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Global worker No1 2022

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On 10 March, the labour-backed Employee Free Choice Act (EFCA) was introduced in both houses of the US Congress. If passed, the legislation &ndash; which has the support of global labour &ndash; would remove many of the advantages an employer now routinely uses to avoid unionisation in the US. 
The proposed law would entitle a union to be authorised to represent workers&rsquo; interests if a simple majority signed cards or a petition requesting union representation. Currently, as mandated under the 1935 US National Labor Relations Act, union recognition can occur either through such a &ldquo;card check&rdquo; measure, or through a government supervised election. 
But it is an employer that chooses which of the two methods is used and in nearly all instances, a government ballot is the bosses&rsquo; choice. This gives an employer the necessary time on a jobsite to implant fear and counter the merits of unionisation. 
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Statistics reveal that in 25% of all US organising drives, employees with pro-union sympathies or those who openly support a union are sacked. Further, in 78% of all campaigns leading to a government ballot, employers use intimidation by delivering harsh anti-union messages on the shop floor, including threats of plant closure, layoffs, and other negative impacts if a union is elected. 
The EFCA would grant workers, not employers, the right to choose the method for union representation, either through a National Labor Relations Board (NLRB) secret-ballot election or through a majority card-check or petition. (Business interests in the US are now engaged in an intense lobbying effort against EFCA, saying it absolutely denies secret-ballot elections, a falsehood.) 
Secondly, the proposed law contains mandatory government arbitration so that a collective agreement can become effective if the two parties cannot reach one after a period of time. Similar to industrial relations in many developed countries, both labour and management submit proposals to a government panel, which then would put in place a collective agreement for a two-year period. 
Currently, after a union is certified, many employers in the US practice what is called &ldquo;surface bargaining,&rdquo; meaning they adhere to the 1935 law which states they must engage in bargaining, but do so without ever intending to enter into a collective agreement. In such practices, the result is to delay the process and to frustrate the legitimate desire of workers to be part of a collective labour agreement. 
Another major US labour law reform contained in the EFCA is a financial penalty on employers who discriminate against workers exhibiting lawful union activity. Now, there is no risk to an employer who fires union activists during organising campaigns. A worker must prove such bias, with the NLRB sometimes taking years to determine a case, including inevitable employer appeals. Even when a case is concluded in favour of a worker, the award is mere back pay, minus wages and other compensation the worker may have received following the discharge. 
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The EFCA contains triple back pay damages for workers found to have been illegally sacked. 
This is the fourth time the EFCA has been introduced in the US Congress. The last time, in March 2007, it passed the House of Representatives by a 241-185 count, but died three months later in the 100-member US Senate, where an archaic rule mandates 60 votes necessary to invoke cloture, or the required number needed in a vote to halt a filibuster. The measure then had 51 US Senate supporters, although President George Bush promised a veto. 
This time the EFCA has the support of President Barack Obama. Two weeks ago, when introduced, the EFCA had 223 of 565 House members signed on as co-sponsors, while the Senate side had 40 co-sponsors. 
In this session of Congress, sponsors will attempt a different strategy by first bringing EFCA forward in the Senate. It is expected to begin receiving committee hearings in late April, with the bill brought to the Senate and then House floors during the summer. 
Global labour, through the Council of Global Unions, is encouraging national unions to bring the American EFCA to the attention of their respective governments, as well as to employers who have operations in the US. More can be learned about this important US legislative proposal by clicking <a href="http://www.americanrightsatwork.org/">here</a>.

Employee Free Choice Act Again Introduced in US Congress

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Fair Work now will replace former Prime Minister John Howard&rsquo;s draconian WorkChoices as the industrial relations law of the land in Australia. That was assured this past Friday, 20 March, when Parliament&rsquo;s Senate passed the Labour Government initiative.
But it didn&rsquo;t come without a political struggle. A compromise was struck between Labour and its allies and the Liberal Party, most notably over the definition of a small business and the inter-connected protection against unfair dismissals. 
The compromise sets the small business definition at 15 full-time workers, part-time workers not included for the first 18 months, or until 1 January 2011. But thereafter, workers with one year of service &ndash; no matter; full-time, part-time, or casual &ndash; will have protection. Under Howard&rsquo;s WorkChoices, businesses with fewer than 100 workers were exempt from the unfair labour dismissal statute. 
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The Labour Party also compromised on some restrictions to union access to worksites and union access to certain types of information. In all, 231 Senate amendments were submitted to a Fair Work House version, which passed in December 2008. But the new law is fairer and gives workers far better protections in an economic downturn than what was on the books under Howard. 
It creates ten national job standards, charters collective bargaining as the main tenet in labour-management relations, and creates a national industrial umpire with enforcement powers, the Fair Work Commission, thus replacing six Howard-era agencies that essentially were charged with removing workplace regulations. 
It also spells out workers&rsquo; rights to representation; access to arbitration; establishes a 38-hour workweek; grants four weeks annual leave; and allows the practice of flexible work schedules and conditions to take hold. Additionally, it sets out a standard process for regularly raising the minimum wage. 
The unfair dismissal statute, plus implementation of good-faith enterprise bargaining takes effect 1 July 2009, while the remainder of the provisions take effect 1 January 2010. 
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Sharon Burrow
Sharon Burrow, President of the Australian Council of Trades Unions (ACTU), called the Senate passage a &ldquo;major step forward for working Australians,&rdquo; marking &ldquo;a historic moment in restoring workers&rsquo; rights. After a decade of attacks on working people by the Liberal and National Parties the tide has turned,&rdquo; she said. &ldquo;We can take pride in what we have achieved.&rdquo;

Australia’s Senate Hammers Final Nail into WorkChoices Coffin

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In 11 days, trade unions in the free world will celebrate May Day &ndash; the globally-recognised tribute to work and labour. But in Turkey, May Day last year was met with government repression and police thuggery. 
 
Turkish unions now demand that their government declare May Day as an official holiday, as it was prior to the military coup d&rsquo;&eacute;tat in 1980. May Day celebrations were banned between then and the early 1990s, but were allowed only on limited basis after that. 
 
For trade unions in Turkey to hold any kind of celebration on May Day, they invite trouble. At last year&rsquo;s celebrations, security forces used excessive means to disperse unionists before they reached Taksim Square in Istanbul, site of a planned celebration. They used gas, water cannons, and batons in doing so. 

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Turkish police gassing the headquarters of DİSK in the early morning hours of 1 May last year
Recently, a bill was submitted by the government to the Turkish Parliament to make May Day public holiday. Parliament&rsquo;s Interior Commission raised no objections to the bill and it will be brought before Parliament on April 22. 
 
The Confederation of Turkish Trade Unions (T&uuml;rk-İş), the Confederation of Progressive Trade Unions (DİSK), and the Confederation of Public Sector Unions (KESK) have announced their intention and decisiveness to celebrate 1 May 2009 in historic Taksim Square, which has great significance to Turkey&rsquo;s unions because it was there that 36 unionists were killed celebrating May Day on 1 May 1977. 
 
The Turkish government uses this excuse to ban May Day celebrations in Taksim Square. 
 
In 2007, on the 30th anniversary of the so-called &ldquo;Bloody May 1&rdquo; of 1977, Turkish unions re-launched an initiative to overturn the ban on the 30th anniversary of the so-called &quot;Bloody May 1&quot; in 2007. But in both 2007 and 2008, thousands of demonstrators were taken into custody for attempting to assemble there on May Day 
 
Turkish unions consider Taksim Square as a symbol for the struggle for the eight-hour workday, for improvements in work conditions, and for the promise of living wages. But the Istanbul governorship has announced that any other square will be open for celebrations, but not Taksim Square. 

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ICEM General Secretary Manfred Warda
In a statement on Turkey for May Day, ICEM General Secretary Manfred Warda, said, &ldquo;We consider the government proposal to the Parliament to make May Day an official holiday a step forward. I am convinced this would be important to Turkish democracy and as meaningful signal to the adherence of trade union rights. 
&ldquo;I should, however, say that this only holds true if Taksim Square is opened to peaceful demonstrations on May Day. It is a symbol for the struggle of democracy and union rights. ICEM will be present in Turkey this year to follow May Day celebrations. We know that the upcoming ILO Labour Conference in June will scrutinize the Turkish government because they must modify their labour laws. ICEM believes that any changes should be significant, not just minor modifications. Turkey must put forward adequate changes regarding freedom of association, collective bargaining, and the right to strike, changes that are in line with major ILO Conventions and, in fact, standards that have already been ratified by Turkey. We will follow the developments and continue our solidarity with our Turkish affiliates in this struggle.&rdquo;

ICEM, Turkish Unions Demand May Day Holiday; Want Celebrations at Historical Taksim Square

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The Consultation Committee on Corporate Social Responsibility (CCSR) for the EDF Group of France met on 24-25 March in Paris to discuss and determine policy on the worrying situation facing employees of the mostly public electric utility and its subsidiaries throughout the world. The group determined that EDF is bound by its prior corporate social responsibility agreements to, at the very least, maintain the standard of living of its employers. 
 
In this regard, due to the effects of the global financial meltdown, specifically on purchasing power of EDF employees, adjustments must be made to salaries merely that living standards remain consistent. The committee&rsquo;s statement from Paris meeting was addressed to EDF Group Chairman Pierre Gadonneix, and other management officials, Mr. Lagarde and Mr. Caron. 

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The ICEM supports the statement of the group, and its demands, which were circulated by Marc Ferron, secretary of the CCSR and member of French union FCE-CFDT. 
 
The statement calls for more attention on the workers at EDF subsidiaries in the developing world. Workers there have been hit hardest by the crisis. The CCSR requests EDF management to redistribute profits towards the increase of salaries to, at the very least, the level of inflation and the cost of living in the country concerned. 
 
The EDF Corporate Responsibility Agreement was originally signed on 24 January 2005 by Pierre Gadonneix, EDF's President and by the assembled employee representatives from each country where the Group is present. Commitments in the Agreement included provisions for industrial restructuring within the group. Current restructuring within the group is taking place in Clover in Poland, and in UK&rsquo;s energy industry. The enterprise Leibin in China will soon be restructured and job preservation throughout all restructuring projects is called for.

EDF called on to respect CSR agreement, block job losses

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The Governing Council of the United Nations Environment Programme (UNEP), consisting of 140 countries, took a landmark decision at its deliberations in Nairobi in February 2009. The council moved to start negotiations toward an international treaty on mercury that either bans or places very strict restrictions on the dangerous chemical. 
 
UNEP&rsquo;s unanimous decision may mean the beginning of the end for mercury, although the transition to either a no-mercury or low-mercury world will still take time. 

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UNEP has, for seven years, coordinated the intense scientific and policy debate on how best to deal with mercury, said the agency&rsquo;s executive director and UN Under-Secretary, Achim Steiner. Now &ldquo;the world&rsquo;s environmental ministers, armed with the full facts and full choices, decided the time for talking was over &ndash; the time for action on this pollution is now.&rdquo; 
 
The Governing Council also was unanimous on the risk to human health. Mercury and its compounds are highly toxic to humans, especially to the nervous system at even relatively low levels of exposure. It is particularly harmful to the development of unborn children. It accumulates in humans and animals and can be concentrated throughout the food chain, notably in certain types of fish. 
 
The EU has called for a ban to begin on mercury by 2011. UNEP&rsquo;s main function is to promote international policy cooperation in the environmental field.

Say Farewell to Mercury? UNEP’s 2009 Nairobi Action Sets the Stage

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Over the past decade, multinational tyre companies considered Central Europe as an investment utopia, shifting production and expanding factories at a rapid rate. Recently, US-based Goodyear invested US$100 million in its existing plant in Debica, Poland, while Bridgestone of Japan moved to construct a second plant in Poland. 
 
In Hungary, Hankook of South Korea, established a production unit, and Bridgestone`s new plant is close to start-up. Apollo Tyre of India is also a plant in Hungary. Similarly, in Romania, Pirelli just started an operation in Slatina, where the Italian company has teamed Continental AG in steel-cord production. 

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This Central European growth, however, brings with it some consequences concerning job conditions and trade-union representation. Wages, working conditions, health and safety regulations also fall short of the level common in West European countries. In some of the new plants, trade union rights are denied or companies prefer plant-level and company-based unions. 
 
This has led the ICEM to boost national trade unions to challenge these circumstances by creating a regional network of rubber unions. Trade union leaders from Hungary, Slovakia, Romania, and Slovenia came together to discusses these challenges, as well as the effects of the economic crisis at a meeting in Budapest on 8-9 April. 

Hosted by ICEM Hungarian affiliate VDSz, the meeting was sponsored by the Friedrich-Ebert-Foundation (FES) of Germany, and was also attended by French and Spanish trade union representatives and ICEM&rsquo;s sister organisation, EMCEF. 

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VDSz President Gy&ouml;rgy Paszternak
Following presentation by the ICEM on the global picture of the industry, the participants gave reports about individual situations in their countries. Hungary has always been the centre of the rubber industry in the region, but the union organising ratio has fallen since the level is what at before 1990, a VDSz representative reported. Unions are blocked from being freely established in some companies, like Hankook and Bridgestone. 
 
The ICEM was asked to continue to support the struggle at both companies to achieve union recognition. In Slovakia, the financial crisis has substantially decreased production, with work hours reduced and workers&rsquo; typically paid 60% of their normal salaries. Slovenia has just adopted a law for a shorter work-week, which was supported by the trade unions. 
 
The crisis has dramatically impacted the auto and auto-supply industries in Slovenia. Initially, wages were not cut but workers were forced to use their holidays. As the crisis dug deeper, wages and working hours were reduced. Likewise in Romania, the auto industry is in a significant crisis, seriously affecting the tyre industry. One positive note is that the union organising 1,500 workers at the new Pirelli factory in Slatina won 10% wage gains. The meeting also heard EMCEF&rsquo;s presentation on the crisis as well as its activities regarding social dialogue, collective bargaining, and the European Works Councils. 
 
&ldquo;We must not let the crisis destroy our earlier achievements,&rdquo; said VDSz President Gy&ouml;rgy Paszternak. &ldquo;We must be vigilant in not allowing employers to misuse the current conditions. Our entire social future depends on trade union recognition, representation, and increased pay and working standards.&rdquo;

Central European Rubber Unions Form Joint Strategies on Financial Crisis

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The 4th ICEM World Congress in Bangkok in 2007 mandated that the ICEM develop a policy on sustainability as a basis for future initiatives, including discussions with employers, governments, and other Global Union Federations (GUFs). An initial meeting of a Working Group toward this end occurred early in 2008, and it established some parameters for ICEM positions and created the basis for development of an initial discussion paper. 
 
Last week, on 14 April, this Working Group reconvened in Geneva to review and comment on the discussion paper. Based on their deliberations, the paper will be revised and will become a draft policy for submission to the ICEM Executive Committee on 23 June 2009. 
 
Representatives from all ICEM Sectors and Regions were invited. The meeting was chaired by Lars Myhre of Norway's Industi-Energi (IE). Other participants included Ivan Mokhnachuk and Victor Miachin of Russia's mining union, Rosugleprof; Jan Str&oslash;mme of IE; Dave Shier of the Canadian Power Workers Union (PWU); Alfons de Potter, Belgium's CSC Energie Chimie; Marc Blanc, France's F&eacute;d&eacute;ration Chimie Energie, CFDT; Ralf Bartels of Germany's IGBCE; Anabella Rosemberg, representing the International Trade Union Confederation (ITUC); and Ana Belen Sanchez of the ILO. ICEM General Secretary Manfred Warda was also a participant. 

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In general, the Work Group expressed satisfaction with the ICEM's initial discussion paper. The group suggested that the final ICEM policy needs to clearly express the viewpoint of an industrial union federation on all aspects of sustainability. 
 
Participants also pointed out that opportunities for a new focus and new dialogue between governments, employers, and unions &ndash; as the drive towards sustainability takes shape &ndash; must not be overlooked. In that regard, all agreed that the recent financial collapse has opened opportunities for discussions that might not have been possible a year ago. 
 
The role of energy in development, social security, and sustainable jobs were crucial issues to the Working Group, and the ICEM must demand a balanced energy future that includes cleaner use of fossil fuels (including carbon capture and storage/sequestration), nuclear, and, of course, renewable energy sources. The future of energy must consider questions about access to energy and price fairness and stability. 
 
Pulp and paper, chemicals, rubber, and materials sectors all have their particular sustainability challenges, which the ICEM acknowledges. Finally, the Working Group reiterated that sustainable jobs must be decent jobs that recognize the principles of human rights, labour rights, and particularly the respect for the rights of women and other disadvantaged groups. 
 
Warda closed the meeting by explaining the next steps on sustainable development, which will include a draft policy incorporating input from the Working Group, acceptance of the final paper by the ICEM Executive in June, and a possible multi-GUFs&rsquo; conference on sustainable development sometime&nbsp;in the future.

ICEM Holds Second Work Group Meeting on Sustainable Development

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Every year, on April 28, the world commemorates workers killed, injured, or made ill as a result of their jobs. 
 
How many are there? Collecting good data on occupational injuries and deaths is very difficult. The most credible source of international statistics is the ILO. Their numbers are staggering. The ILO has estimated that globally, there are two million work-related deaths annually. That's more than 5,000 every day, and for every fatality, hundreds more injuries and illnesses occur. 
 
These numbers, as incredible as they seem, are generally believed to be gross underestimates. 
 
Fatalities are under reported by workers and employers. Often, an occupational fatality is not identified as such. Once reported, a fatality must be &quot;accepted&quot; or recognized by a country's regulatory authority or workers' compensation board to be counted among the statistics. In many jurisdictions, large numbers of workers are exempt from workers' compensation coverage. Data for injuries are even less reliable than for fatalities. 

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Worker deaths that are immediate and obvious tend to be recognized. Deaths due to illnesses that have an occupational origin are rarely recognized. Cancer is one of the biggest work-related killers, but rarely is it properly acknowledged. Relatively few occupational diseases are recorded in official statistics. 
 
Injury and illness data are notoriously subject to bias and methodological problems. Many workers' injuries, illnesses, and even fatalities, are simply never recorded. Workers' compensation assessments and insurance premiums are often based on these statistics, creating a huge financial incentive for employers to suppress or discourage the reporting of accidents. 
 
This is done in a number of ways, ranging from schemes that bring injured workers into the workplace so their injuries won't be counted as &quot;lost time,&quot; to sophisticated psychological techniques like &quot;behaviour-based&quot; safety programs. Threats of discipline or discharge following a reported accident are not uncommon. &quot;Post-incident drug-testing&quot; has been highly effective in causing workers to conceal injuries rather than risk a false-positive test result. 
 
In the days leading up to 28 April, many statistics will be quoted. Appalling as the numbers may be, the truth is probably far worse. 
 
In the end, 28 April is not about numbers, it is about people. Next week, on Tuesday, let us pause and remember those who paid for their livelihoods with their lives or their health. Then let us renew the fight for safe and healthy workplaces.

28 April: Day to Renew Fight for Safe and Healthy Worksites

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28 April is Workers&rsquo; Memorial Day, or more formally, the International Commemoration Day for Dead and Injured Workers. It is the day that trade unions across the world mourn the dead, but pledge even harder to wage the fight for safe, healthy, and risk-free workplaces. 
 
The commemoration day is rooted in the Canadian labour movement, whose unions worked for several years before the country&rsquo;s Parliament in 1989 passed Bill C-223, adopting 28 April as the official &ldquo;Day of Mourning.&rdquo; While labour groups in several countries began commemorating the day soon thereafter, it became a global day of health and safety recognition and a vivid reminder of the ever-present risks and hazards inside worksites when the UN lit a Commemorative Candle in 1996 for the victims of the Kader toy factory fire in Thailand three years earlier. 
 
Some 188 mostly young women workers perished in that fire and another 500 were severely injured. Now, 20 countries officially recognize the day, with Croatia being the latest, moving in recent weeks to designate it the National Day of Occupational Safety and Health. 

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(The others: Argentina, Belgium, Bermuda, Bolivia, Brazil, Canada, Colombia, Dominican Republic, Ecuador, Greece, Luxembourg, Panama, Peru, Poland, Portugal, Spain, Taiwan, Ukraine, and Venezuela.) 
 
The day also is marked by labour unions and workplace health and safety groups in over120 countries. It is more than just a memorial day to remember the estimated two million workers who die each year from workplace accidents, job-related injuries, or occupational illnesses. It is a day of renewal and action for positive change to make worksites safer and risk-free. 
 
ICEM trade union affiliates are encouraged to find an activity next week to take meaningful action. Use the day, for example, to work in your community and within your union to engage your government on ILO Convention 176, the Health and Safety in Mines Convention; or any of the other ILO Conventions which your government has not ratified, such as Convention 155, the Occupational Safety and Health Convention; No. 162, the Asbestos at Work Convention; No. 148, the Work Environment Convention; No. 174, the Prevention of Major Industrial Accidents Convention; No. 119, the Guarding of Machinery Convention; and No. 136, the Benzene Convention. Only through direct action will change occur.

28 April, Day of Mourning: History is Recent but Roots are Growing

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The union that won a long battle to represent Firestone Rubber Plantation workers in Liberia has now won a Labor Ministry-supervised vote to represent workers at ArcelorMittal&rsquo;s mining development in Liberia. 
 
On 11 April, ICEM-affiliated Forestry, Logging, and Industrial Workers&rsquo; Union of Liberia (FLIWUL), greatly assisted by the United Steelworkers (USW) of the US, easily beat a yellow union in a representation election that took place in Nimba County on the Liberian-Guinea-C&ocirc;te d&rsquo;Ivoire border and at Buchanan, a port city on the Atlantic Coast. 
 
ArcelorMittal, the world&rsquo;s largest steel-maker, is undertaking a US$1.5 billion re-development of iron ore mining operations near Yekeba in Nimba County and a 250-kilometre railroad line to Buchanan. 
 
The union vote, however, encountered flagrant interference by a company official and a Liberian legislator, despite both an ICEM letter (found <a href="/wp-content/migration/icem/6%20letter%20to%20Bernard%20Fontana%20-%203%20Feb09.pdf">here</a>) and a USW letter warning ArcelorMittal not to interfere in the election. But an ArcelorMittal boss and a national lawmaker showed up in Buchanan several hours after voting began and demanded a halt to balloting. 

<img alt="" src="" width="149" height="112" />
FLIWUL activists in Harbel
On the eve of the vote, the yellow union used a radio broadcast to discourage workers from voting. Election observers also reported that whoever was behind this group had pressed members of the Liberian Parliament to intervene with the Labor Ministry to cancel the vote. 
 
The ArcelorMittal official was Arthur Massaquio, who earlier on 11 April was the company&rsquo;s designated election observer, but left the polling area soon after balloting began. When he returned several hours later, he was with Representative Gabriel Smith. The lawmaker began questioning workers on why they felt the urgency to have a union vote, before ordering workers back to work because he was canceling the election. 
 
Despite this, and the fact that several workers did leave the Buchanan polling area without voting, FLIWUL won the fair, government-supervised election. FLIWUL got 198 votes, the yellow union 19, and the &ldquo;no union&rdquo; option on the ballot received one. In Buchanan, the FLIWUL got 59 votes and the company union 15. The ICEM had an observer present for the vote through a designated representative from the Ghana Mineworkers&rsquo; Union. 
 
FLIWUL Secretary-General David Sackoh told the ICEM following the vote that an investigation into the Buchanan interruption is underway, but that he is confident the vote will stand. 
 
ArcelorMittal is developing Nimba County&rsquo;s one billion cubic-metre iron ore reserves in a 25-year concession that will see the Liberian government receive 30% of the net profits, plus 4.5% in royalty fees. Some 2,000 Liberian workers are expected to be employed in the mining enterprise and the rail link and port hub. This northern Liberia mining area was originally operated by the Liberian American Swedish Chemicals Company (LAMCO), but production ceased in 1989 with the outbreak of civil war.

Despite Interference, FLIWUL Wins Union Rights for ArcelorMittal Workers in Liberia

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