VW workers declare indefinite strike against redundancies at Taubaté plant in Brazil

After failing to reach an agreement with the Taubaté Metalworkers’ Union, Volkswagen management irresponsibly announced 100 redundancies at the plant after deciding against discussing other options with the union.

On the same day as the company made its announcement, 5,500 workers responded by voting to begin an indefinite strike in support of their demand for the reinstatement of their colleagues. On 19 August, a mass meeting took place at the plant to express support and solidarity with the workers. The meeting was attended by representatives of the United Autoworkers (UAW), affiliated to IndustriALL Global Union, and unions from São Carlos, Anchieta, Curitiba and Resende affiliated to the CUT, Força Sindical and the UGT.

Negotiations are continuing under the auspices of the labour justice system. A mediation hearing is scheduled for 25 August.

Jorge Almeida, IndustriALL Regional Secretary, expressed the global union’s  support for the Volkswagen workers by writing a letter of solidarity, in which he said:

IndustriALL Global Union vigorously condemns the actions of Volkswagen Brazil, which, instead of negotiating an agreement between the two parties, announced in an irresponsible manner that it was making 100 workers redundant. We are calling on Volkswagen Brazil to think again and exhaust the possibilities for negotiating in order to avoid an unwanted dispute. IndustriaALL is following events closely and is ready to provide whatever solidarity is necessary.”

Argentina textile unions unite to campaign against precarious work

Clandestine sweatshops staffed mainly by foreign workers who have no basic labour rights are common in the textile sector in Argentina. Unions in the sector met IndustriALL representatives to discuss how to improve working conditions for these workers. They agreed to start a campaign against precarious work on the eve of the World Day for Decent Work on 7 October.

The meeting was attended by representatives of the Textile Workers’ Association (Asociación Obrera Textil, AOT), the National Clothing Industry Workers’ Federation (Federación Obrera Nacional de la Industria del Vestido y Afines, FONIVA), the Clothing Industry Workers’ Union (Sindicato Obrero de la Industria del Vestido y Afines, SOIVA) and the Clothing Cutters’ Union (Union Cortadores de la Indumentaria, UCI) all affiliated to IndustriALL, and the Union of Textile Industry Employees (Sindicato de Empleados Textiles de la Industria y Afines, SETIA). The meeting was also attended by IndustriALL Regional Secretary Jorge Almeida and the Precarious Work Project coordinators, Armelle Seby (world) and Elías Pintado (regional).

Precarious work in clandestine sweatshops

Each union representative described the problems they face and proposed possible solutions. One issue is the immigration of workers who come to work in the country in the clandestine textile sweatshops. About 2.7 million Bolivians have migrated to Argentina lured by promises of a decent job.

However, they are employed in precarious working conditions with no health insurance. They work long hours and are often injured at work because of the lack of safety measures. The unions therefore agreed to organize a high profile campaign to try and attract the attention of the government and textile companies. 

“We have to make them realize that they have a social duty to provide decent working conditions. We are talking here about slave labour, child labour and clandestine sweatshops. There are thousands of sweatshops involved in sewing and cutting clothes with these working conditions in the Flores district. We are very keen to take strong action to influence legislation. It is essential that unions focus on this at every single company,” explained Heraldo Pablo Mage of the UCI.

Armelle Seby and Elías Pintado said that precarious work is one of IndustriALL’s five priorities. Unions are encouraged to add this issue to their agenda in order to stop precarious work becoming more widespread. IndustriALL recommends three methods of action: campaigns to promote better legislation; campaigns to promote union membership; and collective bargaining. The aim is to build sustainable joint strategies in all these three areas.

The meeting proposed action plans and further planning seminars and agreed on the importance of improving contact between IndustriALL-affiliated unions to facilitate information exchange, improve support for each other and build a joint agenda. Finally, they agreed to hold another meeting before 7 October to draw up an action plan for a campaign against precarious work.

Jorge Almeida assessed the importance of the meeting in these terms:

“Precarious work requires us to reorganize our work and improve the day-to-day operation of trade unions. We congratulate the textile workers’ unions in Argentina who agreed to send representatives to this meeting and discuss how to strengthen union work to promote decent jobs.”

USW mobilizes for fair contracts in steel industry

Rallies and marches have been planned from 19 to 21 August at ArcelorMittal facilities in four states: West Virginia, Pennsylvania, Ohio and Indiana.

At the same time, USW members are also participating in a series of events targeting 12 plants in six states belonging to Allegheny Technologies (ATI).

In June, the Steelworkers entered into negotiations of new master agreements at both ArcelorMittal and U.S. Steel, which employ around 30,000 USW members combined. Both contracts are scheduled to expire on 1 September.

The USW reports that both ArcelorMittal and U.S. Steel persist in their proposals to drive down compensation and force union members to pay significantly more for active and retired health benefits that are unlikely to provide the coverage of the current plans.

“We recognize that this is a difficult time for the steel industry,” said USW International President Leo W. Gerard, “but we also recognize that for generations, these have been good, middle-class jobs that have allowed workers to care for their families and support their communities.

“It is important that we make sure that remains true for our generation and for those who come after us,” Leo W. Gerard added.

Steelworkers at U.S. Steel have been organizing strike and lockout preparation sessions at local unions across the country.  Local union activists at each site are coming together to make plans to organizing picket lines, mobilize community support, and administer strike or lockout assistance in the event of a work stoppage.

Elsewhere, steelmaker Allegheny Technologies announced on 14 August the lockout of 2,200 steelworkers at 12 sites around the country. The lockout is the culmination of a months-long campaign by ATI management to force workers to accept draconian and unnecessary concessions. The United Steelworkers say ATI is spending millions of dollars on bringing outsiders to replace skilled and experienced union members even though the union has never threatened to strike or even conducted a strike authorization vote.

IndustriALL assistant general secretary Fernando Lopes said, “IndustriALL and our 50 million member strong family fully supports the USW members in their fight for fair contracts for the welfare of workers and their families.”

Industry bargaining for living wages

In garment industry supply chains, exploitative working conditions are standard. Workers are forced to work long hours, often far beyond legal boundaries, for poverty wages and in poor conditions.

Decades of public campaigning and recurrent fires and building collapses occasioning multiple deaths have given a high level of visibility to labour conditions in garment supply chains. But responses by those companies at the top of the chain have not been able to bring about the fundamental change necessary.

Building new models of cooperation

Corporate social responsibility (CSR) programs rely on auditing and compliance to attempt to improve conditions in the factories, which produce for them. These unilateral, voluntary and nonbinding efforts have overwhelmingly failed to improve wages and working hours or to ensure respect for workers’ right to join a union. Notoriously, social auditing and certification bodies SAI and BSCI gave clean bills of health, respectively, to Ali Enterprises before it burnt down killing 254 workers and Rana Plaza before it collapsed, killing 1129 workers.

IndustriALL policy director Jenny Holdcroft says:

“Violations of the rights of garment workers, low pay and excessive working hours are a global problem to which there needs to be a global response. We need a fundamental change to the way that production is organized in garment supply chains to provide relief to workers from poverty wages and crippling working hours.”

Such a fundamental change may be the legacy of the Rana Plaza collapse. The Bangladesh Accord on Fire and Building Safety is a legally-binding agreement between global unions and more than 200 clothing companies.

Through the Accord experience, unions and companies have identified the elements that must be present in order for strategies to improve supply chain labour standards to be effective:

These experiences have made it possible for garment companies and IndustriALL Global Union to join forces to apply such an approach to living wages in the garment industry, in a process known as ACT.

Identifying the root causes

Garment workers are currently under-represented by trade unions which face massive barriers to organizing from both employers and governments. Over 90 per cent of workers in the global garment industry have no possibility to negotiate on their wages and conditions and so are not able to claim their fair share of the value that they generate.

Garment sector wages in Bangladesh are currently $68 a month, but unions say that these need to increase to at least $120 for workers to be able to support themselves and their families adequately. In Cambodia, the minimum wage has risen to $128, but this is still well below union demands for a living wage.

The absence of industry wage bargaining in the garment industry has left workers reliant on ineffective minimum wage mechanisms for any wage increases. While minimum wage fixing at least establishes a common floor, the wages that result are well below the level of a living wage in most major garment producing countries like Cambodia and Bangladesh.

Particularly in supply chain industries, bargaining at the level of individual factories will never be enough to drive up pay and conditions when MNCs can simply move to suppliers with lower standards and lower labour costs. Efforts by individual MNCs to raise standards meet with opposition in their supplier factories, which have to compete with other factories on labour costs. Even if buyers increase the prices they pay, without collective bargaining in place there is no guarantee that the increases will be passed on to workers. Furthermore, most suppliers have multiple buyers, all of whom negotiate prices with them individually.

Industry bargaining is key

Industry bargaining enables the particular features of the textile and garment industry to be taken into account in wage structures in a way that minimum wage fixing processes are unable to do. It enables comprehensive agreements to be reached that take into account all relevant issues including wages, overtime, working hours, production peaks and productivity and efficiency.

Jenny Holdcroft says that collective bargaining at industry level is the missing mechanism that will enable significant progress to be made towards living wages for garment workers:

“Industry-wide agreements make it very difficult for employers to escape their obligations. They effectively take labour costs out of competition by creating a level playing field that enables conditions to improve for all workers in an industry.

“The incentive then is to compete on the basis of efficiency and quality rather than by undermining wages and working conditions. Factories have a collective interest in ensuring that they are not undercut by unscrupulous employers paying wages lower than the prevailing rate.”

By covering all workers in an industry, industry agreements ensure the inclusion of the most vulnerable workers including the many precarious workers, migrant workers, contract workers and home workers found in the garment industry.

MoU on living wages in the garment industry

IndustriALL has signed a Memorandum of Understanding with each of the brands involved in the ACT process. The MoU is explicit in identifying the development of industry bargaining in garment producing countries as essential to achieving living wages and the need for effective recognition of workers’ rights to freedom of association and collective bargaining in order for this to be realized.

The ACT process will develop the means to link the supply chain responsibilities of buying companies to the collective bargaining process between local unions and employers. This will involve developing contractual or other mechanisms that support suppliers to implement the negotiated wage. Commitments to continued sourcing and greater stability of orders will be key, as will commitments that prices paid will take account of negotiated increases.

By linking national industry-level collective bargaining between unions and employers to the purchasing practices of brands, the ACT process creates a framework for genuine supply chain industrial relations. Through industry bargaining, wages can be negotiated at a level that enables workers to properly support themselves and their families while addressing the specific nature of the industry, working hours, productivity and other issues that have bearing on wages.

To ensure that the agreed rate is actually paid, the resulting agreements need to be registered and legally enforceable under national laws. Factories also have to have the means to pay the agreed rate and this is achieved through reforming purchasing practices. All three elements must be present to create a system that will actually deliver on living wages.

The ACT process aims to transform the way that wages are set, by establishing industry agreements supported by brand purchasing practices as the primary means of wage fixing in the global garment industry. This is an ambitious aim, which will require significant political will, particularly in those countries that supply cheap labour to global supply chains.

The way forward

For the first time, the ACT process has established the commitment of IndustriALL and major clothing brands to working together to create a system that addresses the structural barriers to living wages. The outcome will be to increase garment workers’ wages in a way that is scalable, sustainable and enforceable.

Drawing on these experiences, and those of the Bangladesh Accord, there is no reason why similar models cannot be developed that institutionalize relationships between buyers, factories and workers to address other labour rights problems that are entrenched in the very way that supply chains are managed.

There is now an opportunity to remodel the industrial relations architecture to address the realities of employment relationships and working conditions in today’s global supply chains, towards genuine supply chain industrial relations.

Click here to read the full paper which will appear in the International Journal of Labour Relations in December 2015.

Upcoming elections at Honda in Mexico to be closely watched

The independent Honda workers union, STUHM, has been demanding bargaining rights for over four years. If STUHM prevails and wins the election, Honda will become one of only a handful of car assembly plants in Mexico – the world’s fourth largest car exporter – to have an independent union.

IndustriALL Global Union and its affiliates worldwide in the sector, as well as independent unions in Mexico, have given their support to STUHM in their efforts for clean elections. IndustriALL affiliates, the Confederation of Japan Automobile Workers’ Unions (JAW) and Federation of All Honda Workers’ Unions (AHWU), expressed their solidarity support with Honda workers in Mexico demanding that Honda de Mexico management "guarantee a just and fair election based on workers' own will” should the union election go ahead. 

IndustriALL has demanded a guarantee from the federal board of conciliation and arbitration that the election will be free and fair and that basic steps will be taken to ensure the integrity of the process.

In Mexico, the majority of workers are covered by ‘protection contracts’ (sham collective agreements entered into without the knowledge or consent of workers).

STUHM’s experience is sadly all too common in Mexico. In June of this year, after four years of waiting, the federal labour board finally issued the list of registered voters – and then, in a glaring case of double standards, gave the union only a few days to make objections to the thousands of names on the list.

To STUHM’s dismay, it was found that the list was riddled with errors, including for instance the names of workers who were long dead. This fiasco prompted IndustriALL to write to the board, demanding that a reliable list be made available and that other basic safeguards be put in place in line with international standards.

In his second letter to the president of the federal board of conciliation and arbitration of Mexico, IndustriALL's general secretary, Jyrki Raina, demanded that :

In further exchanges, IndustriALL reminded the authorities that the situation had become so serious that the Honda case had been raised on the floor of International Labour Conference in Geneva and that all eyes were now on Mexico to ensure that Honda workers get the right, without any further delay, to join the union of their own choosing.

The federal labour board will convene a hearing at the end of August to determine next steps.

Four-day drivers’ strike to hit Indesit deliveries in UK

Unite says: “The delivery of thousands of ‘white goods’, from fridge freezers, washing machines to cookers, will be severely disrupted as more than 200 drivers and warehouse staff at Indesit UK Ltd gear up for four days of strike action in a pay dispute.”

The strikes are planned to start on 6am and will last for 24 hours on 21 August; 48 hours on 27 August; and 24 hours on 1 September.

At the same time, workers will apply work-to-rule action from midnight on 19 August until 6am on 21 August and from midnight on 25 August until 6am on 27 August.

The company’s offer guaranteeing a 45 hour-a-week for redundancy pay and bringing forward the introduction of the London weighting (a special allowance to compensate for the increased cost of living in the capital) for drivers’ assistants to this year, was rejected when presented to the members.

Unite regional officer Mark Plumb said: “It is abundantly clear that this dispute centres on the derisory 1.5 per cent offer which was below inflation at the time of the anniversary date in January.

The pay offer is equal to the one made in 2014, when the inflation rate was two per cent.

“Our members are tired of being fobbed off year-on-year with one-off bonuses, which may never materialise or when they do are worth virtually nothing. Our members are seeking a substantial increase in their basic pay after years of below inflation pay rises,” said Mark Plumb.

Colombian unions take action to recruit outsourced workers

Recruiting new members among outsourced workers is a step towards achieving direct employment contracts for these workers and making it possible for them to reap the benefits of collective bargaining and collective agreements and recover their right to strike. At the seminar held on 28-29 July, Sintracarbón and USO, trade unions affiliated to IndustriALL Global Union, presented their successful experiences in recruiting new members among outsourced workers at Cerrejón and Ecopetrol respectively.

Some union leaders have criticized this initiative because they believe it validates outsourcing. However, the unions have explained that their aim is to establish a platform for action that will make it possible for these workers to achieve better working and living conditions.

Sintraelecol, also affiliated to IndustriALL, followed the example of Sintracarbón and USO. With support from the National Trade Union School (Escuela Nacional Sindical) and IndustriALL, Sintraelecol leaders prepared a list of demands to present to ENEL (Codensa and Emgesa) in Bogota and Cundinamarca and to the Bogota Energy Company (EEB).  With the commitment and support of all workers at energy generation, marketing and transmission workplaces, the union negotiated a collective agreement that covers contract workers as well as the small number of directly employed workers. The company agreed to respect the law and the freedom of association.

“The unions should recruit massive numbers of outsourced workers. They should be sector level unions able to create a favourable balance of forces and defend workers’ rights. We must build on this to negotiate framework collective agreements that cover all outsourced workers so they get the same conditions as directly employed workers. We should all get involved in this fight. Sintracarbon and USO have made impressive progress on this issue”, said Carlos Bustos, IndustriALL Projects Coordinator in Colombia.

Workers protest against ‘return to apartheid’ at Rio Tinto in Namibia

Last Friday’s protest follows workers downing tools in July after Rio Tinto installed surveillance equipment in haul trucks. The workers are represented by IndustriALL affiliate Mineworkers Union of Namibia (MUN).

The Rössing workers’ petition says the surveillance equipment – including a voice recorder hidden behind the operator’s seat – was installed by management without consultation in violation of Rio Tinto’s code of conduct “The way we work”.

IndustriALL recently documented Rio Tinto’s systematic violation of its own code of conduct in Rio Tinto; the way it really works.

The petition also raises victimization of workers’ representatives, the company unilaterally changing conditions of work, and safety concerns.

Safety concerns are widespread among workers at Rio Tinto. This year there have already been worker fatalities at Rio Tinto in Canada, Chile, Indonesia, Madagascar and South Africa.

Rössing workers’ demands include the withdrawal of charges against workers that protested the installation of surveillance equipment, that management respect company policy, and that management treat workers with respect.

MUN also recently raised concern about the increasing use of precarious labour at Rössing. Precarious labour includes temporary, casual and contracted-out work that is often low-wage, low-benefit and insecure.

Workers at Rössing are preparing for the 7 October global day of action at Rio Tinto. 7 October is a day on which unions around the world mobilize against precarious work as part of IndustriALL’s STOP Precarious Work campaign. Unions around the world at Rio Tinto will call on Rio Tinto to stop using precarious work and instead provide safe jobs with good wages and benefits.

Female mine workers – colleagues not sex objects

Speaking at conference addressing health and safety in mining in South Africa on 7 August, Phumeza Mgengo, who is national secretary of the women’s section at NUM, said:

"We as women are viewed as sex objects in most cases. If women are given tasks which require them to bend [over], your middle area is exposed and that leads to sexual harassment.”

She told participants that women are complaining of abuse and discrimination from their co-workers in mining:

"When they [men] see us, they don't see colleagues, they see sex objects."

South Africa’s mining industry has been marred by acts of violence against women. In March this year, a woman was raped at the Thembelani mine in Rustenburg and in December last year, a male contract worker was convicted of the brutal rape and murder of female miner, Pinky Mosiane, who was working underground at Anglo Platinum’s Khomanani mine in 2012.

IndustriALL’s director of mining, Glen Mpufane, said:

“Sexual violence against women is widespread and unreported by victims due to fear of reprisals, intimidation and losing their jobs.

According to official figures, the number of women working in mining has risen from six per cent of the workforce at the beginning of 2008 to 16 per cent at the end of 2104. However, women are underrepresented in all hierarchical positions.

“Discrimination against women is deeply rooted and demands change,” added Mpufane.

In one month’s time, Phumeza Mgengo will speak about women’s health and safety in mining at IndustriALL’s World Women Conference in Austria on 15 and 16 September.

IndustriALL Global Union responds to the mining and metals crisis

The mining and metals global sector came out of the financial crisIs of 2008 to 2012 unscathed. In the midst of the global recession in 2008, induced by the global financial crisis, the mining industry experienced a commodities boom. The boom was largely fuelled by the growth of China and India and created an unprecedented demand for coal, mineral resources and precious stones. Against the background of the financial crises, mining companies outperformed the overall market. Most mining companies came through the crises with robust balance sheets.

Paradoxically, mine workers did not benefit from the boom. Any benefits in mineworkers’ conditions of employment, in mainly wages and salaries, were the results of blood, sweat, tears, toiling through tough and often brutal collective bargaining.

Even with healthy balance sheets the captains of the industry remained oblivious to the needs of its workforce. Instead, they went on a crazy spending spree, rewarding themselves with hefty pay increases and bonuses, made irresponsible investment on risky project pipelines, and flooded the market with unmitigated production targets. Now the chickens have come home to roost.

Boom times could not last forever and the party ended when China and India’s economies began to slow down and even began to contract. Not surprisingly, workers are expected to brace themselves for hard times and take the brunt for the collapsing commodity prices, even though they have had no hand in the unfolding tragedy of job losses and massive lay-offs as these companies embark on massive cost containment measures.

From being touted as the most important asset for mining companies, they are now considered as liabilities and are thrown out to join the mass of the unemployed and thus externalizing the social cost to society and the state. It is wicked that at the same time as mineworkers are bearing the brunt of the collapsing commodity prices, the mining companies are paying dividends to their shareholders.

IndustriALL Global Union is calling on the mining industry to act responsibly in these difficult times for mine workers and their families. Our affiliates are reporting disturbing trends that mining companies, in their haste to reduce costs, undermine trade unions by approaching and coercing individual workers to accept voluntary retrenchments.

Some of these mining companies further violate national laws that require consultations with trade unions. In this instance, precarious work and the precariousness of work is increasing.

The Chairperson of the mining sector of IndustriALL Global Union and General Secretary of the Construction, Forestry, Mining and Energy Union, Andrew Vickers commenting on the unfolding tragedy, says:

IndustriALL Global Union is putting these mining companies on notice that they should immediately desist from these nefarious behavior and actions. They must enter into dialogue with the affected national unions to find mutually acceptable solutions to the crisis.

Retrenchment should be a measure of last resort and if retrenchments and lay-offs are unavoidable, then due process that respect the country laws and regulations must be respected.