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Sri Lanka's emergency regulations have been severely condemned by world industrial trade union leaders currently meeting in Brussels. 
 
Promulgated on 3 May, the regulations suppress "fundamental democratic rights and basic trade union rights," said the Executive Committee of the 20-million-strong International Federation of Chemical, Energy, Mine and General Workers' Unions (ICEM). 
 
The ICEM particularly deplores the "total suppression" of Sri Lankan workers' "rights to strike, to picket and to march in public procession" in any sector that the country's President declares to be an "essential service". The wide range of sectors already hit by the decrees includes fuel distribution, electricity supply, commodity exports and "the sale, supply or distribution of any articles of food or medicine or any other article required by a member of the public," the unions point out. 
 
Calling on the Sri Lankan government to withdraw the regulations immediately, the ICEM pledged to mobilise "full solidarity action" by its unions worldwide and to lodge a complaint against Sri Lanka with the UN's International Labour Organisation (ILO). The emergency regulations breach the ILO's core standards on freedom of association and collective bargaining.

Unions Slam Sri Lankan Decrees

The international community "is still very far from fulfilling its financial obligations" to cover "technical and safety issues" related to the decommissioning of Chernobyl nuclear power station. 
 
That was the warning today from leaders of the world's energy and allied unions, currently meeting in Brussels. 
 
Chernobyl, the site of the world's worst-ever nuclear accident in 1986, is to be closed by the end of this year, the Ukrainian government has confirmed. Funding for the closure and for replacement power sources is to come from the G7 industrial countries, the European Union and the European Bank for Reconstruction and Development. 
 
But, the Executive Committee of the 20-million-strong International Federation of Chemical, Energy, Mine and General Workers' Unions (ICEM) said in Brussels today, the funding pledges made by the donors at a meeting this March are inadequate. 
 
The ICEM leaders particularly insisted that "a Social Action Plan developed by international experts and the Ukrainian government, in cooperation with the ICEM-affiliated Ukrainian Atom Union, should be an integral part of any decommissioning scenario and its practical implementation. The international community, the governments of donor countries and the Ukrainian government must ensure the proper financing of the Social Plan." 
 
The social plan is designed to tackle the severe employment impacts of the Chernobyl closure, both at the power station itself and in the town of Slavutich, where most of the Chernobyl workers live.

Unions' Chernobyl Warning

The UN's International Labour Organisation (ILO) should send a special Commission of Enquiry to Colombia without delay to investigate the widespread murder and abduction of trade unionists there. 
 
That is the call today from global unions representing more than 160 million workers worldwide. 
 
In an unusual move, the labour proposal was issued jointly by the International Confederation of Free Trade Unions (ICFTU) and all of the global unions' sector-by-sector International Trade Secretariats, including the International Federation of Chemical, Energy, Mine and General Workers' Unions (ICEM). 
 
This underlines global labour's deep concern over the rising tide of violence in Colombia. Trade unionists there are among the most frequent targets for assassination - mainly by right-wing death squads, and sometimes also by guerrilla movements. At least 129 Colombian trade unionists were murdered in 2000, and up to now, at least 63 more have been assassinated this year. Others have "disappeared". Trade unionists and their families face constant threats and intimidation. 
 
Within the ILO, the world's governments, unions and employers meet on equal terms. They adopt international standards on, amongst other things, the protection of trade union rights. The ILO's annual conference is currently in session in Geneva. 
 
Addressing its plenary this afternoon, ICFTU General Secretary Bill Jordan will call on government and employer delegates to support the global unions' proposal for an enquiry on Colombia. 
 
If a special Commission of Inquiry finds persistent abuse of labour rights in a country, the ILO can ultimately call for the international community to take measures against the government concerned. This has recently happened in the case of Burma, over its systematic use of forced labour. 
 
The ILO commission should investigate all aspects of trade union rights in Colombia, the global unions say. It should establish who is to blame - both directly and indirectly - for the killings, abductions and threats against trade unionists. It should also gauge the overall social effects of these anti-union activities in a country where the trade unions are among the few remaining forces for peace and reconciliation. 
 
And it should examine closely why the Colombian government has not been taking adequate measures to guarantee the security of trade unionists, in line with ILO standards and the recommendations repeatedly made by the United Nations. A report this March by the Office on Colombia of the UN High Commissioner for Human Rights found that the State had not decisively assumed its responsibility to guarantee the safety of trade unions and other sectors particularly at risk. 
 
Similarly, the unions say, employers in Colombia should be taking proper steps to ensure that trade unionists are safe from attack in the workplace and on the way to and from work. 
 
The global unions' proposal will now be examined by the ILO Governing Body. Other organisations that have called for an ILO Commission of Inquiry on Colombia include Amnesty International and the Committee for the Defence of Human Rights in Colombia.

Colombian Killings: 63 Trade Unionists Murdered Since January

Workers across South Korea held strikes and demonstrations today. 
 
Chemical workers were to the fore in the protests, which were called by the Korean Confederation of Trade Unions (KCTU) to "bring an end to state violence and the attempt to destroy the democratic trade union movement represented by the KCTU." 
<img height="265" alt="" src="/sites/default/files/migration/icem/danwanted.jpg" width="200"/>
WANTED: Police have distributed leaflets calling for the arrest of KCTU President Dan Byung-Ho. (photo: KCTF) 

47 Korean workers have been imprisoned since June because of their trade union activities, the KCTU reports. Warrants are out for another fifty, including KCTU President Dan Byung-ho and General Secretary Lee Hong-woo. 
 
If the government wants "a process of consultation and consensus," the KCTU said, then "it would need to revoke the current orders of arrest issued against the key KCTU leadership, including President Dan." The launching of a dialogue could "end the escalation of confrontation," the union centre stated. 
 
 

<img height="161" alt="" src="/sites/default/files/migration/icem/koreademo1.jpg" width="215"/>
Strikers in Korea today. The KCTU put the turnout at 80,000. (photo: KCTF) 

Violent police tactics against striking workers all over Korea have provoked national and international protests. The repression has been particularly severe since the KCTU launched a campaign of "coordinated strikes" on 12 June. 
 
Coordinated strikes are something of a tradition in Korea, where enterprise-based trade unions are grouped in sectoral federations. Company-level unions draw up separate bargaining agendas, and hold separate ballots on action in each company. But they also pursue broader common demands set by their national confederation, and the separate strikes are timed to coincide. 
 
The KCTU believes that the authorities are out to destroy it, because it is the chief opponent of the "neoliberal" policies pursued by the government of President Kim Dae-jung. 
 
 

<img height="40" alt="" src="/sites/default/files/migration/icem/strike2001.gif" width="150"/>
 
"The main features of his economic policy have been 'foreign capital attraction', 'privatisation', and 'flexibilisation'," the KCTU points out. "These objectives are all designed to favour capital (investors, employers, business) rather than labour." 
 
The June strikes were in support of "six points" aimed at countering these neoliberal trends. The "six points" were also a focus of today's action. They are: 
<ul>
 <li>An end to the neoliberal structural adjustment drive and retrenchments 
 </li>
 <li>A 12.7 percent wage increase and renewal of collective agreements 
 </li>
 <li>Employment status change for "irregular" workers to "regular" employees, legislative reform to eradicate discrimination against irregular workers, and consolidation of basic labour rights (trade union rights for government employees (civil servants, university professors, etc.) 
 </li>
 <li>Reductions in working time (5-day work week) 
 </li>
 <li>Expansion of the public medical system, expansion of the public education system, reform of the media and tax reform 
 </li>
 <li>Abolition of the National Security Law, achievement of national independence, opposition to President Bush's missile defence programme. </li>
</ul>
 
Taking a prominent part in the June campaign, and in today's protests, were company-based member unions of the Korean Chemical and Textile Workers' Federation (KCTF). 
 
Particularly violent raids by the police - and by gangs of specially recruited armed thugs - were deployed against strikers at the Hyosung synthetic fibre plant in Ulsan. 
 
On 5 June, more than 3,000 riot police stormed the plant. For a while, workers succeeded in holding the police at bay, so as to give others time to escape. Most of those who stayed behind - 242 in all - were arrested. 
 
But the union's Deputy President Choi Min-seok and seven other activists shinned up a 40 metre high chimney at the plant. It took five days, two helicopters and an elite squad of police climbers to arrest them. 
 
Once the strikers had been cleared from the site, riot police barred the entrance and strike-breakers were brought in to get production going again. 
 
The violence of the attack brought protests from the 20-million-strong International Federation of Chemical, Energy, Mine and General Workers' Unions (ICEM), to which the KCTF is affiliated at the global level. 
 
"The Hyosung dispute is essentially over management bad faith during negotiations on employment security," ICEM General Secretary Fred Higgs pointed out in a letter to Kim Dae-jung. "It is therefore an industrial relations issue, and there was no good reason why riot police and troops should have intervened in the Hyosung dispute at all - let alone in the very violent way that they did." 
 
Higgs asked President Kim to "put a stop to such unwarranted police interventions in industrial disputes." He also urged him to "order the police to withdraw from the Hyosung plant" and to "bring your influence to bear on company managements so that they bargain in good faith with trade unions, notably in the case of Hyosung." 
 
The KCTU has called for a "summit meeting" between Kim Dae-jung and KCTU President Dan Byung-ho. In the meantime, the KCTF and other industrial union federations are ready for more protests, leading up to a mass rally on 22 July.

Korean Strike Against Arrests and Neoliberalism

The world's pharmaceutical and allied workers' unions today issued a strong protest over plans by multinational Roche to cut 3,000 jobs. 
 
Roche workers in the US, Britain and Switzerland will be hit particularly hard by the dismissals. Announced last night, the cutbacks have already caused protest demonstrations in Basle, Switzerland. Roche currently employs some 65,000 people worldwide, of which about 41,000 are in the pharmaceutical sector. 
 
Roche's decision is "one more example of an economic logic that prescribes the maximisation of profits, to the greater good of shareholders and the detriment of wage-earners." So says the 20-million-strong International Federation of Chemical, Energy, Mine and General Workers' Unions (ICEM) in an emergency resolution adopted by its Executive in Brussels today. 
 
The ICEM denounces "this short-term economic vision which seeks to sacrifice the interests of employees and of the community in order to achieve immediate high returns on capital." It encourages its affiliated unions to "organise at the international level, so as to resist these job cuts and remind Roche of its social responsibilities."

World's Pharma Unions Protest Roche Job Cuts

Industrial workers face a double challenge from climate change. 
 
For workers and their families, changes in the world's climate have big implications for living standards, lifestyles, the supply and price of food, and health and safety. 
 
But on the other hand, measures to limit those changes are seen as a major threat to industrial jobs. 
 
So must we choose between environment and employment? Between environment and development? 
 
Not necessarily, says a position paper adopted today by unions representing the world's energy workers - and workers in some of the world's most energy-intensive process industries. 
 
A "just transition" within industry is the key to minimising climate change while maximising jobs, says the 20-million-strong International Federation of Chemical, Energy, Mine and General Workers' Unions (ICEM). The detailed paper "Labour and Climate Change" was approved today by the ICEM's global Executive Committee, currently in session in Brussels. 
 
The ICEM feels a particular responsibility to help define, refine and promote the concept of sustainable development. Many ICEM-affiliated workers around the world "are directly employed in the energy industries - coal mining, oil and gas extraction and processing and power generation." And "the majority of the other industries in which the ICEM is involved - chemicals, pharmaceuticals, rubber, ceramics - are heavy energy users." 
 
Tackling climate change and other environmental problems is therefore seen as a special challenge. "Not only will there be major industry restructuring required," the ICEM warns, "but unions and governments may find themselves in conflict if a major effort is not made to find a globally just and substainable solution." 
 
And how is that conflict to be avoided? Certainly not by ignoring the problem, the ICEM insists. "Just transition" implies an acceptance that industry will have to make big changes. Better to start now, and to plan the transition properly, than to face panic measures and social chaos a few years hence. 
 
At the same time, industry alone will not be able to solve all the problems. As the ICEM points out, the choices made by individuals, as consumers, will be equally important. 
 
 
ACTION POINTS 
 
Among the ICEM paper's main recommendations: 
 
- CARBON TAXES, in other words taxes on the use of fossil fuels, "must be considered carefully by ICEM unions." On balance and over time, "increased taxes on natural resources, including a carbon tax on fossil fuels, will lead to more jobs in other industries. However, the clear consequence is also that resource and energy-intensive industries are penalised... The jobs that may be created from cuts in labour taxes as a result of a carbon tax are not immediately likely to go to those workers who lose their jobs in power generation and energy-intensive industry." But "in assessing the cost of this to the members of ICEM unions we need to bear in mind that massive employment losses in many ICEM industries are already occurring as a result of technological change and market forces. Carbon taxes will accelerate that problem, but how much of an additional contributor will they be?" If ICEM unions are confronted with carbon tax proposals, the paper argues, they should also negotiate to have the tax revenues directed towards reducing the taxes and charges on labour - thus creating jobs - and to funding "just transition" programmes for affected workers. 
 
- EMISSIONS TRADING, under which a country, industry or company can purchase part of another's right to emit climate change gases, receives qualified support. "ICEM unions should give serious consideration to supporting emissions trading both within and amongst nations. The main caveat is that emission-trading systems should not be relied upon to be the primary means of reducing emissions, as that will unfairly penalise ICEM industries and workers because emission-trading will focus on carbon dioxide and the energy industries to the exclusion of other greenhouse gases and other emission sources." 
 
- TECHNOLOGY TRANSFER is vital if the world is to be united in its efforts to tackle climate change. "ICEM unions in both developed and developing countries have a major interest in the transfer of appropriate technology to developing countries to help mitigate greenhouse gas emissions. However, the transfer of such technologies should involve more than a simple 'zero sum' achievement where jobs are concerned - such that the transfer costs are not predominantly borne by workers." 
 
- THE UN'S INTERNATIONAL LABOUR ORGANISATION, THE EUROPEAN UNION AND THE OECD must be pressed "to address, in particular, the implications for job security and job creation of the various climate change mitigation measures being considered." To that end, the ICEM will continue to actively support a climate change discussion launched between TUAC and BIAC, the union and employer advisory committees to the OECD. 
 
- In general, DIALOGUE BETWEEN UNIONS AND EMPLOYERS ON CLIMATE CHANGE MITIGATION MEASURES is essential. Particularly important are "shared commitments to energy efficiency, energy conservation and emissions in ICEM industries." In many such industries, "there is substantial scope to reduce energy use and greenhouse gas emissions. In some cases these do not require large capital investments and are able to reduce costs to business. Workers can be one of the drivers for this change if they are empowered to do so." 
 
- One way of building up workers' interest and participation in this issue is to INCLUDE ENVIRONMENTAL TARGETS IN COLLECTIVE BARGAINING. Where environmental measures actually save the company money, "the bargaining arrangements should provide for sharing of the financial gains." Where such measures entail additional costs and/or adversely affect a firm's market position, "collective bargaining should provide for consultation over least-cost responses, including minimisation of job losses." 
 
<a href="/sites/default/files/migration/icem/labourandclimatechangeEN.pdf" type="internal">Labour And Climate Change 
</a> 
<a href="/sites/default/files/migration/icem/LabourAndClimateChangeFR.pdf" type="internal">Monde du Travail et Changement climatique</a> 
 
<a href="/sites/default/files/migration/icem/LabourAndClimateChangeGE.pdf" type="internal">Die Position der Gewerkschaften zum Problem der globalen Klimaveränderungen 
</a> 
<a href="/sites/default/files/migration/icem/LabourAndClimateChangeJA.pdf" type="internal">労働組合と気候変動 </a> 
 
<a href="/sites/default/files/migration/icem/LabourAndClimateChangeRU.pdf" type="internal">Трудящиеся и изменение климата 
</a> 
<a href="/sites/default/files/migration/icem/LabourAndClimateChangeSP.pdf" type="internal">El trabajo y el cambio climático 
</a> 
<a href="/sites/default/files/migration/icem/LabourAndClimateChangeSW.pdf" type="internal">Arbetarna och klimatförändringen</a>

Environment? Employment? We Can Have Both!

Workers now have information and co-determination rights on the supervisory board of Franco-German chemicals giant Aventis. 
 
An important precedent for European worker participation is set by the agreement, which has just been finalised by the French and German chemical workers' unions, the company and the European Mine, Chemical and Energy Workers' Federation (EMCEF). 
 
German law provides for Mitbestimmung (worker co-determination) in big companies at two levels - the works council and the supervisory board. Within the European Union (EU) as a whole, meanwhile, worker participation so far has been at the level of European Works Councils. 
 
The supervisory board is one of the two tiers within German company boards. It determines overall corporate policy and appoints the management board, which is in charge of the day-to-day running of the company. The management board answers to the supervisory board for its conduct of the company's business. 
 
The most common type of corporate-level co-determination in Germany requires equal numbers of employee-elected and shareholder-elected representatives within the supervisory board. However, at least one of the employee representatives is a senior manager and the chairman is, in practice, an extra shareholder representative with a casting vote. Nonetheless, there is strong pressure to maintain consensus within the supervisory boards, which also play a crucial role in German unions' information about trends within the company. 
 
The German labour minister has tabled proposals to further update and strengthen the country's co-determination system. But the growing economic integration of the EU has raised some issues. Labour legislation varies greatly from one EU country to another, and the creation of a European company statute could complicate the question of co-determination rights. 
 
So an important test case was created in 1999 by the merger of German-based chemicals multinational Hoechst AG with French-based Rhône-Poulenc S.A. to form Aventis S.A. 
 
Aventis is headquartered just outside Strasbourg, France. Hoechst AG continues to exist as a German-registered firm, but it is now an intermediate holding company affiliated to Aventis, which owns about 97% of the Hoechst shares. 
 
Immediately after the merger, the German and French chemical workers' unions set about ensuring worker participation within the new company. An agreement in principle was reached with the Aventis management last year. But the new arrangement, the first of its kind at the European level, ran into problems on the ground. The additional agreement just signed clears up the practical details. 
 
The package is a "viable compromise," commented Hubertus Schmoldt. He is President of the German chemical workers' union IG BCE and of EMCEF, and Vice-President of the 20-million-strong International Federation of Chemical, Energy, Mine and General Workers' Unions (ICEM). 
 
"The decisive point," Schmoldt said, "is that we are making a start on the qualified representation, in practice, of workers on the boards of transnational corporations." 
 
Four of the six worker representatives - two French and two German - will be voted on to the supervisory board of Aventis S.A. by the company's shareholder assembly. The worker representatives will have the same rights as the ten representatives of capital on the board. 
 
The two other worker seats on the board are those required by French law, which assigns them to the works council (comité d'entreprise). Under the Aventis agreement, EMCEF will nominate the candidate for one of these two seats. In return for the works council's agreement to this, it will have the right to be represented on the Aventis "European Dialogue Committee". 
 
The unions see this package as a milestone on the way to co-determination within European companies. 
 
The agreement now goes to the Aventis AGM for formal approval. 
 
Aventis employs around 95,000 people in more than 120 countries. In November 2000, it announced that it intends to focus on pharmaceuticals and will divest its activities in agriculture.

Aventis Worker Participation Deal Is European First

Trade unionists from across Belgium and international delegates converged on an industrial suburb of Liège, Belgium, this morning. They were protesting over plans by tyre giant Continental to shut down production of truck tyres there. 
 
After a meeting outside the gates of the Continental plant, hundreds of workers marched round the industrial estate. Later, a motorway was blocked by demonstrators. 
 
 

<img height="287" src="/sites/default/files/migration/icem/demo13.jpg" width="380" alt=""/>
CONTINENTAL'S BELGIAN CLOSURE: 
700 JOBS AT RISK 

Continental's closure plan jeopardises 700 jobs in an area that has already suffered greatly from the delocalisation strategies of the multinationals. 
Today's demo was organised by Belgian general workers' union the Centrale Générale-FGTB and salaried staffs' union SETCa-FGTB, both of which are affiliated at the global level to the 20-million-strong International Federation of Chemical, Energy, Mine and General Workers' Union (ICEM). Co-organiser was the chemical workers' union CSC-Chimie. 
 
"The workers around the world are watching," ICEM General Secretary Fred Higgs told the demonstrators, "and they are insisting that workers in Belgium be treated with respect and dignity." An ICEM contingent took part in the demonstration, carrying the banners of the international. 
 
The ICEM has launched a worldwide solidarity campaign in support of the Belgian Continental workers. 
 
Continental's announcement has caused widespread outrage in Belgium. Its plant there is one of the most modern in the company, and its Belgian workers had accepted a whole series of job cuts and pay reductions since 1997 in order to safeguard the Belgian operation. "Today," says the Central Générale, "the workers note that all this simply served to generate profits for the multinational, which invested them elsewhere." 
 
The unions had called for a moratorium on the closure until the end of this year at the very earliest, so as to give time for serious negotiations on job preservation measures and compensation. The management's response was to speed up the closure plans. "A provocation," say the unions. 
 
There is no doubt where the real responsibilities lie, Michel Nollet told the demonstrators this morning. He is the President of the Belgian national trade union federation FGTB. Multinational companies had undertaken closure after closure, Nollet said. This proved that governments had lost control of their economies. Noting the absence of politicians from today's demonstration, Nollet challenged governments worldwide to reassert their authority over the multinational corporations. And he called for international trade union solidarity to fight Continental's closure plan.

Outrage Over Continental Tyre's Belgian Closure Plan

"What do we want? A just wage!" chanted demonstrators marching through central Bangkok on Monday evening. "How much do we want? 180 baht a day! When do we want it? Now!" 
 
180 baht is a little less than four US dollars. A modest pay claim by any standards, yet Monday's march was the second that Thai unions have had to hold in support of this and other key demands submitted to Labour Minister Dej Boonlong back in April. 
 
This time around, the numbers had grown. 47 private and public sector unions and people's organisations took part. Significantly, the more than one thousand union demonstrators were joined by students and representatives of the urban poor. 
 
The rally was coordinated by the labour union of workers in the Electricity Generating Authority of Thailand (EGAT). At the global level, the EGAT Labour Union and a number of the other unions taking part are affiliated to the 20-million-strong International Federation of Chemical, Energy, Mine and General Workers' Unions (ICEM). 
 
The ICEM has declared its full support for the Thai demonstrators' demands. 
 
The current daily legal minimum wage in Thailand ranges from 133 to 165 baht, depending on the region. The unions want 180 baht nationwide. In Bangkok, a family cannot live reasonably on much less than 500 baht a day, and most industrial workers have to take several jobs or put in excessive overtime just to make ends meet. Many are actually paid less than the legal minimum. 
 
The government has been dragging its feet on the issue, pointing out that a national employer/union/government committee is responsible for setting the minimum rate. But this process tends to be very slow-moving, and it has never come up with a real living wage. 
 
The employers, meanwhile, are opposing the pay demand. They say four dollars a day would be a body blow to Thailand's global competitiveness! 
 
Another focus of the protests is a proposed new Labour Relations Act, which would further weaken collective bargaining and the right to strike. The unions want the government to withdraw this legislation, and instead to adopt a union-drafted law that protects worker rights. 
 
Further demands by Monday's marchers included immediate implementation of an unemployment insurance scheme and other social security improvements and the ending of a long lock-out at a textile plant. 
 
"Workers and urban poor - our problems are the same," a representative of the Network for the Urban Poor told the rally. "[Prime Minister] Thaksin says that in ten years' time, there will be no more poverty. Perhaps he means that, ten years from now, all the poor will have died!" 
 
During the last elections, the now ruling Thai Rak Thai party promised that, if voted into office, it would implement an unemployment insurance scheme and increase wages. 
 
But a worker delegation that met with government officials during Monday's demo reported little progress, except that the government undertook to respond within a month to the demand for unemployment insurance. 
 
The government has broken its promises, said Somyot Pruksakasemsuk, of the Centre for Labour Information Service and Training (CLIST). 
 
"Thai capitalists are able to go on golf vacations in other countries," Somyot told the demonstrators,"while we assemble electronic pieces in the factories as our bosses yell insults like 'Hurry up, Buffalo, work faster!'" 
 
165 baht per day "is far below a just living standard," Somyot insisted, and "the money that is in the unemployment fund is our money, it is the people's money." 
 
The rally closed with music from members of the Student Federation of Thailand and a vow from workers to keep the pressure up.

Thai Workers Demand Four Dollars A Day

South Africa's miners have approved an offer from the last three gold firms to settle with the National Union of Mineworkers, the NUM announced in Johannesburg this afternoon. 
 
The deal with Goldfields, Harmony and DRD means that the NUM can now sign a national agreement on wages and conditions with the Chamber of Mines, thus averting strikes in South Africa's biggest-employing sector. 
 
For the first time ever in a national bargaining round, the NUM has secured all of its demands. These include a minimum monthly wage of 2 000 Rand (about US$ 244) by the year 2002. The basic minimum is an entry point amount for miners joining the industry. At present, their monthly pay ranges from 1 200 to 1 600 Rand (about US$ 146 to 195). Increased annual leave is another gain. 
 
The campaign was also remarkable for the support that the union received from a number of major gold investors, shocked by the conditions under which this high-value commodity is mined. In South Africa's mines, low pay rates have long been mirrored by high accident rates. Recently, however, union-management cooperation has gone some way towards cutting the number of deaths and injuries. 
 
At the global level, the NUM is affiliated to the 20-million-strong International Federation of Chemical, Energy, Mine and General Workers' Unions (ICEM). "The NUM has conducted a strong, well-structured campaign," said ICEM General Secretary Fred Higgs today. "We congratulate South African mineworkers on their achievement." 
 
The following is the full text of a statement issued this afternoon by NUM Vice-President Crosby Moni: 
 
Today we bring good news for the mining industry and the country as a whole. 
 
The 2001 wage review between the National Union of Mineworkers and the employers is regarded by us as negotiations with a difference. For the first time in our history none of the original demands tabled by the union had to be removed from the negotiations. Every one of the issues put forward was an attempt by the union to put the industry on an irrevocable path towards transformation for a humane and caring industry. 
 
The fact that employers have found agreement with us on these important issues that aim to improve the quality of working life on the mines, means that we will tread this path together. 
 
We must also add that for the first time we had received messages of support from gold investors through the world who, whilst afraid of the impact of a looming strike were horrified to hear of the conditions under which miners in South Africa labour. They were very sympathetic with our demands, especially those in dispute. 
 
Last night Branch Leaders who were part of our negotiating team reported back to members on the settlement offer in respect of Goldfields, Harmony and DRD. We are pleased to announce that members voted unanimously in support of these proposals. We are therefore in a position to conclude the negotiation with the Chamber [of Mines] and sign off the 2001 Agreement on Wages and Working Conditions. We now look forward to its implementation. 
 
We declared 2001 the Year of the Member. In these negotiations they were consulted every step of the way. They showed unity, commitment and purpose in this round. For this I, on behalf of the National Office Bearers and the National Executive Committee, wish to think them profusely for their stance. This agreement is theirs.

South African Mining Settlement

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