BRAZIL: As in many parts of the world, subcontracting in Brazil has resulted in widespread precarious work. Although described as modern and competitive, in practical terms subcontracting has meant a reduction of wages and benefits, an increase in the hours of work and has created job instability.

Terceitização en Brasil (Subcontracting in Brazil), a recent publication of the national trade union centre CUT, brings to light all the consequences of subcontracting in Brazil. Written by university professors and trade union activists, the publication explores the impact of subcontracting in eight sectors of the Brazilian economy and also looks at the important contribution Brazilian unions are playing in responding to the practical reality of subcontracting.

In a section on the metal sector, Valter Sanches General Secretary of IMF affiliate CNM-CUT, speaks of the a historical changes caused by the implementation of subcontracting in the sector, citing examples of how metalworkers are trying to prevent subcontracting through collective bargaining agreements. Sanches also explains how international framework agreements can be important instruments in the fight against precarious work.

The book also sets out the project of regulating subcontracting through the law, elaborated for CUT after a vigorous internal debate, and recommends a debate in the National Congress, making it obligatory reading for all that are fighting for a better life.

Mexico. Members of Section 271 of the National Miners’ Union, on strike since August 8, have returned to work after reaching agreement with ArcelorMittal.

The agreement included an eight per cent pay rise and a benefits package worth a further seven per cent, including two more days holiday, two more days pay added to the Christmas bonus and 15,000 (US$1,100) pesos in social welfare benefits for each one of the 3,500 union members. Agreement was also reached on an increase in annual profit sharing (from 20 to 25 days).

All increases are backdated to May 1 and the company will pay 100 per cent of wages and credit vouchers lost during the strike. The value of vouchers has been increased from 150 to 170 (US$13) pesos. Other benefits included increases to company contributions towards educational grants and school equipment for workers’ children, life insurance, sports, funeral expenses and much more.

The union said "the agreement discarded the company’s initial plan to make the negotiations for a collective agreement conditional on making more than 700 union members redundant (20 per cent of union members). Nobody will lose their job."
 
The union added that the outcome of the negotiations showed the leadership of comrade Napoleón Gomez Urrutia "who worked closely with Section 271 leaders to reach the agreement. The workers are agreed that the outcome showed the capacity, experience, intelligence and commitment of comrade Gómez Urrutia and the correctness of his negotiation and conciliation strategy in pursuit of the miners’ demands."

GLOBAL: The United Nations Climate Change Conference (COP 15) is taking place in December 2009 in Copenhagen.  The international trade union movement is playing a role in this process to support a binding international agreement that will provide a framework for combating global warming, while at the same time safeguarding employment and workers’ rights.

In order to discuss and put forward a common industrial workers’ position, IMF, International Federation of Chemical, Energy, Mine and General Workers’ Unions (ICEM), European Metalworkers’ Federation (EMF) and European Mine, Chemical and Energy Workers` Federation (EMCEF) are holding a joint meeting entitled "Cutting Emissions, Transforming Jobs" in Germany on October 14 and 15.

IMF, ICEM, EMF and EMCEF will use this event to arrive at a common position on climate change to take forward to the United Nations Climate Change Conference (COP 15) in December in Copenhagen.

The meeting will be structured in panel discussions around the main themes of environmental protection, sustainable development, sectoral concerns, green jobs and just transition. It will then discuss the unifying principles and materials to be prepared for future work.

GLOBAL: On April 29, 2009 the IMF wrote that, after years of strong criticism by trade unions, the World Bank had finally decided to stop using the labour indicators of its "Doing Business" annual report that for years has given higher rating to countries with the lowest workers’ protection.

We were wrong! It was not true. Read again our story here and you will see how wrong and naïve we were.

We believed the leaders of the World Bank and the International Monetary Fund when, in January this year, they told a high level global unions delegation that they fully understood the anger of trade union members who are paying the price for a crisis that they have not caused.

We were wrong when we thought that the Bank in April was serious in recommending social safety nets to shield vulnerable parts of society and protect the rights of workers (http://www.doingbusiness.org/documents/EWI_revisions.pdf). No! It’s just business as usual!

The just released "Doing Business 2010" discourages countries from adopting social protection schemes and designates governments that do so as anti-business. The recipe is the usual one: reduce severance pay for dismissed workers; reduce or eliminate requirements for prior notice about job cuts; and, get rid of measures to retrain redundant workers. So, Portugal is bad because it increased the dismissal notice period by two weeks, and Belarus is good because it made it easier to eliminate jobs! Honduras is bad because it increased severance pay and advance notice requirements in response to the economic crisis, but Rwanda is very good because it eliminated any requirement for prior consultation of employees’ representatives or notification to labour inspectors about job cuts!

Congratulations, Mr Zoellick! But, didn’t you announce in April that the Doing Business indicator of labour market flexibility which encouraged reduction of workers’ protection "shouldn’t be used as basis for policy advice or in any country programme documents"? Please, tell us when, exactly, the Bank plans to stop promoting the elimination of social and workers’ protection?

GERMANY:  Around 45,000 union members from all parts of Germany came to the Frankfurt Stadium on Saturday September 5 to participate in the day of action organised by the IMF affiliate IG Metall.

The action was part of the campaign ‘Together for a good life’ (Gemeinsam für ein gutes Leben) organised by IG Metall and aimed at expressing workers’ discontent with current policies in the country and to state workers’ demands for a ‘good life’, the most important of which is job security. For more information go to: http://www.gutes-leben.de/

The day of action composed several stages starting with a morning rally of young IG Metall members. Young workers worried about their future prospects in terms of job security and permanent employment went through Frankfurt streets and chanted: "This must be different!The future belongs to us!"

Later the action continued at Frankfurt stadium where union members demanded fundamental changes in business and politics of the country and a fairer society. The day of action was held on the eve of German Federal elections.

IG Metall’s call for a good life and job security echoes the call that metalworkers from around the world will make during the global week of action from October 3 to 10 in the campaign against precarious work.

The impact of the global financial crisis on workers is the theme of IMF’s action this year. Affiliates are taking the fight to governments, calling on them to strengthen legislation to prevent employers from using precarious employment in place of permanent and direct employment.

ITALY: The SKF Trade Union World Council examined how the world financial crisis is impacting on workers and what measures the company had taken to minimise the effects at a meeting from September 2 to 4 in Turin, Italy.

Attended by SKF CEO, Tom Johnstone and trade unions from SKF operations around the world, the meeting heard how production has dropped by 37 per cent in the last 14 months on a global basis. Because of the decrease in demand, 3,800 workers had been made redundant and approximately 2,000 are subject to different programmes. Additionally 18,000 workers are under some form of shorter working time programme, which have been done through government programmes in some countries and through agreements with trade unions in other countries.

In June, the company announced that the factory in Fontenay, France will close and 380 employees will lose their jobs. The SKF World Council expressed their solidarity and support with the French unions on their demand to the management to review the decision.

During reports from trade union representatives from Austria, Brazil, Bulgaria, China, France, Germany, India, Italy, Malaysia, Mexico, Poland, Spain, Sweden, Ukraine, UK and the U.S. the main issue discussed was how the financial crisis had hit and influenced the situation at subsidiaries in the country. Most plants have had redundancies and/or short time work to be able to handle the situation in the best way for workers.

The World Council also discussed how cooperation could be increased by strengthening the networking between the SKF unions by creating a database hosted by the IMF and administered by the network.

GLOBAL: Across the world IMF affiliates are making plans to participate in the global week of action from October 3 to 10 in the campaign against precarious work and the World Day for Decent Work on October 7.

The impact of the global financial crisis on precarious workers is the theme of IMF’s action this year. Affiliates are taking the fight to governments, calling on them to ensure equal rights for precarious workers and to strengthen legislation to prevent employers from using precarious employment in place of permanent and direct employment.

In Thailand, TEAM is planning in conjunction with unions from other sectors a massive demonstration in the heart of Bangkok on October 7. In Indonesia IMF affiliates Lomenik and FSPMI will be in the streets on October 4 and in Australia actions will take place in all capital cities around the country on October 7.

To kick off the action, on September 5, IG Metall is holding a rally in Frankfurt as part of their campaign "Gemeinsam für ein gutes Leben" (Together For a Good Life). The rally will call for policies that reflect the concerns of the majority of people, the most important of which is job security, according to a survey carried out by IG Metall to find out what people expect from a ‘good life’.. For more information go to: http://www.gutes-leben.de/

To support these and other efforts elsewhere in the world, this week the IMF released a new poster and leaflet, in conjunction with the International Trade Union Confederation, Global Union Federations and the European Metalworkers’ Federation, which can be downloaded from the IMF website here.

This October, IMF and its affiliates around the world are calling on governments to:

• Restrict temporary and contract work to cases of genuine need
• Guarantee equal pay for precarious workers and their right to join a union
• Require long-term temporary jobs to be converted to permanent jobs

Details of actions being taken by IMF affiliates will be reported on the IMF website at: www.imfmetal.org/precariouswork

GLOBAL: Trade unions from Australia, Europe, India met on August 24 to 26 in Singapore to develop a strategy to build a global union network for the world’s fifth largest steel company, Tata Steel Group. Senior management from the group, which has operations throughout Asia under its NatSteel banner, operations in Europe under the Tata-Corus Group and its biggest operations in India under the Tata Steel Group, also contributed to the discussions through Mr T.V.Narendran, President and CEO of NatSteel Holdings Pte Ltd.

During the meeting participants discussed the situation throughout the company, from the recently announced 2,500 job losses in the United Kingdom, to the planned expansion of operations in India. The outcome from these discussions was to recommend a set of principles that each of the unions present would use to develop international solidarity under the umbrella of the IMF. The principles include a commitment to establish an active global union network that will:

• Develop joint strategies,
• Facilitate regular and timely exchanges of information about union goals, challenges, strategies and victories,
• Facilitate regular and timely exchanges of information about what the Tata Steel Group does in its global operations and how it affects workers,
• Strengthen the local national union networks that already exist and create new networks, and
• Support each other in collective bargaining processes, particularly in confrontations with the company.

It was also agreed that although Tata Steel Group was an important sector of the company it only represented a small part of the overall Tata Group which covers many different industries. Consequently, it was agreed that a much broader strategy will need to be developed within the overall group involving other relevant Global Union Federations from the outset.

USA: The United Autoworkers (UAW) expressed anger at Toyota’s announcement on August 27 to close NUMMI, its plant in California, the only unionised Toyota plant in the U.S.

"Toyota’s announcement that it will close the NUMMI plant is devastating news for thousands of workers in California," said UAW President Ron Gettelfinger.

"This is no time to close a highly successful manufacturing facility. California is one of the most important markets for Toyota," said UAW Vice President Jimmy Settles calling the move "illogical" and "ill-timed" in today’s economy.

The announcement to close the plant, a joint venture with General Motors, came after GM decided to withdraw from the joint venture in June when it announced to give up the Pontiac brand, which has already caused a cut in production of almost 60,000 units.

Four thousand UAW-represented workers at the plant will lose their jobs and up to 35,000 families in California whose livelihoods are tied to the facility will be negatively affected.

Toyota has 26,000 non-union workers at nine auto assembly and powertrain plants in the U.S. and Canada.

GLOBAL: New guidance was released on August 20 on how to use and promote the International Labour Organisation’s Global Jobs Pact with the objective of maintaining and creating employment in response to the global financial crisis.

Prepared by the International Trade Union Confederation, the guidance outlines how national unions can use the tripartite framework of the Global Jobs Pact, adopted at the International Labour Conference in June 2009, as a basis for initiating discussion with governments and employers.

"Beyond the immediate employment challenges the Global Jobs Pact recognises that the current social and economic crisis has profound structural causes and that without addressing these any recovery stands to be temporary with a serious risk of a recurrence of similar crises in the future," states ITUC General Secretary Guy Ryder.

According to the ITUC guide, unions are advised to advocate a number of policy responses to the crisis outlined in the Pact, including:

• Boosting effective demand, including through the use of stimulus packages,
• Maintaining wage levels and avoiding deflationary wage spirals,
• Keeping people in jobs,
• Expanding social protect, and
• Providing old-age security.

The ITUC also urges using the Pact to ensure that responses address root causes of the crisis. In particular, responses should emphasize the important role of the state, the need to reduce inequality, to promote transformation to a green, sustainable economy, to rethink export-led economic models and to have a financial sector at the service of the real economy.

It is important to ensure that measures adopted include temporary and non-regular workers.

The ITUC warns the crisis risks eroding workers’ rights and unions must use the Pact and other mechanisms, such as ratification and implementation of labour standards and the declaration on multinational enterprises, to protect workers’ rights and ensure decent work for all. The respect for freedom of association and the right to collective bargaining must be the basis of all programmes.

The ITUC guidance is published here on the IMF website.

The ILO Global Jobs Pact can be found at:

English:

http://www.ilo.org/wcmsp5/groups/public/—ed_norm/—relconf/documents/meetingdocument/wcms_108456.pdf

Spanish:

http://www.ilo.org/wcmsp5/groups/public/—ed_norm/—relconf/documents/meetingdocument/wcms_108439.pdf

French:

http://www.ilo.org/wcmsp5/groups/public/—ed_norm/—relconf/documents/meetingdocument/wcms_108438.pdf