European brands agree to compensate Tazreen victims

The brands made the commitment at a meeting held on 15 April in Geneva to discuss a 5.7 million USD compensation plan for the victims of the Tazreen Fashions fire in Bangladesh, which killed 112 workers and injured about 120 in November 2012.

The meeting was hosted by IndustriALL Global Union and attended by major European retailers, a leading Bangladesh trade unionist, the Clean Clothes Campaign and the Worker Rights Consortium.

In an outrageous display of indifference to the suffering of Bangladeshi families, major US corporations Walmart, Sears/Kmart and Disney refused to pay any compensation to the victims and failed to attend the meeting. Walmart was apparently the largest buyer from the Tazreen factory. The companies, which failed to enforce their own worker safety standards, have claimed to be deeply saddened by the deaths.

Major European retailers C&A (Netherlands), KiK (Germany) and El Corte Inglés (Spain) attended the meeting and agreed to make substantial contributions to the compensation plan for the families of the dead and for the injured. The Italian clothing brand Piazza Italia did not attend but has agreed to participate in the package.

"We have agreed on confirming the concrete amounts that each of these brands will contribute by the end of this month," says IndustriALL General Secretary Jyrki Raina. "The families and the injured have already waited far too long."

Other companies that were sourcing from Tazreen and failed to attend include Hong Kong based trader Li & Fung, Teddy Smith (France), Edinborough Woolen Mills (UK), Dickies (US) and Karl Rieker (Germany).  Li & Fung has however agreed to paying compensation.

The compensation plan, developed by IndustriALL and its affiliates in Bangladesh and supported by international labour rights groups, is based on the compensation formula used in other recent fires. These include the December 2010 fire at That’s It Sportswear, a factory producing for Gap and other US brands, and the fire this January at Smart Export Garments, which was producing clothes for Inditex and others.  The details of the plan will be worked out in a subsequent meeting to be held in Dhaka, Bangladesh.

Says Ineke Zeldenrust from the Clean Clothes Campaign, “We once again call upon Walmart and the other major companies sourcing from Tazreen to aid the families of the dead and the injured workers. Their refusal to do so indicates a shocking lack of concern for the rights and well-being of the workers who make their clothes and who, in this case, were injured or killed in the process."

IndustriALL and IF Metall working for solution at Electrolux Thailand

Within the mechanisms of the Global Framework Agreement (GFA) between IndustriALL and the Swedish household appliances manufacturer, which is also signed by IF Metall of Sweden, a process of negotiations and analysis has been conducted regarding the anti-union actions of the company’s management in Thailand. Workers at the company’s washing machine factory in Rayong formed a union in February 2011 and have been strongly persecuted by management since then.

IndustriALL reported on the imprisoning and then mass dismissal of 98 workers on 11 January 2013, and the various campaign tactics employed by the union subsequently in fighting for their jobs back. The plant-level union has been supported by IndustriALL’s Thai affiliate TEAM for a full reinstatement of all dismissed workers.

Through social talks with local level and international company management, IndustriALL, IF Metall and the Thai trade unionists achieved positive decisions at both levels with management agreeing to full reinstatement. However this is yet to occur.

An agreement was reached between IF Metall and Rayong management on 26 February whereby all dismissed workers, including eight union representatives, would be reinstated and back to their jobs as soon as possible. This agreement was then confirmed at a 27 March international meeting at IF Metall head office in Stockholm, involving senior international management, IndustriALL and IF Metall. The meeting also established joint work going forward including a delegation of international management and IF Metall to visit the plant later in the year and monitor labour relations there.

All sides pledged full commitment to building constructive and mature systems of industrial relations at the Electrolux Rayong plant, in line with the global agreement.  However, although the 26 February agreement still stands, there has been a failure of local plant-level management to enact the solution and reinstate all workers.

The serious violation of labour rights at Electrolux Thailand has also concerned NGOs in Sweden and elsewhere. On 9 April, Swedish NGO Swedwatch lodged an OECD complaint regarding the violation of core international labour standards at the Rayong plant.

IndustriALL and its affiliate IF Metall continue to call on Electrolux to live up to its commitment and ensure full solution and reinstatement in Rayong as a matter of urgency.

National industry agreements reached in Sweden

The industry national collective agreements were reached between the Teknikföretagen employers group, and IndustriALL Global Union affiliates, IF Metall, Unionen, and the Swedish Association of Graduate Engineers (Sveriges Ingenjörer) and the agreements cover over 500,000 workers.

Sweden's industrial workers will see their salaries raised by 6.8 per cent over a 3 year period. The distribution of the 6.8 per cent varies between the different agreements. 

In addition to the wage increase, the national agreements contain a development of the parental insurance. The insurance will cover 10 per cent of the wage loss during parental leave and the period is increased from 5 to 6 months. This development is part of an agreement covering all blue-collar workers union within the trade union confederation, LO, and is estimated to be the biggest development of eliminating the differences between female and male wages during many years. The agreement also allows for more flexibility in setting working hours and better and simpler overtime rules.

This national industry agreement, which runs until March 2016, also serves as an example for the rest of the Swedish labour market and the national collective negotiations to follow during 2013. IndustriALL affiliate IF Metall have 43 national collective agreements, and with these first 7 agreements signed, 36 agreements remain to be negotiated and signed during the national bargaining round, ending in November 2013.

Victory! Napoleon Gomez taken off Interpol red alert list

Since 2006 and Napoleon’s strong condemnation of the Industrial Homicide at Pasta de Conchos, the mineworker leader has been persecuted by the corporate-government alliance and forced to lead the union from exile in Vancouver, Canada. IndustriALL Global Union is celebrating this positive and long awaited decision from Interpol, which will now allow Napoleon to travel to and take his seat on the international executive committee of IndustriALL.

After a long, bureaucratic internal process at Interpol which has included numerous stages of examination of the case lodged against Napoleon by the previous right-wing PAN party government of Mexico.

In a parallel case, as has been reported, the Magistrates of the First Collegiate Tribunal for Criminal Matters of the First Circuit, Juan José Olvera Lopez, Luis Perez de la Fuente and Jose Luis Villa Jimenez, unanimously resolved to grant the injunction ordering Interpol Mexico Interpol to take action to cancel the red notice that had been issued.

The decision by the international Interpol authority overrules the Mexican branch and vindicates the long standing Los Mineros claim that the previous two governments of Vicente Fox and Felipe Calderon abused their power over the Mexican Interpol branch to run a sham case against Napoleon in the interest of discrediting him and keeping him in illegal exile.

Napoleon stated: "It's terrible that international Interpol has found it necessary to make it clear that these Mexican authorities abused the international instrument of the red notice for political ends and unethical business interests.”

A new book authored by Napoleon Gomez called Collapse of Dignity will be launched internationally on 17 April. IndustriALL Global Union is excited by and fully supportive of the book launch.

Collapse of Dignity is Napoleon’s powerful account of the union’s fight, mounted in the face of traitors, armed aggression, death threats, and a political alliance going all the way up to the level of the president.

Gomez’s story is one of outrage, but also of hope. Through Collapse of Dignity lays bare sickening injustice and inexcusable aggression against the Mexican working class, it is at its core a fervent call for a global workers’ movement that will represent the fundamental rights of every person who works for a living.

Visit the Collapse of Dignity website and order your copy online.

IndustriALL angered by Colombian death threats

Trade unions around the world have been expressing solidarity with Colombian colleagues since the extreme right-wing paramilitary group “Los Rastrojos” public statement promised to “hunt and kill” the list of prominent Colombian trade unionists.

Industrial relations are tense at a number of key mining and manufacturing sites in Colombia. The powerful groups that stand to benefit from a weakening of the trade unions in these negotiations are strongly suspected to be linked to the death threats. The complicity of the state authorities throughout years of trade union assassination allows the murderers to continue with impunity, and must be condemned in the strongest terms.

In 2012 over 280 death threats were made to trade unionists in Colombia, with 20 murders. Already in the first three months of 2013 four murders have been carried out.

The 1 April hit list includes IndustriALL Executive Committee member Igor Diaz, President of Sintracarbon and president of the IndustriALL’s affiliate council in Colombia. Diaz and three of his Sintracarbon colleagues also on the list are central figures in their community and the wider social justice and democracy movement. Sintracarbon’s trade union official Heli Arregoces Ibarra survived an assassination attempt on 7 April, when two men on a motorbike fired a gun at him on the street in the city of Riohacha.  

IndustriALL is equally concerned about the targeting of leaders at other affiliated organizations Sintrametal, Sintraelecol, Utramicol, USO, and colleagues at the national centre CUT and partner trade union Sintramienergetica.

IndustriALL leadership lodged the organization’s serious concerns over trade union rights violations in the country at the Colombian Mission to the United Nations in Geneva on 4 March. Despite promises made by the Colombian ambassador of government action, the reality is different.

Apart from a number of trade unionists, the hit list includes several targets working for human rights NGOs, lawyers, religious leaders, and even a senator who all work for social justice.

Write your appeal to President Juan Manuel Santos and send via fax to 0057 1 596 0631.

MENA unions support Iraqi oil leader

The regional conference of IndustriALL Global Union in the Middle East and North Africa took place on 4-5 April 2013 in Beirut, Lebanon. 50 delegates from Morocco, Tunisia, Egypt, Palestine, Lebanon, Jordan, Bahrain, Kuwait, Yemen and Iraq were joined by representatives of partner organizations from France, Turkey and Australia.

The majority of delegates highlighted problems with trade union rights in their countries. Hassan Juma’a Awad, head of IndustriALL affiliate the Iraqi Federation of Oil Unions (IFOU) informed the conference of his upcoming trial, where he is accused of organizing a strike and demonstration in February. Workers of the South Oil Company (SOC) took action after the management had rejected calls for negotiations on unpaid wages and benefits, precarious work and putting an end to corruption.

MENA union leaders expressed their full support to Hassan Juma’a and urged the Iraqi authorities to stop the persecution of Juma’a and other unionists. International solidarity action is underway ahead of the court session which has been postponed till 15 April.

The regional conference supported IndustriALL’s decision to revitalize the campaign to reform Iraqi labour laws from the Saddam Hussein era. The laws ban unions in the public sector and violate the right to organize, collective bargaining and industrial action.

Concerns were expressed about developments in Egypt. In addition to a new constitution that treats unionists like criminals, President Morsi in November 2012 signed a decree which allows the labour minister to hand-pick replacements to over 60-year-old union leaders. As a result, at least two out of four leaders of IndustriALL affiliates in Egypt have been replaced.

This intervention raised a lively debate about the requirements on independence from employer and government influence in IndustriALL’s statutes. The unions have been asked to explain and document the developments, before the matter is brought to IndustriALL’s global Executive Committee at the end of May.

At the same time, IndustriALL will carry out a mapping and training round of activists with the new independent unions in Egypt.

Some positive development in Tunisia was reported by Tahar Berberi, leader of the metalworkers’ union and member of IndustriALL’s Executive Committee. The tripartite social pact signed in January demonstrates the willingness of the government, unions and employers to contribute to building a democratic society through constructive social dialogue.

Guests from Turkey, France and Australia made inputs on organizing techniques, global framework agreements and union networks in multinational companies (MNC). A number of MNCs are already operating in the region, especially in Maghreb countries, where IndustriALL will support networking with its European affiliates.

JCM Spring Labor Offensive Status Report

The JCM received a series of responses in mid-March and reported on the results of measures taken by 55 labor unions of large companies in the automotive, electrical and electronics, machinery, steel, shipbuilding, nonferrous metal, and electrical wire industries, affiliated to the JCM.

All labour unions secured periodic pay raises as part of the wage structure, this involves maintaining the wage system of increasing wages each year for individuals without falling below the previous year’s wage standards for each age group. In order to secure periodic pay raises, it is necessary to raise wages by about 2 per cent per person.　

Regarding bonuses and minimum wage, the JCM achieved a result of 4.77 months worth of bonus, an increase of 0.17 months over the previous year’s standard of 4.60 months. For intra-company minimum wages, 11 labor unions secured raises of 500 yen.

In relation to the government’s move to reform labour regulations the JCM declared,

The government’s advisory body is examining changes to labour conditions that would disadvantage workers. The reforms would enable employers to retrench workers more easily. We the JCM are firmly opposed to these kinds of reforms. What the government should be doing now is curbing growth in the number of non-regular workers, who are subject to unstable employment and low income levels, improving the environment to achieve equal and balanced treatment with regular workers, and raising overall wages standards including for non-regular workers by raising the minimum wage.

Fighting back on contract work in Nigeria’s oil and gas sector

The Nupeng and Pengassan met in March to discuss the need to develop strategies to address precarious work centred on organizing and building unity amongst workers.

The unions noted an alarming trend amongst employers to convert permanent jobs to causal employment, aimed at maximizing profit, cutting labour costs and at depriving workers of their right to join a trade union.

In addition to recruiting contract workers and building common understanding between permanent and contract workers on the need for equal pay for equal work, there was agreement on the importance of working in solidarity with other unions in Nigeria on the issue of contract staffing, outsourcing and precarious work. Participants discussed the need for social dialogue and advocacy at an international level on the issue.

The two unions also put together an action plan for a campaign to be carried out over the next six months that includes information gathering, membership drives, awareness raising and high level meetings with government.

IndustriALL Project Coordinator, Augustine Adokou commented that the campaign efforts by Pengassan and Nupeng including unionizing precarious workers in the oil and gas sector would make a significant contribution to IndustriALL’s efforts on addressing precarious work globally.

Efforts on the campaign seem to already be well underway, with two articles published in the mainstream media on precarious work, drawing heavily from comments made by Hyginus Chika Onuegbu, Trade Union Congress of Nigeria River State Chairman and senior official of Pengassan. See articles attached.

The drama of Rusal Friguia workers in Guinea

Management vindictively responded to a workers’ strike action one year ago by forcibly halting production, leaving 1,030 permanent employees and 2,000 outsourced workers without pay since April 2012. Three of the IndustriALL Global Union affiliates in Guinea, mining federations of CNTG, USTG, and ONSLG national centres, organize the Rusal Friguia workers.

Since 2011, the Rusal Friguia management had refused to engage in collective bargaining with union representatives pretexting the difficult economic situation of the company. Management aggressively followed a tactic of intimidation and provocation of plant-level trade union representatives and workers. On 4 April 2012 Rusal Friguia’s workers launched a strike in protest of the management intransigence. Rusal Friguia immediately suspended its operations in the cities of Fria and Conakry, locking-out workers. In parallel, Rusal pressured the local Labour Court to declare the strike illegal. 

Government-arbitrated negotiations resulted in June 2012 in Rusal Friguia workers agreeing to lift the strike. But Rusal refused to end the lockout until unions accepted responsibility for the company losses during the strike, to which clearly workers refused.

What subsequently became apparent was the Rusal ambition to exploit the rich bauxite deposit called Dian Dian. In negotiations with the Guinean government, Rusal evidently demanded exclusive access to Dian Dian as a condition to reopening its Friguia operations.

Finally, early 2013, Rusal was awarded the contract to operate Dian Dian. The government announced publicly the imminent reopening of the plant in Fria. But as of today the situation remains unchanged.

The government provided financial compensation to workers for the last three months of 2012. But before that date, and since January 2013, workers have not received any income, many of them having to sell their belongings to survive. Workers are not the only ones affected by the crisis, with them the 120,000 inhabitants of Fria, living mainly thanks to the Friguia plant are plunged into a precarious situation.

IndustriALL denounces the plight of Rusal Friguia’s workers and residents of Fria and joins its affiliates in Guinea in calling for a quick and fair industrial settlement.

Honda worker killed in Mexico

IndustriALL demanded that the company undertake an immediate and thorough investigation to determine the causes of the fatal accident and provide the worker's family with financial compensation.

Jose Luis Solorio, general secretary of the Honda Mexico workers’ union, STUHM, announced the death of Armando Arana on 25 March. He died while painting a loading ramp, crushed by a cargo container. He had worked for the company for 14 years and had complained on several occasions about unsafe working conditions. The company responded by harassing him and punishing him by assigning him work away from his usual area, the pressing area. The STUHM leader explained that:

He was ordered, along with other colleagues, to paint the unloading ramps in the motorbike plant yellow. They were ordered to move some containers and work in a space measuring approximately 1 metre. The workers asked the company to put up safety signs, given that they were being asked to work in the container loading and unloading area. Management said this was not necessary and told workers they would be sacked if they didn't do the work, so the workers did not protest

“Around 2.30pm, on the orders of management, a driver reversed into the area to attach a container to his trailer. While completing the manoeuvre, the container crushed Armando Arana who was painting the ramp“. Jose Luis Solorio said that the colleague was a “victim of Honda Mexico’s carelessness and failure to take safety measures” and added that “this crime must not go unpunished”.

STUHM has called on Honda to explain why company managers harassed Armando Arana and why they refused to take the minimum safety measures that could have avoided this tragedy. But more than two weeks after the worker's death, the company continues to maintain a criminal silence.

There has been widespread media coverage of protests by trade unions and civil society organisations. The National Miners’ and Metalworkers’ Union (SNTMMSRM), the Electricity Workers’ Union (SME) and the trade union research centre, CILAS wrote to the company, condemning its attitude. They also wrote to the federal and state labour authorities, calling on “the Labour Secretary and other federal and local labour authorities to identify those responsible for this case of industrial homicide, conduct a detailed inspection of the work area, insist that Honda Mexico take measures to protect the life of workers in high risk areas and prevent further acts of negligence”. See article.

Japanese unions affiliated to IndustriALL have expressed their shock and sadness and contacted Honda's head office to request a detailed investigation of the case. IndustriALL calls on the company and the Mexican authorities to take action and supports the union's demand that this crime does not go unpunished. Finally, it calls on all affiliated unions to ask the company to carry out a fair and responsible investigation into the death of our Mexican colleague.