, the lower house of the Russian parliament, the Duma, and the Constitutional Court have repealed the provision of the Labour Code requiring the consent of the union for the dismissal of its leaders. That was one of the last legislative guarantees against discrimination which actually worked in court; with its elimination the unions have essentially lost their last defense against arbitrary action by the employers.But even so, worker activists have not given up the struggle. First and foremost, they are conducting an active battle in the courts, sometimes winning substantial victories. There have been quite a few decisions in favour of reinstating workers illegally dismissed. Another important area of activity is solidarity campaigns. Activists of the ITUA and other unions have organized mailings of protest letters through websites; they have been holding meetings and pickets, sometimes involving large numbers of participants, such as in Togliatti, where the ITUA union &quot;Unity&quot; managed to turn out 3,000 people. Finally, international support is of tremendous importance. Two years ago the IMF began a global campaign of solidarity with ITUA activists who been victims of physical violence. The latest complaint by the All-Russian Confederation of Labour to the ILO was also supported by the IMF. Despite everything, the protest movement in Russia is growing. According to official data, the number of mass actions rose to 4,900 in the first quarter of this year from 1,269 for the same period in 2009, that is an increase of 400 per cent. All totaled, almost 1.8 million people participated in them. The authorities themselves admit that the role of the unions in this action was by no means the least important. &quot;We never give up&quot; is a phrase with which Alexei Etmanov often concludes his speeches and commentaries. May it serve as a guide for the action of all trade unions in Russia.

"We never give up"Persecution of unions in Russia today

Complaint to the International Labour Organization

From the present to the future

The IMF regards protection contracts and the impact they have on workers as a violation of the right to freedom of association as enshrined in International Labour Organization Convention 87, since there is no question here of a decision freely made. Although the system of protection contracts has also been criticized by many labour lawyers in Mexico itself, the Mexican government has made no serious attempt to abolish it and to properly implement the principles of ILO Convention 87. Challenging the status of protection contracts is a controversial issue in Mexico as they are supported by local and federal government authorities and many existing trade union organizations. Of the high number of protection agreements, most involve the three largest Mexican trade union federations. These unions use protection contracts to prevent other unions from forming or negotiating a collective contract, giving complicit support to wide-spread corruption of the official Mexican trade union system. The IMF has been following the situation in Mexico with concern for some time. In response to continuous complaints from workers, trade unions in the process of formation, existing trade unions and non-governmental and human rights organizations, the IMF decided to lodge a complaint with the ILO Committee on Freedom of Association.The complaint (ILO Case No. 2694) was lodged by the IMF President in February 2009 and outlines how the labour laws and the way they are interpreted in Mexico are in violation of ILO Convention 87, a convention which all member countries are obliged to respect and one that Mexico has specifically ratified.The complaint sets out how the system of protection contracts is used in Mexico to deny workers their right to freedom of association and cites several examples, including the situation at Johnson Controls. While the complaint was lodged last year and will take some time to be considered by the ILO Committee on Freedom of Association, the problems continue in Mexico, as can be seen from the case of workers at Johnson Controls in Puebla.Many workers seek and want change so that all Mexican workers can form genuine trade unions. Just like our colleagues in COT-JC, Carmen and Jorge, who continue to work on their own account, attend training courses and fight for reinstatement to their jobs and a change in the labour situation. It is hoped that more people like Carmen and Jorge will come forward to play their part in building a transparent and democratic trade union movement in Mexico.

Mexico: The fight for a representative union

Why are 90 per cent of collective agreements in Mexico considered "protection contracts"?

The international fight against protection contracts

Complaint to the ILO

Carmen is 49 and was born and lives in Teolocholco, Tlaxcala. She has eight children, five girls and three boys, all teenagers, who either work or study. She has been married 28 years and has a secondary school education. She worked at Johnson Controls in Puebla for 11 years. She was dismissed because she joined an organizing coalition (COT-JC), refused to accept the demands being made on her on the production line, where managers want workers to work three times harder without proper remuneration, and criticized the existing union. When she was dismissed, she could not go to the union for help because the union is a paper union that is backed by the labour authorities. Companies use these unions to ensure cheap labour and no &quot;labour problems&quot;. Carmen now survives on what she earns from a few casual jobs and continues to attend training courses on issues such as women's rights and labour rights. She also works at a small family shop and lives with some support provided by her husband.Jorge is 33. He also lives in Teolocholco, Tlaxcala. He is married with three boys, all teenagers who are at present studying. Jorge has a secondary school education. He was dismissed by Johnson Controls one and a half years ago for calling on the trade union that claims to represent him to protect the workers from company harassment and arbitrary decisions made by management. Carmen and Jorge explained that employees sign individual contracts. They are told there is a collective agreement but they are never able to find out anything about it, let alone being able to have an input into negotiations about the terms of the agreement. This union has no articles of association, at least none that its members are aware of, and it never holds general meetings for the workers, although it has held occasional meetings on certain production lines or in certain departments.The union has a health and safety committee, but this committee never meets. The workers have average pay increases of two per cent per year and, according to Jorge, were given 1,000 pesos (US$82.36) as &quot;profit sharing&quot;. Carmen says: &quot;How is it possible when Chicles Adams pays its workers 40,000-60,000 pesos (US$3,290 - US$4,950) for &quot;profit sharing&quot;?&quot; Workers are entitled to six days annual holiday but many never take them because they prefer to work on those days in order to increase their incomes, however little the pay is. They also work on the bank holidays and obligatory rest days (such as national holidays) stipulated by labour laws, for the same reason - to obtain a few more measly pesos. Employees are covered by social security but the dismissed workers are not. The company pays an end of year bonus equivalent to more or less 20 days pay.There are never any elections to elect union leaders. These leaders just present themselves and tell the workers they are in charge. The union at Johnson Controls is affiliated to the Confederación Regional Obrera Mexicana (CROM). Johnson Controls workers do not know how trade unions are supposed to conduct themselves but they know they want to organize themselves in order to protect themselves from the whims of their employer. That is why they want to join a union of their own choice, the Mexican Miners' and Metalworkers' union (SNTMMSRM). However the company has begun to take steps to intimidate workers to stop them from joining the SNTMMSRM.According to the Centro de Apoyo al Trabajador A.C. (CAT), a labour support centre, workers at the company have been fighting for more than two years and learning about human and labour rights, in order to be able to exercise their right to freedom of association. The workers have formed an organizing coalition at the company (COT-JC). In 2007, some workers participated in the Comisión Revisora del Reparto de Utilidades (Profit Sharing Review Committee) and also demanded a new collective agreement but were dismissed without valid reason in June 2007. The company and the &quot;paper&quot; union in place have continued to harass workers since then and more workers have been dismissed.CAT has revealed that the company is currently doing well. Production has increased and hours of work have increased to almost two full shifts. Some departments have begun to work on Sundays. The plant is working at 90 per cent of capacity, partly to ensure supply of parts for the new Volkswagen A6 model. The first hundred seats, made from leather, vinyl and cloth, came off the production line on April 16. The production managers, Jorge Sambrano and Ignacio Betz called a meeting with workers to thank them for their efforts and to encourage them to work harder in order to achieve the target of 1,200 units per day by the beginning of January 2011. Current production is 800 seats per day for VW and 200 seats per day for Nissan. Sergio Beltrán, secretary of the SNTMMSRM, said he was taking the steps necessary for workers at Johnson Controls to join the SNTMMSRM and hoped to be able to talk to company management. He said it was important for the international union federations, including the IMF, to act as mediators and arrange a meeting with the company.

&quot;Paper&quot; trade unions with no meetings or articles of association

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