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Six miners are likely dead following a roof collapse at the Novodzerzhynska coal mine in Dzerzhynsk, Donetsk region, on 4 May. In a release issued by the Ukrainian Trade Union Federation, ICEM-affiliated Coal Mining Industry Workers&rsquo; Union (PRUPU) President Viktor Turmanov said the disaster was likely &ldquo;caused by gross safety violations&rdquo; due to the shift of rock underground. 
 
Three mines died instantly, while three others were rescued after nearly three days underground. The remaining three miners are unaccounted for and their exact underground location was still unknown as of last week. Fourteen miners were working inside the mine at the time of the collapse, with five able to immediately escape. 

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Turmanov said the search would continue this week, with restoration of the roof needed to carry on with a possible rescue attempt. But after two weeks, it is unlikely the three miners will be found alive. It the area where the roof collapsed, some 250 square metres of rubble accumulated. The tragedy happened 58 metres underground. 
 
Turmanov and PRUPU were instrumental in the days following the deaths in getting Ukraine&rsquo;s Cabinet of Ministers to set aside a large sum of money for better safety conditions at the Novodzerzhynska mine, which included compensation to the mining victims&rsquo; families. 
 
The mine in eastern Ukraine mine was reorganised last year and became a state enterprise connected to the Coal Industry Ministry of Ukraine.

Mine Deaths in Donetsk Region, Ukraine, Raises PRUPU Safety Call

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The ICEM took part in the 21st International Mining Conference of Turkey, sponsored by the Turkish Chamber of Mining Engineers. The ICEM&rsquo;s campaign for ILO Convention 176, the Safety and Health in Mines Convention, was continued there. The ICEM, the ILO, and Turkish mining affiliates met in Ankara during the first week of May, resulting in commitments from the unions to work towards ratification. 
 
The ICEM&rsquo;s mining programme established mechanisms for mining unions in Turkey to exchange successful strategies to combat the global financial crisis. Significant examples come from ICEM mining affiliates in Africa, where different forms of nationalisation and state mining enterprise are emerging to block mass job losses. The ICEM also showcased actions by African mining unions to head off efforts by employers in taking advantage of the financial crisis. 

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In other news, trade unionists in Istanbul carried out an historic May Day by ending a march in the city&rsquo;s Taksin Square. Workers&rsquo; had been banned from holding May Day rallies there by the military in 1980, and that ban was only lifted in the days before 2009&rsquo;s May Day celebration. Taksin Square is the site of the so-called &ldquo;Bloody May 1&rdquo; of 1977, in which 36 trade unionists were killed. It is significant to Turkish unions, standing as the symbol for the right to assemble and for free speech. 
 
In Turkey, 1 May this year was a public holiday for the first time, following a successful campaign of pressure by trade unions.

ICEM Campaign for ILO 176 Continues in Turkey

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The German social-democratic organisation, the Friedrich Ebert Foundation (FES), released a briefing paper entitled &ldquo;Comeback of Global Governance,&rdquo; outlining the need for reform of mechanisms for global political and monetary governance. The current financial crisis is seen by many as the opportunity to reform global financial bodies, which fail both in terms of representation and of effectiveness. 
 
The past year has seen a list of failures in terms of global governance, from the Doha round of world trade talks to follow-up of the Monterrey Financing for Development Conference. Even the preliminary rounds of discussion at Posnan, Poland, environment and sustainability forums have illustrated significant obstacles in commitments over combating climate change. 
 
Arguably the most vital changes needed are inside the International Monetary Fund (IMF), whose failings have become all too apparent during this current global recession. The current financial crisis is a clear indication of how urgently an effective global regulatory framework is needed in order to come to grips with the present crisis and to contain future excesses. The days of the World Bank and IMF governing the world on a neo-liberal agenda now must end. 
 
The IMF&rsquo;s system of quotas and voting rights gives European countries an imbalanced amount of power that is no longer justified by their order in the world economy. Despite the limited voting-rights reform carried out in March 2008, the Benelux countries, for example, continue to have a higher quota than China. The reforms to the IMF that are on the agenda will go some way towards creating a fairer system, although they do not go far enough in &lsquo;giving a voice to the voiceless.&rsquo; 
 
The current economic climate offers many alternatives for change. US President Barack Obama seeks to establish a new disarmament and non-proliferation treaty. German Chancellor Angela Merkel calls for a world economic council. French President Nicolas Sarkozy and British Prime Minister Gordon Brown advocate an international banking oversight commission. Germany and France, together with Russia and Brazil, promote a new global economic and financial architecture that has a special focus on regulating financial markets. 
 
Find the FES briefing paper <a href="http://library.fes.de/pdf-files/iez/global/06319.pdf ">here</a>.

International Labour Calls for Reform of the Structures of Global Governance

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Following the release of the English and Arabic versions of the &ldquo;ICEM Guide on Contact and Agency Labour (CAL),&rdquo; the ICEM has now also released French, Spanish, and Russian versions of this important tool to assist unions around the world with their efforts in this growing area of work. 
 
The French version can be found <a href="http://cal.icem.org/images/documents/icem%20manual%20frans%2026032009def.pdf ">here</a>. 
The Spanish version can be found <a href="http://cal.icem.org/images/documents/icem%20manual%20spaans%20070420092.pdf ">here</a>. 
The Russian version can be found <a href="http://cal.icem.org/images/documents/icemmanualrussiandef.pdf ">here</a>. 
 
The English and Arabic versions of the manual, as well as the ICEM&rsquo;s CAL campaign website can be found <a href="http://cal.icem.org">here</a>. 
 
The ICEM CAL Guide describes numerous problems faced by short-term contract workers, and by workers employed through temporary work agencies, containing a number of best - as well as worst - practices from around the world. 
 
The guide also provides an overview of some of the most recent changes in national and international labour laws and standards. It further deals with combating the phenomenon at company level through collective negotiations. Useful and encouraging examples, together with union strategies and ideas to counter the many abuses in this field, are also provided.

ICEM Releases Contract and Agency Manual in French, Spanish, Russian

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The announced 5.5% wage cut for 15,000 employees of Czech mining company OKD will not occur and instead, through negotiations with mining unions, a compromise has been reached. That compromise, occurring on 30 April, calls for a decrease in the number of agency workers used, and a partial reduction in the number of employees from supplier companies. 
 
The demand for cuts is due to the impact of the world&rsquo;s financial crisis. 

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The company originally proposed an across-the-board decrease in salaries of 5.5%, cancellation of some bonuses, and a reduction in staff of 2,600 regular employees and 900 workers employed by supplier companies. The negotiated compromise preserves all full-time jobs, with job reductions coming from among the 3,000 agency workers that OKD used and from staff of some suppliers. 
 
A mining union spokesman called the compromise the lesser of two evils. 
 
OKD, the Czech Republic&rsquo;s largest hard coal producer, is wholly owned by New World Resources of the Netherlands, an investment company focusing on assets in Central Europe. In 2008, OKD produced 12.7 million tonnes of coal, of which 7.4 million tonnes was coking coal.

Czech Mining Unions Preserve Pay; OKD to Cut Agency Staff, Suppliers’ Staff

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On 15-16 April, the ICEM organised an Asia/Pacific-wide conference on Contract and Agency Labour (CAL) in Singapore. The conference, attended by 50 trade unionists, was held with the support of the Friedrich Ebert Foundation (FES) of Germany. 
 
Participants spoke candidly on the ongoing problems of short-term contract and agency work, and other forms of precarious work, and how it affects their daily lives. The experiences expressed made it abundantly clear that the phenomenon is wide-spread, still on the rise, and detrimental to labour relations in Asia-Pacific countries. Such contributions, in addition to those from the ICEM and the FES, came from Singapore, Thailand, Philippines, Malaysia, India, Indonesia, Nepal and Korea, as well as from Sweden, Denmark, and Germany. 
 
An omnipresent problem is that, in almost every Asian country, regular, permanent, and direct-employed workers are being replaced by CAL workers, who are often paid less than permanent workers. They never get the same benefits, nor do they have much of a job future. In Malaysia, for example, it was said that CAL in the past used to be almost uniquely a problem for migrant workers. This is no longer so. In Pakistan, trade unionists note a sharp increase in the use of &ldquo;piece-rate workers.&rdquo; 

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A concurrent issue expressed by all participants is the fear factor. Contract and agency workers are afraid even to discuss union issues, let alone join a union, since this often translates to an end to their fixed-term contracts. It appears to be a simple matter for companies operating in Asia to remove workers from their workforce, or to shift them to less secure jobs. 
 
Among the numerous other problems mentioned was the lack of respect for law where there is some semblance of existing legal protections, such as in the Philippines, India, or Indonesia. Another problem voiced is that oftentimes there are too many unions in some countries, making cooperation difficult. 
 
The positive news is that unions, slowly but surely, are starting to deal with the problem at all three levels that the global ICEM campaign on CAL is aimed at: legislative changes that not only protect workers from abuses, but also leading to more direct and permanent employment (a promising bill is being readied in the Philippines); work at company level, including making the issue key in collective bargaining as well as an organising priority; and evaluating internal union structures to ensure that CAL workers can effectively join trade unions. This has occurred in Thailand, Malaysia, India, Singapore, and Korea. 
 
An important concern on this latter point, as acknowledged by all, is the need to organise more trade union work at industry or sector level, steering away from company-unionism, where it is often easy for employers to &ldquo;divide and conquer&rdquo; the two sets of workers. 
 
Unfortunately, there are currently still many more problems than success stories. One specific example is the continuing problem in stemming the number of CAL workers at Linde in Thailand, an industrial gases company, and granting full-time, permanent employment to such workers. 
 
Adverse examples given of &ldquo;CAL employment techniques&rdquo; in Asia include the use of standard 17-month contracts, in which the collective agreement calls for more rights and benefits for workers after 18 months. Another is supervisors who openly discriminate against CAL workers linked to a union. In the Philippines, companies have used blank resignation letters, asking CAL workers to sign before they even start work. Other workers have been asked to re-enter their current job, but under another name, thus preventing them from gaining increased benefits, or becoming part of the permanent workforce.

ICEM Singapore Conference Illuminates Problems for Contract, Agency Workers in Region

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With labour agreements now complete at two major tyre producing plants in Argentina, ICEM affiliate Sindicato Unico Trabajores del Neum&aacute;tico Argentina (SUTNA) is focused on obtaining a renewal two-year contract with the third &ndash; FATE S.A.I.C.I., an Argentine based producer and the country&rsquo;s largest tyre-maker, employing some 1,200 workers. 
 
Workers at FATE had rejected the company&rsquo;s prior offer, a proposal that fell short of wage gains and bonus payments made at Pirelli S.p.A. and Bridgestone-Firestone Argentina. Negotiations will resume at the Ministry of Work on 6 June. Rubber workers have protested FATE&rsquo;s inferior demands, but have taken no industrial action.
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Earlier this spring, agreement was reached with both Pirelli and Bridgestone-Firestone, which employ a combined 1,400 SUTNA union members at Buenos Aires factories. At both worksites, workers won pay increases totaling nearly 25%, which included ratification and other bonuses. 
 
At the Firestone plant, workers received a 10% increase effective April 2007; they will receive a 6.5% increase in October 2007; 3.5% in March 2008; and 2.5% in May 2008. At Pirelli, SUTNA also negotiated a 10% increase effective in April 2007. Three percent is due in January 2008; 2% for April 2008; and 1.23% for June 2008. 
 
SUTNA General Secretary Pedro Wasiejko pledged early this spring that, in this round of national rubber bargaining, no worker would earn less than 2,741 pesos (&euro; 600) per month.

Argentina’s Tyre Union Focuses Now on Pact with Single Company

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After a difficult year of negotiations, which included industrial actions this spring and a subsequent string of three-day lockouts by the company, 500 tyre workers at Bridgestone&rsquo;s Salisbury factory near Adelaide, South Australia, accepted the Japanese company&rsquo;s terms. 
 
Workers of three unions passed by the thinnest of margins &ndash; 240 to 225 &ndash; a new three-year agreement. The contract, some ten months after a prior one expired, grants workers 6% wage increases from May 2007 to May 2010, with possible bonuses interspersed.
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Production workers, numbering about 450, are represented by ICEM affiliate Liquor, Hospitality, and Miscellaneous Union (LHMU), while most maintenance workers are represented by Australian Manufacturing Workers&rsquo; Union (AMWU), also an ICEM affiliate. Electricians at Salisbury are represented by ICEM affiliate Communications, Electrical, and Plumbing Union (CEPU). 
 
Bridgestone used the full weight of the 2005 WorkChoices law in Australia to leverage its inferior bargaining demands. Workers had engaged in four stop-work actions since March, as well as an overtime ban. The company punished workers for the unions&rsquo; actions by employing contract workers on maintenance and electrical work, and taking the offensive under WorkChoices by imposing three-day, non-paid lockouts. 
 
&ldquo;Clearly, the restrictions placed upon union members by the current Australian industrial relations legislation made pursuit of improvements more difficult for members,&rdquo; said LHMU lead negotiator, Jim Watson. &ldquo;The company relied on the legislation and frustrated union members into accepting the agreement.&rdquo; 
 
Bridgestone workers had last seen a pay raise in December 2005. The previous agreement had expired in June 2006.

Bridgestone Workers in Australia Come to Terms with Company

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On 19 May, in a testament to the growing Solidarity now coming to strikers at Novamed in Turkey, 16 energy-sector trade union leaders from Russia, Azerbaijan, Kazakhstan, Moldova, and Belorussia visited picket lines in the Antalya Free Trade Zone. 
 
Eighty-four strikers have been out since 26 September 2006, protesting the medical equipment company&rsquo;s harsh and unusual practices. Novamed, part of German-based Fresenius Medical Care, has refused to recognise ICEM Turkish affiliate Petrol-Iş.
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&nbsp;ROGWU President Lev Mironov Addresses Turkish Strikers 
 

Eighty-two of the strikers are women. They have been subjected to inhumane treatment, including being forced to apply for permission from company bosses before becoming pregnant. 
 
The delegation from Eastern Europe and Central Asia came to Turkey following discussion and prominence of the strikers&rsquo; plight at the ICEM&rsquo;s Executive Committee meetings earlier in May. They were greeted at the picket line by Petrol-Iş General Secretary Mustafa Cavdar and other leaders of Turkey&rsquo;s dominant oil and chemical workers&rsquo; union.
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In thanking the trade union leaders, Petrol-Iş President Mustafa Oztaskin stated that their presence is a solid reminder that &ldquo;this is a struggle backed by the whole trade union movement throughout the world.&rdquo; The strikers heard from Lev Mironov, president of the Russian Oil and Gas Workers&rsquo; Union (ROGWU); Melik Mirzoyev, general secretary of the ICEM&rsquo;s Interregional Oil and Gas Workers&rsquo; Federation; and Jahangir Aliyev, general secretary of the Oil and Gas Workers&rsquo; Union of Azerbaijan. 
 
Other leaders visiting the picket line on 19 May included: Yelena Mustafina, Oil and Gas Workers&rsquo; Union of Kazakhstan; Nikolay Stratila, Chemical and Energy Workers&rsquo; Union of Moldova; Yuriy Rovda, Belarus Petrol Gaz İş&ccedil;ileri Sendikasi Başkani; Ludmila Hrushetskaya, Belarus Mining and Oil Workers&rsquo; Union; and Tamara Bashuk, Ludmila Chubaryan, Natalya Navmova, Hasipat Hugayeva, Rostislav Zagorodniy, Vera Shchukine, Larisa Lukiyanova, Ludmila Brovkina, and Aleksander Vasiliyev, all of ROGWU.
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&nbsp;

Energy Trade Union Leaders Visit Novamed Picket Lines in Turkey

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Privatisation auctions by Nigeria&rsquo;s Bureau of Public Enterprise (BPE) of refineries owned by the state&rsquo;s Nigerian National Petroleum Corp. (NNPC) have brought further strikes and threats of strikes. The two oil workers&rsquo; unions in the country &ndash; ICEM affiliates PENGASSAN and NUPENG &ndash; are protesting the lack of transparency in the sales. 
 
Late last week, branches of both unions at the Kaduna refinery threatened a shutdown of that facility if the BPE follows though on 51% sale of Nigeria&rsquo;s second largest refinery. In mid-May, BPE threw out the lone offer for Kaduna, a US$102 million by the China National Petroleum Corp. (CNPC). But shortly thereafter, the government&rsquo;s privatisation arm accepted a US$160 million bid by Bluestar Oil, which is a consortium of Nigerian industrial interests.
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Bluestar had earlier won a bid on the larger Port Harcourt refinery with a US$561 million offer. The lack of transparency in that process brought a two-day strike by the unions on 24-25 May, which halted all shipments of crude oil into the refinery. 
 
The branch unions of PENGASSAN and NUPENG at Kaduna called Bluestar&rsquo;s bid &ldquo;a deal &hellip; sealed under the table, to a company that has no record of refinery operations, and for a price that can only be described as give-away.&rdquo; 
 
The statement by the unions added: &ldquo;Based on the glaring lack of transparency in the privatisation process and insincerity on the part of BPE, the sale of (Kaduna) fails to meet the minimum standard, set by the government and cannot in any sense of the word be said to have been a transparent exercise. 
 
&ldquo;First, the sole bidder (CNPC), failed to match the undisclosed reserved price of Kaduna during the first and second rounds of bidding, suddenly another company (Bluestar) that did not submit a bit, that did not conduct any due diligence on the facility, that is completely alien to the transaction, that has no track record in the refining sector, is now said to have 51% shares of Kaduna in a process the BPE describes as &ldquo;closed-in&rdquo; bidding.&rdquo; 
 
PENGASSAN and NUPENG have vowed to resist the turnover to Bluestar until all the issues raised by the union are resolved.

Privatisation of Nigerian Oil Refineries Bring Further Unrest

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