Boeing South Carolina mechanics vote to join Machinists Union

A bargaining unit of flight line mechanics, who ensure that the Dreamliner 787s built at the factory are flight ready, has voted to join the Machinists Union. The 176 workers represent a portion of the 7,000 who work at the South Carolina site, and the victory opens a significant beachhead in a longstanding battle to unionize the site.

National Labor Relations Board rules mean that groups within a workforce – “micro units” – can negotiate union contracts if their working conditions meet certain criteria. The union hopes to set a precedent with the micro unit, encouraging other parts of the workforce to unionize.

The IAM represents 35,000 Boeing workers at 24 locations in the US, but the company had until now successfully fought off unionization efforts in South Carolina. The US South is notoriously anti-union, and South Carolina has the lowest private sector union density in the US. Previous attempts to unionize the factory failed, including an attempt in 2015, when the anti-union campaign was led by state governor Nikki Hailey, currently the US ambassador to the UN.

Boeing fought the current organizing drive as well, hiring union busters and forcing workers to attend anti-union meetings. The company filed last minute legal challenges to the vote and attempted to have the ballot boxes impounded. When the result was announced, the company expressed disappointment and pledged to try to have the vote declared illegal.

The IAM’s Mike Evans, who lead the organizing drive at the site, said:

“This election was never just about wages. The men and women wanted dignity and consistency in the workplace. And this vote put them closer to achieving those goals. We hope Boeing does the right thing by agreeing to sit down and negotiate in good faith with the dedicated Flight Readiness Technicians.”

IndustriALL aerospace director Georg Leutert said:

“In the South, employers, government and Members of Congress work together to create a very hostile environment for unions. Boeing tried everything to stop these workers from unionizing, and yet they chose to stand up for dignity and respect at work. This is a major achievement, and we hope more will follow. We congratulate the IAM.
“It is time for Boeing to be mature and establish a productive relationship with the union.”

The IAM represents 600,000 members at companies that include Boeing, Lockheed-Martin, General Electric, United Airlines and Harley-Davidson.

Brazilian oil workers temporarily suspend national strike

The Superior Labor Court (TST) declared the strike illegal because of its "abusive" nature and imposed sanctions of two million reais per day (USD$ 540,000) for the unions that backed the strike called by the Federation of Petroleum Workers of Brazil (FUP).

“The decision of the TST seeks to criminalize and marginalize social and trade union movements. The FUP calls on its affiliated unions to suspend the strike, in a momentary and necessary step back for constructing an indefinite strike. This serious violation of trade union rights must be widely denounced,“ says the FUP.

The hike in the price of oil derivatives is directly related to the new policy implemented by the illegitimate government of Michel Temer and the CEO of Petrobras Pedro Parente, following the coup d'état against Dilma Rousseff.

Prices are influenced by fluctuations of the dollar and the value of a barrel of oil on international markets, and increases strengthen the position of private companies and multinationals operating in the sector.

At the same time, these same factors have a negative affect on Brazil's industrial development. It is for this reason that the workers are seeking to prevent the privatisation of the state-owned company in order to safeguard jobs, resume production in the refineries and put and end to imports of oil derivatives.

The strike and demonstrations are taking place in an atmosphere of protest, given that for more than one week independent truckers in Brazil have been striking against rising diesel prices. The Government, for its part, has been speaking of a "lockout" by the transport companies.

All this has led to shortages in fuel and basic products, flights have been cancelled, factory production has been halted due to a lack of supplies, and animals have died as a result of shortages in animal feed. The country is going through an unprecedented crisis. The solution is a return to democracy and the establishment of a legitimate government.

"IndustriALL expresses its solidarity with the Brazilian people and the FUP, supports the demands of the tanker drivers, and demands that Petrobras uses its own refineries and does not sell them off to foreign investors. If the refineries are sold, the Brazilian people will have to pay much more for petrol, diesel and cooking gas. Changes in the policy of fuel prices barely serves the interests of international financial capital, absurdly increases profits and harms the Brazilian people", concludes Valter Sanches, general secretary of IndustriALL.

IndustriALL Global Union’s statement on recent developments on steel and aluminium tariffs

In these circumstances, IndustriALL will increase its efforts to combat the persistent global problem of steel and aluminium overcapacity. Although we strongly support efforts to preserve and create jobs in the steel and aluminium industries, we criticize the implementation of tariffs which, as in this case, are indiscriminate, unilateral, and unfair and can provoke a trade war, which in turn would put at risk thousands of jobs in several countries.

Our governments must coordinate efforts in international forums such as the OECD Steel Committee and the Global Forum on Steel Excess Capacity to pressure China to reduce its capacity, to end unfair practices that create overcapacity, and to prevent it to happen in other countries. IndustriALL Global Union will continue to support those efforts, continue to participate in the OECD Steel Committee, and will continue to seek to open the Global Forum on Steel Excess Capacity to trade union participation.

We further commit to increasing collaboration among our unions in combatting the problem of global overcapacity of steel and aluminium. This collaboration will help to ensure that our global union power and solidarity are strengthened. In this sense, IndustriALL Global Union will participate at the IndustriALL Europe Base Metals meeting in Brussels next week to discuss this issue.

We will keep on working together in solidarity with all our affiliates in the steel and aluminium sectors so that unilateral governmental decisions do not threaten jobs anywhere in the world.

Exxon bars workers from joining shareholders’ meeting

Two hundred workers have been on strike for about a year against a maintenance contractor that works for ExxonMobil’s Australian subsidiary, Esso Australia. The contractor has slashed wages and benefits and imposed a more burdensome work schedule.

Steven Soloman, one of four Australian workers who travelled to Dallas attended the meeting, ready to challenge the company over the hundreds of millions of dollars it has spent on union-busting efforts. Company officials, however, refused to allow him to speak.

The company also took the extreme step of banning the other three Australian workers from admittance to the meeting, despite remarks from ExxonMobil CEO Darren Woods acknowledging that the company would need its world-class work force to reach its goal of doubling productivity in downstream and chemical sectors and tripling productivity in upstream activities by 2025.

The company stated that the workers were barred in order to protect shareholder safety. However, none of the three banned union members have been charged with any crimes related to their legal strike in Australia.

The three barred union members were able to make their presence known outside the meeting by handing out leaflets to shareholders detailing their struggles and by speaking to a crowd of other organizations in attendance.

IndustriALL energy director Diana Junquera Curiel says that Exxon banning four trade unionists with the required documentation to enter the meeting is unacceptable.

There are no ongoing negotiations with ESSO/UGL and the 200 striking workers, and their families, deserve better. IndustriALL is calling on Exxon to find a solution to this conflict that has been going on for a year, to establish a dialogue with unions and to stop outsourcing.

Members from IndustriALL US affiliate USW joined the shareholders’ meeting to confront Exxon on the treatment of the Australian contractors and to advocate for greater transparency from the company on its political spending with the company.

USW member and ExxonMobil employee Ricky Brooks, president of Local 13-2001, presented shareholders with a proposal, on behalf of the USW and 25 co-filers, that would require ExxonMobil to file a report detailing the company’s spending on political lobbying, both individually and through industry groups, each year. The proposal received 26 percent of shareholders’ votes.

In addition to advocating for the transparency proposal, Brooks spoke out about safety issues at his Baytown, Texas, facility and brought attention to the unjust actions ExxonMobil has supported against the striking union members in Australia.

Haitian government denounced at the ILO

Said IndustriALL Global Union’s project and rights Officer Suzanna Miller:

“For workers in the Haitian garment industry, including members of our affiiate GOSTTRA, ILO standards on working hours and the 48-hour working week are meaningless concepts. Not because they don’t care about their rights, but because all they can afford to think about are the hours they have to work in order to survive on starvation wages.“

In theory, workers in Haiti’s garment sector typically start at about 7am and work till 4pm. In practice, though, it’s a different story, as workers often put in several more hours off the clock in order to reach their daily production quotas.

Explained Miller:

“Not reaching the daily production quota can have a devastating impact. Without it, workers are left with only the minimum wage of 350 gourdes a month, about a third of what they need to survive.

“Excessively high targets. Off the clock working. Underpayment of overtime: This is nothing short of wage theft. The failure of the Haitian government to uphold international standards and national laws is giving employers and their multinational customers free reign to steal from some of world’s poorest workers.

“Now, to make matters worse, the government has introduced a new law on working time which repeals existing standards on overtime, weekly rest and Sunday pay and nightime rates.

“In May of last year, workers at 22 garment factories went on strike to demand higher wages. Dozens of union leaders and members of our affiliate GOSTTRA have yet to be reinstated, in spite of very clear recommendations following an investigation by the ILO’s Better Work programme. Not only were they not reinstated, they were also blacklisted. Meanwhile, the government continues to sit on its hands.

“Just ten days ago thousands garment workers again took to the streets of Port-au-Prince to demand a wage increase. With their leaders dismissed, their legal rights trampled and their laws rolled back, their kids going hungry and the debts piling up, they simply had no other choice.“

Concluded Miller:

“Without better wages and respect for union rights, ILO Conventions on hours of work will remain purely academic. And without those rights, there will be no lasting social peace in Haiti’s garment industry.“

ICT, electricals and electronics unions resolve to intensify organizing

Takahiro Nonaka, co-chairperson of the IndustriALL ICT EE sector said:

Workers around the world in ICT EE sector are facing increasing challenges of precarious work and now confront new questions emerging from rapid technological change, which will affect the industry both in good and bad ways. The trade union movements need to strengthen our capabilities and strategically build global solidarities to help one another.

The steering committee meeting witnessed frank discussion over a series of issues including ongoing union organizing initiatives, organizing non-manual, women and young migrant workers, union activities and campaign against precarious work, future organizing strategy and defending workers rights in the supply chain and strategies to improve occupational safety and health (OSH) measures.

Prihanani Boenadi, co-chairperson of the IndustriALL ICT EE sector said:

Achieving gender equality and at least 40per cent women representation in union structures and activities should be one of the primary objectives of the unions. Our unions are progressively advancing with enhanced women participation and we need to intensify this process. Increased women participation will enable unions to effectively defend workers rights as ICT EE sector consist of large amount of women workforce.

Union representatives from Indonesia, Malaysia, Vietnam and Philippines shared respective union’s organizing efforts, increasing union membership and their struggle to win wage increases, improving working conditions and OSH measures.

Jenny Holdcroft, assistant general secretary of IndustriALL said:

In recent times we witnessed enormous progress in bringing more workers into union folds. However, the ICT EE industry continue to be the difficult space for organizing as some of the leading companies that have large and complex supply chain in the sector are hostile to trade union activities. Unions need to work strategically to create space for dialogue with multinational corporations while breaking new grounds for organizing in their supply chain.

Union representatives from France, Singapore and United Kingdom shared strategies adopted by unions on issues emerging from the gradual ascent of Industry 4.0. They underlined that it is important for unions to engage effectively with the government’s policy initiatives and employers’ future plans in order to influence them to protect workers’ interests. Simultaneously, unions need empower their membership and work with employers to re-imagine the future of work, redesign jobs and re-skill workers and employers.

Kan Matsuzaki, IndustriALL ICT director said:

IndustriALL affiliates have made significant progress in organizing new members into their unions, which will enable them to effectively defend workers rights, while increasing paying membership. Our affiliates are well on the way to achieve the target of more than 15000 newly recruited members in ICT EE sector.
Towards building union power, affiliates have strategically moved forward with establishing and strengthening trade union networks in companies such as IBM, SIEMENS, NXP, Ericsson, STMicroelectronics and GE. We are also striving for more such networks and launch new global framework agreements. Further, we are forming new alliances with other global union federations and civil society networks like ‘Good Electronics’ to counterbalance powerful MNCs, while deepening union density to gain negotiating space in the companies.

On 29 May all participants visited Siemens' Kalwa Factory in Mumbai and interacted with management officials and union representatives. The factory visit enabled participants to understand that IndustriALL’s GFA with Siemens empowered to establish progressive industrial relations in the factory.

DRC unions close ranks against Glencore

The affiliates agreed not to compete amongst themselves but cooperate and give each other necessary support in the upcoming social elections for union representatives at workplaces that are held every three years according to the DRC labour laws.

The grievances that were raised by workers to the IndustriALL fact-finding mission to Glencore’s copper and cobalt mines in the DRC which went to Kolwezi in February were read and adopted as the reality prevailing in the mines. The grievances included workers’ rights abuses through constant threats of dismissals, poor adherence to health and safety standards, occupational diseases, racism and discrimination, unfair and unjust job classifications, low pay, inferior pay for Congolese workers versus foreign ones. Further, workers complained of inadequate drinking water during shifts and that no laundry, ablution facilities and showers existed at the mines. The hospital was also too far away for workers' families.

These are the grievances that IndustriALL took to the Glencore AGM in Zug, Switzerland in May where TUMEC was joined by trade union representatives from Australia, Canada, Italy, South Africa, Spain, Switzerland and Zambia and NGOs who demonstrated outside and later attended the meeting.

The affiliates agreed to support CSC which is the majority union that currently chairs the ten unions represented at Mutanda Mine. They will also support each other by developing common positions at KCC and supporting the same candidates at the two mines in the social elections.

In their organizing and recruitment drives, the affiliates will also not compete for members but will instead work as a unit and collaborate to build the strengths of their unions.

The meeting set up an IndustriALL Lualaba provincial committee of six members to coordinate the Glencore campaign and other pressing issues that the unions are facing.

Says Charles Kumbi, IndustriALL Sub Saharan Africa region project officer:

“What was emphasized at the meeting is the need for the union leadership to involve workers in whatever decisions they make. It is important for workers to participate in decision making as this promotes participatory democracy in the unions which is key to building strong unions in the DRC. This will also counter the practices by mining companies to divide the workers by pitting them against the other.”

Namibian union declares dispute over retrenchments of 600 workers at Langer Heinrich Uranium mine

The LHU mine, a subsidiary of Australia’s Paladin Energy, has given notice to retrench 600 workers and put the mine on care and maintenance citing lowest spot uranium prices in 15 years. The company says uranium prices have not recovered since the Fukushima nuclear disaster in 2011 that was triggered by an earthquake and a tsunami. The mine, which employs 317 permanent workers, while the rest are employed by contractors, only wants to retain 20 workers, and has informed the ministry of mines and energy, the labour commissioner, and the provincial governor of its intentions.

However, Paladin doesn’t want to sell the mine but to keep it as an asset until prices pick up. Uranium spot prices are averaging US$30 but contract prices are higher. Contracts are signed years in advance of making the first delivery. In 2017 LHU produced 3.4 million pounds (1542 metric tonnes) mainly from stockpiled ore. Uranium is used in nuclear reactors. According to the World Nuclear Association there are 447 nuclear power reactors globally, with 61 under construction.

Concerned about the job losses which will affect hundreds of its members MUN is fighting for fair severance packages and has declared a dispute of interest according to Namibia’s labour laws and is questioning how the proposed severance packages were arrived at. Further, the union says LHU is negotiating in bad faith by not giving the union enough time to consider the retrenchment packages that it is proposing.

In a petition to the LHU, the MUN expresses “disappointment and dissatisfaction in the way the company has approached this very serious and equally sensitive issue of the care and maintenance decision. Despite having an active recognition and procedural agreement, the company instead elected to address a memo to the union without attempting to engage the union prior to making the decision.” The union demands that LHU considers workers families and financial obligations when coming up with the severance packages.

Says Glen Mpufane, IndustriALL director of mining:

“We expect global multinational mining companies to mine responsibly and respect the human rights of workers. This also applies to fair compensation of workers when there are retrenchments. It is unacceptable for mining companies to continue sacrificing workers’ livelihoods for profits.”

Kazakhstan: union leader, prisoner of conscience, is released

The local court decided to release Kushakbayev on parole on 10 May. The decision was not contested and the release became effective on 28 May. He was released the day the International Labour Conference (ILC) of the ILO began in Geneva. At the ILC last year, IndustriALL and other international and national union organizations raised the case of the imprisoned leaders in conjunction with the trade union rights violations in the country.

Kushakbayev was sentenced on 7 April 2017 to two and a half years for instigating an illegal workers’ strike against the dissolution of the Confederation of Independent Trade Unions of Kazakhstan (KNPRK), to which OCC trade union was affiliated.

The OCC union itself is facing dissolution. On 4 May, at the hearing of its case in the court of the city of Aktau trialing dispute between union members and Berik Bekbayev, appointed by the employer as acting chair of the OCC union after Yeleusinov’s arrest, it became known that the OCC union had already been liquidated in April by the decision of Mangystau regional economic court based on the Mangystau governor’s lawsuit. The union is trying to appeal the decision of the Mangystau court. The hearing of the appeal will take place on 30 May.

The Oil Construction Company is a part of KazMunaiGas, the largest state oil and gas company in Kazakhstan. KazMunaiGas is known for its notorious involvement in the major labour dispute at Zhanaozen which resulted in riots with 17 killed and many protesting workers wounded in 2011.

On 22 May, workers of the Oil Services Company, another subsidiary of KazMunaiGas, refused to work, demanding an end to lay-offs and better working conditions. The company has developed a 5/50 programme, inviting workers to resign and receive compensation worth 50 per cent of five-years’ wages.

Workers of pre-retirement age, as well as those whose health was deteriorated due to working in harmful conditions, agreed to the proposal of early retirement. However, most workers do not want to lose their jobs. The authorities promised to consider the workers’ demands within a month.

Kemal Özkan, IndustriALL assistant general secretary, says:

“We are pleased that our brothers Amin and Nurbek are freed, however they faced large fines and are not fully exonerated from the charges. After their release on parole the union leaders will not be able to occupy leading positions in public organizations including trade unions for other five years. The international trade union movement expects that the Kazakh authorities change the law on trade unions, bringing it into line with international labour standards, primarily with ILO Convention Nos. 87 and 98, so that workers can create and join trade unions by their own decision, without any interference of the state.”

ILC announces list of countries to come under scrutiny

Included in the list are countries where IndustriALL Global Union trade union affiliates are directly affected. These include Algeria, Belarus, Brazil, Haiti, Mexico, Nigeria and the Ukraine.

The Committee on the Application Standards (CAS), which is made up of representatives of government, employer and worker delegates, checks how International Labour Organisation (ILO) standards ratified by member states are being applied.

Following the publication of the shortlist, governments are invited to respond and provide information on the case in question, which will be addressed in the plenary of the Conference.

In Algeria and Mexico, the CAS will examine cases on violations of the fundamental ILO Convention 87 on Freedom of Association and Protection of the Right to Organise.

Belarus will be scrutinized under Forced Labour Convention 29, while Brazil and Nigeria, will come under examination for breaching ILO Convention 98 on the Right to Organise and Collective Bargaining Convention.

In Haiti, the CAS will address violations of multiple Conventions on hours of work and weekly rest (Numbers 91, 14, 30, 106), and the Ukrainian government will be invited to supply information on violations of labour inspection Conventions 81 and 129.

See the full shortlist of cases to be examined by the CAS here.

For more information on the cases, read the report of the Committee of Experts on the Application of Conventions and Recommendations.