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Sappi: pulp & paper/pâte et de papier/pulp y papel

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Jens Bundvad of Danish trade union CO-industri was unanimously elected 11 June as General Secretary of Nordic-In, the five-nation, 22-member Trade Union Federation. The election occurred at Nordic-In’s biennial Congress in Stavanger, Norway. 
 
Bundvad succeeds Jyrki Raina, the federation’s first General Secretary who was elected to lead the International Metalworkers’ Federation (IMF) last month. 
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Jens Bundvad
Stefan Löfven remains the president of 1.2-million-member Nordic-In, which effectively covers industrial workers in Denmark, Finland, Iceland, Norway, and Sweden. Löfven is also president of the Swedish union, IF Metall. 
 
Nordic-In came into existence in January 2006 with the merger of Nordic Metal and the Nordic Industry Workers’ Federation (NIF). Its mission is to coordinate policies and actions of the Nordic trade unions, especially within European industry federations European Metal (EMF), EMCEF, and the European Textile, Clothing, and Leather Federation, as well as globally with the ICEM, IMF, and the International Textile, Garment, and Leathers Workers’ Federation (ITGLWF).

Nordic-In Elects Jens Bundvad as General Secretary

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Just prior to US President Barack Obama’s state visit late last week to Ghana, the country’s Federation of Labour (GFL) teamed with the International Trade Union Confederation (ITUC) to hold a two-day conference on labour rights in America. 
 
The conclusion, as recited by the GFL’s Executive Board, is that even though the US preaches democracy and human rights, and makes such principles conditional in the granting of aid to developing countries, workers in the US themselves lack fundamental human and labour rights to association, join a union, or to participate in collective bargaining. 

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A statement from the conference said, “Violations of trade union rights occurring in Africa are influenced by the anti-union practices, especially in the USA, where workers are deprived their fundamental rights to organise and bargaining collectively. 
 
“Strangely, the USA has not yet ratified ILO Conventions 87 and 98 concerning freedom of association and the right of workers to bargaining collectively. This is an indictment on the image of the USA as a founding member of the ILO.” 
 
The 7-8 July conference specifically examined the hurdles US workers and trade unions are facing currently in trying to pass the Employee Free Choice Act. The EFCA is a proposed law that would give American workers the same opportunities to organise and bargain that workers in nearly all other developed countries have. Through decades of US labour law precedents, employers have coerced, intimidated, and threatened their staff from joining trade unions, and current US labour laws have allowed them to do so with impunity.

Ghana Labour Federation Lashes Out at Lack of US Work Rights

pulp and paper/pâte et de papier/pulpa y papel

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ICEM affiliate the Indian National Mineworkers’ Federation (INMF) led a joint protest of all coal worker unions in India, against the proposal of the Indian Government to disinvest shares of Coal India Ltd., a state owned body. All coal mines in the country were nationalised by former President Indira Gandhi, because of malpractice throughout the industry, and the inadequate rate of progress in the development of the industry. The unions jointly submitted a strong statement condemning the decision to amend the Coal Mines Nationalisation Act and calling on the government to desist. 
 
The statement is signed by INMF President, Shri Rajendra Prasad Singh and INMF Secretary General, Shri S.Q. Zama, along with the leaders of the other coal mining unions of India. The statement argues that Coal India is competent as is, and a more effective way of improving its operations would be for the government to provide adequate facilities, and also for the coal industry to be given “infrastructure status”. All the trade unions in the Indian coal industry pledge, in the statement, to work together to faster develop the industry and achieve the goal of producing enough coal to satisfy domestic need, and avoid importing it. 

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Coal India Ltd. made a profit in 2008 of US$1.8 billion. Raw coal production during 2008-09 went up by 7.90 per cent to 493.20 million tonnes. Coal India Ltd. is one of 40 publically owned companies targeted for privatisation in India. 
 
The Board of Coal India Ltd. has recommended that 5 to 10 per cent government equity can be disinvested. Coal Minister Sriprakash Jaiswal accepts the recommendation and will now approach Prime Minister Manmohan Singh. Jaiswal plans for the shares to be offered first to employees, secondly to those whose land was transferred to CIL, and then remaining shares will be open to all buyers. 
 
The unions oppose the allocation of virgin coal blocks to private companies, as well as the transfer of areas currently controlled by Coal India Ltd. (CIL). The statement points to the private sector’s record of exploitation of mineworkers, and the extremely low wages paid by private companies currently operating in the industry. “We demand that all the blocks should be handed over to Coal India for further production of coal.” 
 
Further demands made in the joint statement are for an industry-wide wage to be enforced by the National Coal Wage Board, and for the prevention of outsourcing coal industry jobs to private agencies. “We demand that the contract workers should not be allowed to be engaged in permanent and perennial nature of jobs and in other coal sectors they should be paid minimum of the scale in coal industry.” 
 
The ICEM supports the campaign to oppose disinvestments and privatisation of the Coal Industry in India.

Indian Mining Unions Oppose Privatisation

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A record number 364 union and management participants attended a Social Dialogue Conference in Thailand last week, 31 August, sponsored by the ICEM, the Thai Ministry of Labour, FNV Mondiaal of the Netherlands, LO-TCO of Norway, and the Employers’ Federation of Thailand (ECOT). 
 
The title of the conference was “International Labour Standards and the Wisdom of Co-Existence,” and central in purpose was to shape a common understanding of ILO core labour standards, as well as building responsible social governance between Thai labour unions and multinational companies. 
 
Over 150 people more than were expected turned out for the conference, held at the Siam City Hotel in Bangkok. Managing directors and human resource executives from 28 companies attended, including representatives from Esso, Linde-TIG Industrial Gases, Goodyear Tire & Rubber Co., and Norske Skog paper company.
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Part of the Partipants at the Social Dialogue Conference
ICEM General Secretary Manfred Warda congratulated those present, and expressed hope that a true commitment to a new era of labour-management relations in Thailand was at hand. He also pledged to extend the resources of the Global Union Federation to Thailand in order that the country ratify core labour conventions, namely Conventions 87 and 98, freedom of association and right to collection bargaining, and Convention 111, the Discrimination in Employment and Occupation Convention. 
 
“It is imperative that values of mutual faith and cooperation be built between managers of transnational companies and Thai labour unions,” said Warda. “For this to effectively begin, the Thai government must lead by starting the process toward ratification of ILO core labour standards.” 
 
The ICEM organized the conference, jointly with the Thai Ministry of Labour, as a follow-up to a resolution from its 2007 Bangkok Congress. There, delegates recognized a Thai labour-management system structured on authoritarianism and hierarchal in industrial relations.
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 Yoshio Sato of Japan, representing ICEM's Asia-Pacific Region; in rear, ICEM Thai Chairman Rawai Pupaga, ECOT Gen. Sec. Siriwan Romchat-thong, and the Thai Labour Ministry’s Somchai Chumrat
 
ECOT General Secretary Siriwan Romchat-thong confirmed in her opening remarks that the employers’ federation would support ratification of Conventions 87 and 98. A panel discussion composed of labour, management, and governmental leaders showed a consensus toward ratification in the immediate future. 
 
The Thai Permanent Secretary of the Labour Ministry, Somchai Chumrat, stressed the mutual benefit that can be gained through trust between labour and management by dialogue and understanding. “Employers cannot live in a vacuum,” he said. “Managers and workers’ representatives must sit together to discuss the wisdom of conducting labour relations in peaceful cooperation.” 
 
He added that although Thailand recognizes the benefit of foreign investment, senior executives of multinationals must clarify the roles of local managers in Thailand so that they act according to international labour standards and national laws. 
 
Another speaker that echoed the immediate need for a changed culture was Rawai Pupaga, chairman of the ICEM Thai Affiliates Committee and President of Government Pharmaceutical Employees’ Association (GPOTU). As a first step, he called on Thai workers and managers alike to show respect for workers’ rights by taking part in World Day for Decent Work activities on 7 October. 
 
Other resource people calling for a different labour-management culture were Tim de Meyer, senior specialist for the ILO on International Labour Standards and Labour Law, and Lae Dilokwidhayarat of Chulalongkorn University. Dilokwidhayarat stressed that the globalisation of capital and freedom of movement demands respect for the concept of decent work, meaning adequate compensation, trade union representation, and stability, security, and protection of workplace rights. 

A side meeting to the Social Dialogue Conference occurred between the ICEM, local executives of Linde and its Thai Industrial Gases subsidiary, and ICEM affiliate TIG Local Union. The Thai subsidiary of Linde has been neglectful over trade union rights at some 20 Thai workplaces, particularly in respect to work rights and full-time opportunities for short-term contract and temporary workers. The meeting did produce an understanding that TIGLU and the company’s managing and human resource directors would meet in the near future to discuss problems and strive for a better relationship.
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Visit to the Norske Skog Mill in Singburi 

One employer that has practiced exemplary social responsibility in Thailand has been the Norwegian paper company Norske Skog. On 1 September, Warda, Rawai Pupaga, ICEM Thai Project Coordinator Aranya Pakapath, and ICEM’s Asia-Pacific Contact Person, Phee Jungsun, visited the factory in Singburi, where workers and local managers, including Managing Director Torpong Thongcharoen, hailed a relationship that can serve as a standard within Thailand. Notably, the collective agreement at Norske Skog in Singburi has strict language regarding the use of contract and agency labour, language that both sides respect and adhere to.

ICEM Social Dialogue Conference in Thailand Exceeds Expectations

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Meeting in Lagos, Nigeria, on 15 September, ICEM’s Sub-Sahara African Regional Organisation (SSARO) called for greater security measures to be taken to protect energy workers in the Niger Delta. With representatives from ICEM’s two Nigerian affiliates, NUPENG and PENGASSAN present and hosting the meeting, the committee noted that the region has not known peace since oil reserves were first extracted 50 years ago. 
 
The committee differentiated between community and labour groups genuinely seeking career opportunities for the indigenous people of the region and a stop to environmental degradation, and gangs of thugs using kidnappings and ransoms to enrich themselves. SSARO acknowledged that Nigeria President Umaru Yar’Adua is correct in calling on global energy companies to halt purchases of bunkered oil from unsavory types, whose only interest is trading cash for weaponry. 
 
The regional committee, chaired by Rayford Mbulu, President of the Mineworkers’ Union of Zambia, also gave approval to the Nigerian government’s offer of amnesty to militants who come forward and lay down their arms. It urged the main militant group, the Movement for the Emancipation of the Niger Delta (MEND), to extend its unilateral ceasefire indefinitely.
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 Rayford Mbulu 

The committee concluded the Niger Delta debate by identifying the main causes of civil unrest, which has caused cutbacks in production of both oil and gas. They include: a shortage of skill-building, training, and job opportunities by multinational energy companies for people of the region; rampant use of casualisation regarding labour by both local suppliers and multinationals; uneven revenue distribution; environmental degradation; and political marginalization, both at the federal level and within some states of the Niger Delta region. 
 
In other business taken up by SSARO, trade union leaders of Africa called attention to the climate change issue, saying current widespread flooding in many parts of West Africa, including Ghana, Benin, Niger, Senegal, and Burkina Faso, is a direct result of climate change. The committee said such flooding will cause serious famine in parts of West Africa, and called on the governments of Africa to be prepared to deal with the resulting human devastation. 
 
The ICEM’s African regional grouping resolved to bring pressure against global mining and energy giant BHP for its use of replacement workers in a legal South African dispute between the National Union of Mineworkers (NUM) and BHP at the company’s Hozatel manganese mine in Northern Cape State. SSARO also took up the strike by members of the United Steelworkers (USW) in Canada against the Brazilian mining company Vale, and passed a resolution to intervene on mining investment by the Brazilian company in Africa. More on that is <a href="/en/5-Mining-DGOJP/3394-" type="internal">here</a>.

ICEM’s Sub-Sahara Africa Regional Committee Addresses Niger Delta Security

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The ICEM extends its condolences to the families of miners killed and injured in a deadly Polish mine explosion on Friday, 18 September, as well as to all mining unions representing workers at the Katowicki Holding Weglowy (KHW) company. 
 
A methane gas explosion followed by a fire at KHW’s Wujek-Slask mine in the coal-dominated Silesa region of southwestern Poland killed 13, and seriously injured 18 other miners with severe burns. A total of 40 miners were hospitalized following the explosion. 
 
The deadly blast and fire, Poland’s second worst in recent years, ripped through mine shafts 1,050 metres underground at mid-morning on Friday near the town of Ruda Slaska. 
 
The Polish government has declared today and Tuesday, 22 September, a two-day national period of mourning due to the horrible workplace tragedy.
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A Polish website, Pracownik, reported that a miner at the Wujek-Slask colliery made a video last April, showing methane measurements over four times the levels that are considered safe from such an accident occurring. The video was aired on a Polish TV station late Friday. 
 
Mine-safety activists in Poland hinted that any investigation must centre on whether or not methane reading instruments inside shafts had been tampered with in order to boost production. 
 
State-run KHW had merged the Wujek and Slash collieries in 2004 into a single enterprise in order to save costs. In November 2006, 23 miners perished in another Ruda Slaska mine called Halemba, owned by the state-operated Kampania Weglowa (KW). This was the worst Polish mine tragedy in three decades. The Halemba mine had been idled for eight months then, and the company had sent workers 1,000 metres below the surface to retrieve equipment when the blast occurred.

13 Perish in Poland’s Worst Coal Mine Disaster Since 2006

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The profitable electrical and gas distributor National Grid Plc. has provoked industrial actions in the UK with plans to outsource service work to India. British trade unions GMB and Unison, representing some 2,500 workers, are planning further strike actions in company operations in the near future. 
 
The first such strike, a 24-hour one, occurred on 11 September when workers at a service center in Newcastle walked off jobs and manifested at a public square. Some 181 invoicing, procurement, and other jobs could be lost in Newcastle if National Grid gets its way to offshore jobs. Hundreds of other jobs are at risk in the company fulfills its planned agenda.
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Further job actions likely will occur in Warwick and Newcastle. National Grid is the major owner and operator of electric grid distribution and gas distribution in England and Wales, serving 52 million customers. It also controls lucrative electric and gas distribution networks through its private enterprises in the US. 
 
GMB National Secretary Gary Smith says it is “absolutely immoral” that the company would consider turning its back on UK workers and transferring work to India. “It is a shameful example of corporate greed that a hugely profitable UK business is threatening to sack loyal and dedicated staff.” 
 
National Grid posted profits of £3 billion in 2008 and the company and workers have identified £3 million in cost savings. Yet, National Grid has already narrowed a search to two contract companies that would outsource the service work to India. 
 
GMB and Unison are getting strong support from North American ICEM affiliate Utility Workers Union of America (UWUA). In a recent trip to the US, Smith met with UWUA-represented workers employed by National Grid subsidiaries in the state of Massachusetts, and engaged first-hand with the UWUA in is first contract battle with waste-to-energy company Covanta. ICEM-affiliated GMB, as well as other UK unions, have assisted the UWUA in bringing to light Covanta’s derisive anti-worker practices in the US just as the company attempts to expand into the UK.
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In a letter to GMB’s Commercial Services Section, UWUA President Michael Langford called National Grid “one of the most profitable, privatised monopolies in the world.” He added, “In our view, it is unacceptable (for the company) to turn its back on the employees who have sacrificed so much to make National Grid a success.” 
 
On 7 September, GMB and Unison counted ballots, revealing a 97% vote for industrial action. Those strikes likely will occur in the coming weeks if the electric/gas distributor does not retreat from its outsourcing plans.

UK Unions GMB, Unison Begin Industrial Actions Against National Grid

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At the 26th Constitutional Convention of the US’s largest national labour center last week in Pittsburgh, Pennsylvania, delegates elected Richard Trumka as president. Trumka, a member of ICEM-affiliated United Mine Workers’ of America (UMWA), had been serving as secretary-treasurer of the AFL-CIO since 1995. 
 
A third generation miner from western Pennsylvania, Trumka pledged to reinvigorate the American labour movement by recruiting more young people into the ranks of organised labour. In his acceptance speech, Trumka promised to build “a new kind of labour movement – one shaped to meet the needs of Americans in a changing economy.” 
 
Trumka succeeds John Sweeney of the Office, Professional Workers’ Union, who retired after three terms as head of the AFL-CIO. A labour attorney by training, Trumka worked in the Legal Department of the UMWA starting in 1974. In 1982, he was elected as president of the UMWA, a position he held until joining Sweeney as part of a new AFL-CIO leadership team in 1995.
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Arlene Holt-Baker, Richard Trumka, and Liz Shuler  
 

Elected last week to replace Trumka as secretary-treasurer of the 56-union, ten-million-member federation was Liz Shuler, a member of the Electrical Workers’ Union (IBEW) from the state of Oregon. She served most recently as executive assistant to the president of the IBEW. Elected as executive vice president was Arlene Holt-Baker. A member of the public employees’ union, AFSCME, she has held that position since 2007 after being appointed by the AFL-CIO Executive Council . 
 
Among some 70 resolutions passed, two dealt with Iraq. One called on US President Barack Obama’s administration to use its influence on the Iraqi government to adopt internationally-accepted work rights, including passage of an ILO-written labour law that assures the legitimacy of trade unions in Iraq. The other calls on the US government to end its military occupation and bring a speedy withdrawal home of both troops and US armed contractors from the Middle Eastern country. 
 
Another resolution calls on the US to sanction the military regime in Honduras by withdrawing the US ambassador, freezing assets of those responsible for the June 2009 coup, and for the US government to seriously consider suspending all trade with Honduras until Manuel Zeleya is restored as President of a democratic Honduras.

US Mineworker, Richard Trumka, Elected Head of AFL-CIO

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