Korea: planned actions 2014

On 7 October IndustriALL affiliate Korean Metal Workers' Union plans a mass rally of precarious workers and flash mobs jointly with KCTU in Seoul where workers will be calling on the "Real Employer" (principle employer) to step up and be accountable for working conditions.

Precarious workers from throughout metal sector will picket a Hyundai motor sales center on 10 October at 3 pm with the "STOP Precarious Work!" logo printed on scarves and pickets.

About 1500 precarious workers will come to Seoul on Saturday and protest Hyundai and Kia's appeal of the recent landmark Seoul District Central Court rulings for regularization of the precarious workers at Hyundai Motor and Kia Motor. 

KMWU will invite press to attend this rally, entitled "Rally of Precarious Workers Calling for Immediate Implementation of the Court Ruling on Illegal Dispatch, Imprisonment of Lawbreaker Hyundai Motor Chairman CHUNG  Mong-Koo and CHUNG Eui-sun, and a STOP to in-company Subcontracting System." 

Uruguay: planned actions 2014

On 07 October in Uruguay, all IndustriALL affiliates jointly with other unions will hold a conference to discuss the issue of precarious work, also a special publication analizing about deveelopment of labour realtios in the coutnry "Labour Realtions in Uruguay. 10 years of developments" elaborated by the Instituto Cuesta Duarte will be released at the 

Precarious workers exposed to higher health and safety risks

The majority of the unions at Rio Tinto report an increase in the use of precarious work by the company. In France, precarious workers represent around 25 per cent of the workforce whereas five to ten years ago they represented only five per cent. At Qit Madagascar Minerals there are twice as many precarious workers as direct employees. In May this year, Rio Tinto made permanent workers redundant at Hail Creek mine in Australia while continuing to employ casual workers. This illustrates very well Rio Tinto’s race to maximise its profits by replacing its permanent workforce with precarious workers.

Rio Tinto uses triangular employment relationships to escape its responsibility, and undermine trade union work. See the case where hundreds of OMEGA employees in Madagascar were fired.

The recent four deaths at Rio Tinto’s Grasberg mine in Indonesia show once again that precarious workers at Rio Tinto face more health and safety risks than permanent workers. Unions at Rio Tinto worksites indicate that outsourced workers are treated differently from permanent workers when it comes to health and safety. At one site, precarious workers are given antiquated protective equipment compared with direct employees. This is not the only difference of treatment that outsourced workers have to face at Rio Tinto. In South Africa the wage gap between outsourced workers and direct employees is reported by the union to be huge: precarious workers are paid very low salaries and do not receive bonuses. In Alma Quebec, precarious workers earn up to 50 per cent less than permanent and direct workers.

All these abuses were condemned by the Rio Tinto global network when it met last February in Cape Town. As a result, the network decided to organize a Global Day of Action at Rio Tinto on 7 October, the day on which unions around the world mobilize against precarious work.

Unions at Rio Tinto have already fought back to limit the use of precarious work. In 2012, in Canada, after a six-month lockout at Rio Tinto in Alma, the United Steel Workers (USW) succeeded in negotiating a collective agreement limiting the use of outsourced workers to 10 per cent of the worked hours. In Kitimat, UNIFOR negotiated a collective agreement which limits the use of temporary employees to 6.5 per cent of the total hours worked.

Indonesia: another four workers killed at Freeport, Rio Tinto Grasberg mine

As a result of an accident at Freeport McMoRan’s and Rio Tinto’s Grasberg mine on 27 September 2014 four mineworkers lost their lives. Four more miners were injured and one of them seriously hurt.

On 1 October IndustriALL affiliate Chemical, Energy and Mines Workers Union (CEMWU) representing the majority of the workers at Grasberg mine went on strike and blocked the road to the mine demanding punishment of the director of mining, provision of guarantees of no more fatal accidents and for the company to pay financial support to the families of the deceased and injured. Following the strike the management came into negotiations and agreed to workers’ demands, after which the strike stopped.

In the aftermath of the Grasberg mine disaster, serious questions were raised about Freeport McMoRan’s and Rio Tinto’s commitment to mine safety. Earlier in September another worker was killed in a rockfall at Grasberg mine . These tragedies happened less than two years after 28 mineworkers died at Grasberg mine in what was described as the worst mining accident in the history of Indonesia. Another accident at the Grasberg mine killed 11 mineworkers in 2003.

In the wake of the mine accident at Grasberg on 14 May 2013, IndustriALL Global Union organized a high level delegation to Indonesia to protest against the killing of mineworkers in accidents proved to be preventable. At the end of the mission the delegation concluded that the accident clearly illustrated the urgent need for the ratification of ILO Convention 176 in Indonesia.

Jyrki Raina, IndustriALL General Secretary says,

Our condolences go to the families of the perished workers. This should not have happened. How many more lives must be lost at Grasberg before Freeport McMoRan and Rio Tinto take the safety and health of mineworkers seriously and invest in health and safety? How many should die before the Government of Indonesia decides to ratify ILO Convention 176 on mine safety? I urge now the Government of Indonesia to assume their full responsibility and urgently to start designing a safety program to prevent more deaths and injuries of workers”.

The Ministry of Energy and Mineral Resources has temporarily shut down the mine for the purpose of investigating the accident. Without preempting the outcome of the investigation into this accident, IndustriALL Global Union joins the call by the Confederation of SPSI, the National Center of CEMWU-SPSI and FSPMI-KSPI demanding ratification of ILO Convention 176. In addition, IndustriALL Global Union supports the demands of our affiliates to:

  1. Strongly urge the Police Chief Commander, Minister of Energy and Mineral Resources to thoroughly investigate the accident and seriously consider the Recommendation passed by Human Rights Commission on the 14 May 2013 accident which amongst other things, called for the implementation of the law No. 1/1970 on Safety and Health.
  2. Call those in charge to account for the accident and be held individually and collectively responsible.
  3. Strongly urge Freeport and Rio Tinto management to commit to health and safety and to give assurance that such accidents will not happen again.

Soma mine was death trap, report shows

The much-anticipated 126-page expert report, commissioned by the Turkish public prosecutor, clearly states the catastrophe was preventable. While eight high-level managers of the mine’s operating company have already been arrested in connection with the tragedy, the report points the finger of blame at almost everyone involved in the mine, including ministry bureaucrats, with the exception of the miners themselves. “The only innocent group is the workers,” says the report.

The Soma mine is owned by a state-owned company Turkish Coal Enterprises (TKI) and operated by a private company, Soma Kömür İşletmeleri A.Ş.  

Inspectors were able to capture data from the alert and security systems at the mine during the three months before the tragedy on May 13 this year. The report shows that despite fluctuating carbon-monoxide readings and excessively high temperatures prior to the accident, miners continued to work.

Alarmingly, inspectors also found that most safety records were not consistent with the readings from sensors. They had been regularly fabricated. In some cases, safety records had been copied and pasted from the week before. Inspectors counted a total of 48 gas and 19 carbon monoxide sensors but many were broken and there was no proper calibration. Even those in use were not properly calibrated to measure gas levels.

“The gas measuring sensors established for monitoring the air in the mine alerted the start of the accident but the situation was not taken into consideration by company officials,” says the report.

Four days after the disaster, inspectors found underground carbon monoxide levels were still life threatening at 500ppm, which is ten times above the maximum recommended exposure of 50ppm. The report says that gas masks are crucial for miners working in conditions with high exposure to carbon monoxide and yet the masks were not checked regularly. According to the autopsy reports, 85 per cent of the killings were from carbon monoxide poisoning. 

Crucially, the ventilation system was not adequate to meet the rapid expansion of the mine in recent years and had not been adapted accordingly. The ventilation plans for the mine did not even correspond to the real ventilation system underground.

The report blames poor ventilation for actually accelerating the loss of life, as it was unable to reverse the flow of carbon monoxide underground creating death chambers for the miners. It also blames the ventilation system as a “very negative factor” in rescue efforts.

Furthermore, poor communication systems were criticized for not working or meeting standards for underground operations. There was neither an evacuation plan nor compulsory vocational training for workers related to health and safety.

Kemal Özkan, assistant general secretary at IndustriALL Global Union, led a global solidarity mission to Turkey in the wake of the Soma mine disaster. He states:

“The senseless disregard for miners’ safety on the part of owners, management and government almost beggars belief. Lives have been sacrificed for lies. In a relentless drive for profits, sensor warnings were ignored, safety reports falsified, and ventilation systems fatally flawed. As a result, the industrial homicide at Soma left 301 miners dead and 432 children without fathers.  The report brings nothing but shame on the Turkish mining industry.

The pattern of highly intensive mining since Soma Kömür İşletmeleri A.Ş. took control in 2009, led to production levels that were 2.5 times more than was planned. The company was able to extract 15 million tonnes of coal by May 2014 instead of by the original target date of March 2017. The report says: “We are of the opinion that this data confirms the claims or allegations of the workers of highly intensified workload and the production pressures.”

An additional report into the Soma disaster by the Turkish association of chambers of engineers and architects TMMOB, states: “The reason for the carnage is privatization, marketization and the outsourcing policies over the past 12 years in the mining sector and also in the area of health and safety.”

The expert report, which will be used by the public prosecutor for his indictment, singles out people it considers culpable for the accident. The long list includes: the employer; employer representatives; permanent supervisor; technical supervisor; all the shift supervisors in charge of safety; all safety experts; the engineer responsible for underground ventilation; employees responsible for recording the data from the sensors; TKI’s chief control engineer and all control engineers from TKI; the general director of mining affairs; all representatives from the mining affairs general directorate; and inspectors from the ministry of labour and social security.

The report concludes: “Our group is of the opinion that there were many negligent practices and deficiencies and finally this accident was avoidable.”

For more information, please contact:

Leonie Guguen, Communications Officer, IndustriALL Global Union

Tel: +41 (0)22 308 50 23

Mobile: +41 (0)79 137 54 36

[email protected]

[email protected]

www.industriall-union.org 

Arab women strengthen network to fight for rights

According to the ATUC gender policy “women’s participation in Arab trade unions, federations and confederations does not exceed 25%”. This is the issue that will need to be addressed by the ATUC women’s committee which will be formed by the ATUC Congress on 1 and 2 October.

In addition the gender policy contained chapters on consolidating and activating the principles of equality and non-discrimination, empowering women to reach decision-making and leadership positions, political participation and decent work. Women’s right to peace and security and combating all forms of violence is one more chapter. The meeting devoted time to this issue because of the current threats to women in the region from terrorism and ISIS.

IndustriALL’s own Hashmeya Muhsin Alsaadawi presented a paper on violence from conflict as it affects women.  Reporting on the situation in her home country Iraq, the inspirational trade union leader Hashmeya reported:

“Iraq lives in a state of endless war, starting with the dictatorship, wars with neighbours, destruction of infrastructure, embargoes. 95% of the budget went to the military. The wars led to instability and regression, including jihadi marriages and marrying young women off. Iraq has depleted uranium and weapons from the Americans from 1991, which cause cancer cases. In the meantime 15% of women are widows, amounting to 1.5 million widows. It can be considered that because of that 3 million children are on the streets, and 9 million people live in poverty. The women need to be empowered to earn money to support their children. The governments established after 2003 were based on ethnic pillars. Corruption was high. No one cared about citizens. There is no security; no health, paramilitary groups and gangs are rampant. Yazidis and Christians have fled to escape ISIS. Because of the corruption and mismanagement in Iraq it was easy for them to take over. Other countries also intervene in Iraq. There are women who struggle for peace. What is needed is cooperation with civil society organizations. For trade unions the dilemma is that with the millions of unemployed, how can trade unions represent them? The international community needs to create a program to support women refugees. IndustriALL could play a vocal role in getting such a program together.”

The meeting adopted statements on violence, women refugees in Syria and women’s participation which were passed on to the Congress. It was decided that all Arab unions should take one hour of action in support of the fight against violence on 30 October from 11 am to 12 noon.  “The increase in violence throws us back to the dark ages.” The resolution calls on the international community to do its best to stop the human tragedy and to enable people to go back to their home countries.

The gains that were expected in 2010 when the Arab Women’s Network was created have not come to pass, on the contrary, most countries have regressed. Hashmeya’s opinion on this regression: “Labour, students and communities played a role in the uprisings, but they were not well organized. This was abused by the Islamists.” Women are abused, “because they are a commodity, a tool to have fun, but not important members of society.”

Three textile unions form women’s committee in Lesotho

The purpose of the meeting was to create an IndustriALL women’s committee in Lesotho, where about 14,000 textile workers belong to three different unions, FAWU, LECAWU and NUTEXT out of about 40,000 workers. These unions are likely to come together soon to form one union. The textile factories belong to South African or Chinese owners.

The women identified the following issues as being ones that need attention: insufficient toilet time, blocked or locked exits, fainting, excessive targets, sexual harassment, low pay which makes some women resort to prostitution, not enough sleep, insufficient maternity leave, HIV and AIDS. They worked on the basis of body mapping, workplace mapping, life mapping as well as visualization of dreams.

The women knew about one factory where the maternity leave went up from two weeks to 12 weeks. It is Springfield Manufacturing, a South African-owned company. The union negotiated and started by demanding a 15% wage increase. What they achieved was 8% plus the increase in maternity leave from 1 May this year. Everyone agreed on this demand. The union holds mass meetings regularly and asks workers what their demands are. There are about 1000 workers at that factory, with about 80% women. They have some women shop stewards. Everyone at the factory is on permanent contract. The employer pays the maternity benefit. In the meantime they are working on having social security pay the maternity benefit.

Six women were elected to coordinate the committee and keep contact with IndustriALL. To start with they will work to fight discrimination against men and women by:

The women understood that in the future unions must sign agreements that cover more than just money. That will make it more feasible for women’s concerns to be taken up such as maternity leave or sexual harassment or HIV and AIDS. As a first step members need to be educated about social benefits and rights. The women went home with a greater feeling of self-esteem and empowerment.

Unions criticize proposed trade deals

Among the provisions are the notorious Investor-State Dispute Settlement provisions (ISDS) allowing multinational companies to sue governments over laws, regulations and even domestic court decisions that affect current or future profits. Critically the draft ignores a fundamental trade union demand that labour rights violations be subject to the same dispute settlement mechanisms as commercial conflicts.

According to Workers Uniting, Canada has been sued under similar provisions in the North American Free Trade Agreement (NAFTA) more than 20 times and has been forced to pay over USD 150 million to corporations.

“CETA sets a terrible precedent for future trade agreements, especially the Trans-Atlantic Trade and Investment Partnership (TTIP) between Europe and the U.S.,” says USW International President Leo W. Gerard.

“In addition to the deficiencies we have cited in the CETA – which will likely be replicated in the TTIP – the attacks on labour rights in the U.S. threaten the living standards of European and Canadian workers.

Rather than weakening these rights and exporting lower American standards through secret trade deals, we need to look at how to expand European mechanisms to protect workers’ rights and promote worker involvement in companies.

This position is echoed by the German trade union confederation DGB, supported by IndustriALL German affiliates IG Metall and IGBCE, which has raised its concerns in the TTIP negotiation process. It says that a future TTIP must not be permitted to jeopardise workers' rights and must comply with the ILO's core labour standards and the OECD guidelines for multinational companies.

Any agreement must not affect national laws, especially those governing the labour market or social security systems, collective bargaining autonomy, the right to strike, minimum wages or collective agreements. This applies not only to present provisions, but also to future expansions of these protective rights.

Detlev Wetzel, President of IG Metall, says:

"We reject any kind of investment protection agreements and expect all ILO core labor standards be signed by the US. If even one of these points is in doubt, IG Metall will say 'no' to TTIP and CETA."

The DGB is also calling for the rejection of Investor-State Dispute Settlement provisions. ‘In principle, regulations designed to protect investments are not an essential part of an agreement reached between the USA and the EU and should therefore not be introduced along with the TTIP.'

Global campaign defeats union-busting attack at NXP

Twelve dismissed members of the union’s executive will return to work, the other twelve will receive decent separation packages and become full time trade union activists, wage hikes of 12.25% over three years will be much higher than what the company previously said was possible, and a significant number of contractual workers will be regularized. But most important for the NXP workers, the company’s brutal attempt to bust the union was defeated.

See the official MWAP statement here.

Dutch multinational NXP Semiconductors sacked all 24 elected union officials at its plant in a special economic zone in Cabuyao on 5 May for taking time off on national holidays.

A number of security measures meant to intimidate workers were taken. The zone was flooded with police, shuttle buses for the workers were heavily guarded, checkpoints were put up and goons wearing civilian clothes patrolled the plant.

“It appeared that NXP and the government were colluding to destroy one of the only unions present in the special economic zone,” said IndustriALL General Secretary Jyrki Raina. “IndustriALL worked closely with MWAP and allies to mount a powerful campaign.”

An impressive local campaign by MWAP was supported internationally. Actions included large pickets outside of negotiations venues, and the NXP facility, national mobilizations, national support from all 15 IndustriALL affiliates in the Philippines, corporate customer action especially focused on Apple who received over 150,000 petitions and 14,000 official complaints through SumOfUs, a wide-reaching social media campaign flagging the labour rights flaw in the new iPhone 6, outreach and collaboration with the business and human rights community spread the news and built support for MWAP, and a LabourStart campaign targeted NXP management.

More support came from international partners in the form of demonstrations at Apple Stores by United Students Against Sweatshops (USAS) in Los Angeles and Chicago, with participation from USW activists and leaders. Further demonstrations were planned had settlement not been reached.

IndustriALL outreached to unions representing NXP workers in other countries to build support for MWAP. It also worked with unions at many of NXP’s top customers to pressure these customers to demand that NXP end its attack on MWAP.

A number of IndustriALL affiliates including AMWU, IF Metall, IG Metall, Metalliliitto, Unite and USW provided critical support in the campaign. IndustriALL’s sister global union UNI also provided critical support.

“We believe that we have waged a strong battle resulting in a major victory,” said Reden Alcantara, MWAP National President and one of the 12 union leaders who will not return to work for NXP. “We encountered many difficulties in this long and painstaking struggle but we never stopped searching for solutions. We have come this far because of the unity of our members and the all-out support of our global union IndustriALL and of our other supporters and friends from the local and international community.”

The NXP management failed to bust our union. That, to us, is our biggest victory.

Victory for Foxconn workers in Brazil

The victory came in a deal between Foxconn and the Metalworkers Union of Jundiaí following a five-day strike involving 3,700 workers.

The implementation of the new salary structure will take a year to be finalized, but from September 2014 workers at plant two will get an equal wage to those working in plant one.

Foxconn, a Taiwanese electronics multinational, has also agreed to give the workers full pay for the period of the strike, which ended on 18 September.

Foxconn launched its largest factory in Brazil in Jundiaí in 2007. The site specializes in manufacturing computers, notebooks and motherboards. In 2011, the company opened its second production unit in the same city, which is the only facility outside China to assemble iphones and ipads for Apple.

The Metalworkers Union, a member of IndustriALL affiliate CNTM, had been demanding that the company implement a package of wages and career plans that would benefit all workers at both plants in Jundiaí.

It is the second time in two years that Foxconn workers in Brazil have laid down tools. A previous strike took place in February 2013 for the same demands.

During the process of conciliation at the regional labour court, Foxconn agreed to immediately start implementing the new organizational structure. A meeting in January 2015 will also further examine positions and salary plans.