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<img alt="" src="/sites/default/files/migration/icem/CAL_en.jpg" width="100" height="45"/>
The Irish union, Services, Industrial, Professional and Technical Union (SIPTU), is fighting attempts by the government of Ireland to dilute the provisions of the European Union Temporary Agency Workers’ Directive, which comes into force across Europe on 5 December. 
 
The Directive, which was passed in 2008, states that “The basic working and employment conditions of temporary agency workers shall be, for the duration of their assignment at a user undertaking, at least those that would apply if they had been recruited directly by that undertaking to occupy the same job.” 
 
The Directive applies from day one of an assignment, and further states that temporary agency workers have the right to be informed about permanent employment opportunities in the user enterprise and must have improved access to training and childcare facilities in periods between assignments, in order to enhance employability. 
 
Under the Directive derogation from the principle of equal treatment is permitted provided an agreement can be reached between a state’s social partners. In an eleventh hour attempt, Irish Minister for Enterprise and Jobs Richard Bruton has called for a derogation which would mean that an agency worker would only be entitled to equal treatment after six months, rather than from the first day of employment. 
 
In a letter to the Irish Congress of Trade Unions (ICTU), Bruton said, “Without the benefit of some leeway in transposing the directive in the shape of a framework agreement, Ireland will be in a position of significant competitive disadvantage, vis-a-vis our European trading partners,” adding, “In the current climate and with the significant challenges that face us on the road to economic recovery, we must avail of the flexibilities afforded by the directive.” 
<img alt="" src="/sites/default/files/migration/icem/1111.CAL patricia.png" width="108" height="140"/>
Patricia King
Patricia King, Vice President of SIPTU, has made clear that the union is opposed to any attempt by the government to seek a derogation. King said, “We do not see any reason for a derogation to be applied. Why would we? If someone is entitled to equality of treatment, they are entitled to it and there is no reasonable argument being put forward, that I can see, for us to agree to the derogation.” 
 
“If somebody is employed to do a job, which commands a certain skill, background knowledge and experience, and they put themselves forward for that job and are capable of producing the goods, why would they not get the rate of pay on an equal basis as somebody who was doing the job already and who is going to work alongside them?” 
 
Commenting on Bruton’s claims that implementing the Directive would have a negative impact on jobs and economic growth, King said, “All that is a code for not paying the rate and keeping people in low pay”.

SIPTU Fights Attempts to Dilute EU Agency Workers Directive

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A dramatic month-long occupation of an M-real paper mill in Alizay, France, ended on 18 November after trade unions CGT-Filpac and CFE-CGC signed an agreement with the Finnish company to end the blockade and release stockpiled printing papers. The strike began on 19 October after M-real dropped plans to sell the mill to one of two remaining buyers, and announced redundancies for 330 French paperworkers. (See <a href="/en/78-ICEM-InBrief/4726-French-Paperworkers-Continue-Protest-Today-to-Keep-M-real-Mill-Operating" type="internal">ICEM report</a> of 24 October.) 
 
The workers voted in front of plant gates at the Haute-Normandie mill by 95% on 15 November to stop the occupation and leaders of the two unions signed an agreement with M-real on 17 November that provides a temporary reprieve to the plant closure, plus financial and other considerations. 
 
Workers receive a €3,000 bonus for ending the occupation, €1,500 immediately and the remainder in January. M-real commits to running the 230,000-tonne-per-year mill until 7 March 2012 and pledges not to remove equipment or machinery prior. In addition, workers will be paid their salaries during the 30-day strike. 
<img alt="" src="/sites/default/files/migration/icem/ICEM.Solidarity.JPG" width="140" height="136"/>
The negotiated agreement and ending of the occupation came just before French police were to move in and force opening of warehoused paper. The plant closing standoff reached the highest levels of French government, after the unions petitioned the state to expropriate the paper mill assets, and spilled into European Parliament meetings in Strasbourg, France, last week, when French political leaders met with Finnish parliamentarians to complain of intransigence by M-real and its 40% owner, Metsäliitto, a forest products company based in Finland. 
 
“No one should believe that we capitulated,” stated CGT-Filpac plant delegate Thierry Philippot. “We will continue to make sure that this company pays for the moral and physical suffering of workers.” Workers filed harassment complaints with French authorities over the psychological effects of M-real changing its plans. 
 
M-real announced on 4 May a major restructuring to exit office and printing paper manufacturing and focus instead on paperboard used for packaging. It meant putting two fine paper mills up for sale, the Alizay mill near Pont-de-l’Arche and the Gohrsmühle mill in Germany, as well as discontinuing carbon paper production at the Reflex mill in Germany. 
 
After paring a potential 65 bidders for Alizay down to two, M-real last month stopped negotiations with a Thai paper company and a French-based equity company and said it would shutter the mill. 
 
That set off the anger of French paperworkers of CGT-Filpac and CFE-CGC and the occupation began, which included placement of large vehicles in front of plant gates that were locked with heavy chains. The unions also brought the case into a French district court in Evreux over failure by M-real to provide the necessary documents on a possible sale. Statutory consultations over the plant closure did start on 8 November but were quickly suspended due to high tensions, and those talks must begin again separate of last week’s protocol agreement to end the occupation.

French Paperworkers End Mill Occupation in Deal with M-real

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Workers throughout Britain are scrambling to fight to protect their pensions, as companies follow the government’s tactics of attacking pension schemes. Last week members of three joint affiliates of ICEM and the International Union of Food, Agricultural Workers’ Association (IUF) at the food and cosmetics manufacturing multinational Unilever voted to strike. 
 
Unilever is attempting to unilaterally scrap the final salary pension scheme for existing members and replace it with a career-average scheme that would cut as much as 40% of the expected retirement benefits of long serving employees. 
 
The company already blocked the final salary scheme to new entrants in 2008, but this plan to move 5,000 existing members has caused outrage, especially as part of the justification for the 2008 move was to preserve the benefits of existing members. 
<img alt="" src="/sites/default/files/migration/icem/UKGMB.gif" width="90" height="90"/>     <img alt="" src="/sites/default/files/migration/icem/UK USDAW.jpg" width="175" height="70"/>
If the company does not act swiftly to avert the strikes, it will be the largest strike action it has faced in its 80 year history, and the first time a FTSE 100 company has faced a strike purely on the issue of pensions. 
 
5,000 workers producing well-known products such as Persil detergent and Marmite voted resoundingly in favour of the strike ballot. 85% of Unite members, and 75% of GMB members, and a large majority of USDAW members all voted on 28 November in support of the strike which will probably be conducted at 12 factories in December. 
 
"The vote also shows that ordinary workers will not stand idly by to watch profitable employers like Unilever jumping on the pensions robbery bandwagon," stated Allan Black, national officer at GMB and ICEM Executive Committee member. 
 
Union negotiators offered the company alternatives to reduce the risk of the final salary scheme and cap benefits, but were frozen out of discussions by the talks by management. 
 
This month Unilever CEO Paul Polman received shares worth £1,069,986. 
 
Unilever also just announced 600 redundancies in closing the Alberto Culver plant in Melrose Park near Chicago, Illinois in 2013. Workers at the 50 year old factory are members of United Steelworkers Local 9777, most of whom are very long-serving employees. The factory produces well known products VO5, TRESemme and Nexxus shampoos and conditioners, and St. Ives lotions and body wash.

UK Unilever Workers Vote to Strike to Protect Pensions

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The International Federation of Chemical, Energy, Mine and General Workers’ Unions (ICEM) today signed a Global Framework Agreement (GFA) with Petróleo Brasileiro SA, or Petrobras, the world’s third largest energy company. The agreement, the 20-million-member ICEM’s 16th since 1998, was signed at the Brazilian company’s headquarters in Rio de Janeiro by ICEM General Secretary Manfred Warda, and Petrobras Director for Gas and Industry, Maria Das Gracas Silva Foster, Executive Director for Human Relations, Diego Hernandes, and Joao Antonio de Moraes, General Coordinator of FUP (the Oil and Gas Workers’ Unified federation of Brazil). 
 
A GFA is a social pact between a multinational company and a Global Union Federation that puts in place the very highest standards regarding trade union and human rights, health, safety, and environmental practices, and quality of work principles across all of a company’s global operations. 
<img alt="" src="/sites/default/files/migration/icem/1112.petrobras%20gfa%20signed.JPG" width="214" height="160"/>
ICEM General Secretary Manfred Warda signs Petrobras GFA
“This is ICEM’s fourth such agreement with an oil and gas concern,” said Warda, “and it embodies many of the social principles that we expect companies in extractive industries to adhere to.” The ICEM has previously negotiated GFAs with Statoil of Norway, Eni of Italy and Lukoil of Russia. 
 
The agreement was signed with approval from ICEM Brazilian trade union affiliate, the Oil and Gas Workers’ Unified Federation (FUP), whose leaders were present at the signing together with ICEM Latin America/Caribbean Regional Vice President Sergio Novais of Brazil. Support from both FUP and Sergio Novais was important in reaching the agreement. 
 
The agreement commits Petrobras to recognizing the right of freedom of association and to bargain collectively for all employees, as well as establishing formal dialogue channels between staff and management. It also promotes working conditions that are favorable to a balance between work, personal, and family life. 
<img alt="" src="/sites/default/files/migration/icem/1112.petrobras%20gfa%20group.JPG" width="315" height="161"/>
ICEM, Petrobras, FUP
The GFA states that Petrobras “will strive to get all service providers to comply” with nine labour relations points contained in the agreement, including health and safety and providing necessary equipment, permanent institutionalization of negotiation channels, and equal opportunities and promotion of training opportunities. 
 
The agreement also recognizes global standards contained in the ILO Tripartite Declaration on Principles for Multinational Corporations and Social Policy, the OECD Guidelines for Multinational Corporations, the Universal Declaration of Human Rights, and the UN Global Compact. 
 
Warda and Petrobras CEO José S. Gabriella de Azevedo initiated talks on the ICEM-Petrobras GFA as board members of the Global Compact some three years ago. 
 
Petrobras, 56% owned by the Brazilian government, has 80,500 employees and operates in some 30 countries. The company is a leader in exploration and production of oil, and operates 16 refineries as well as numerous petrochemical, biofuels, pipelines and other installations. The ICEM is composed of 255 national trade unions operating in 94 countries.

ICEM Signs 16th Global Agreement with Petrobras of Brazil

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The ICEM Brazilian affiliate, Federacão Única dos Petroleiros (FUP), or Oil and Gas Workers’ Unified Federation, carved important new safety protections for deepwater oil platform workers in a new collective agreement recently approved. 
 
The union twice came to the edge of beginning strike actions, but postponed walkouts when the Brazilian state company agreed to better pay and more FUP and worker involvement in safety matters on the platforms in the Campos and Espírito Santo Basins, as well as across the company nationally. 
 
Following the FUP General Board accepting a revised company proposal that spells out specific safety requirements on 22 November, the contract won favour from 35,000 oil workers in local meetings, many coming on 26 November. 
<img alt="" src="/sites/default/files/migration/icem/ICEMoil4.JPG.JPG" width="110" height="110"/>
The new contract stipulates mandatory union representation of 150 safety specialists on platforms in the Campos Basin, for instance, and it requires three annual inspections per rig. Petrobras is underway with a US$225 billion investment in downstream and upstream projects, including exploration and development of 19 new wells next year in the deepwater Campos Basin off São Paulo state. 
 
FUP leaders throughout seven rounds of bargaining called for the same safety criteria that Norwegian state company Statoil has with ICEM affiliate IndustriEnergi (IE). Since the 2001 killing of 11 workers in the explosions and subsequent sinking of its P36 platform in the Roncador offshore fields, Petrobras has seen some 80 workplace fatalities, including one in September from a fire on a diesel fuel tanker. 
 
The FUP in 2010 forced suspensions on both Platforms 33 and 35 off Brazil, and the company itself shut operations on different vessels in both January and February this year over safety concerns. 
 
Worker safeguards in the agreement came only after FUP set a second strike deadline of 16 November. Following a first strike threat some weeks before, Petrobras agreed to improve health and pension fund benefits for workers. 
 
The pay package, another key issue throughout talks, will see Petrobras oil workers get a 10.71% pay rise, which represents 3.4% in real wages when factoring in Brazil’s inflation rate.

Strike Threat Gets FUP Major Safety Protections for Brazil’s Petrobras Workers

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Settlement was reached on 25 November to end the conflict between ICEM affiliated Sintracarbón and Glencore subsidiary Prodeco SA in northern Colombia. ICEM reported two weeks ago the <a href="/en/78-ICEM-InBrief/4783-Sintracarb%C3%B3n-Launches-Strike-at-Glencore-s-Calenturitas-Mine-in-Colombia" type="internal">resounding vote to strike</a> by 1,200 miners after repeated efforts to bargain with company management toward a new collective agreement failed.  
 
The Calenturitas mine is located in Cesar department’s La Jagua de Ibirico municipality. 
 
The strike lasted nine days, with all Colombian ICEM affiliates present at the picket, Sintraelecol, Fenaltec, Sintracarcol, Sintravidricol, USO and Sintracarbon. Worker unity, in face of concerted company efforts to intimidate and harass, led to agreement on a new contract set to last two years. Operations at Calenturitas were resumed in the afternoon of 25 November after the signing, while at the same time ICEM affiliates gathered for the ICEM Congress in Buenos Aires were planning international solidarity efforts to support the strike. 
<img alt="" src="/sites/default/files/migration/icem/1112.prodeco picket.png" width="240" height="161"/>
Prodeco Picket
Workers achieved a salary increase of 1.5% above the consumer price index and a settlement bonus of 1.5mn pesos (US$773) per worker. The agreement benefits all employees of Prodeco, strengthening their rights association, collective bargaining, and right to strike. And importantly the agreement improves job security. 
 
The effective strike caused the company to lose more than 30,000t/d of coal production, according to reports. 
 
As is almost always the case in labour disputes in Colombia, the Ministry of Labour made clear that if pushed they would declare the strike illegal, empowering the courts to disregard the collective will of mineworkers at Calenturitas. 
 
Calenturitas produces over five million tonnes of coal a year. Prodeco produced 10 million tonnes of coal in 2010 and aims to increase production to 19.9 million tonnes in 2013 and 20.7 million tonnes in 2015. 
 
For every 100 pesos of Prodeco’s cost structure, only 5 pesos are spent on their payroll.

Colombia Prodeco Mine Dispute Settled

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The right wing government of Viktor Orbán in Hungary has systematically over the past year and a half dismantled many trade union freedoms and social dialogue relationships. The new Labour Code is not only completely undermining workers’ ability to fight for just conditions in the workplace, but is now empowering companies to re-open old conflicts and punish trade union activists for actions taken under the previous legislation. 
 
ICEM affiliated unions were shocked to be informed at Congress of Japanese rubber conglomerate Bridgestone’s move to initiate a penal procedure against Tamás Székely, president of VDSZ, the Hungarian chemical workers union. The case against the union president is focused on a 2009 report in the union journal “Vegyipari Dolgozó” or “Chemical Worker” on the treatment of a company employee. 
<img src="/sites/default/files/migration/icem/0912.hungary.tamas.jpg" width="128" height="170" alt=""/>
VDSZ President Tamás Székely
Tibor Skoflek suffered occupational health problems in the spring of 2009 and Bridgestone at the time rejected any responsibility for this. Local management even failed to supply transport to hospital for Tibor Skoflek, and he was taken by a bus driver. 
 
This is the first time in 20 years of Hungarian trade union work that a company initiates a penal procedure against a union leader with absolutely no negotiations or consultation beforehand. 
 
The clear policy of the Orbán regime is to create fear among Hungarian workers so that they rescind trade union membership. 
 
The ICEM condemns in the strongest terms this crackdown on fundamental labour rights in Hungary, and specifically in this case against Tamás Székely, and will be exerting pressure at company and government levels.

Bridgestone Hungary forces the President of VDSZ to court

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A member of ICEM-affiliated Metallurgical, Mining and Chemical Workers’ Union of Georgia who received serious burns but escaped death in a 27 August 2010 coal mine explosion died inside that same mine in late November due to a shaft cave-in. 
 
Sergi Ashotia, 50, was working inside the Tkibuli-Mindeli Coal Mine of Geo-Coal, owned by the Georgian Industrial Group, when he was buried on 24 November by rock and wooden support pilings. A similar shaft collapse at the accident-prone mine in western Imereti region occurred on 6 November, killing two miners – 49-year-old Bondo Mikheilidze and 61-year-old Tamaz Gioradze. 
 
Ashotia was one six miners severely burned in the August 2010 methane gas explosion that killed four miners. The ICEM then charged Geo-Coal, also called Saknakhshiri, with failure to install modern ventilation and detection equipment. 
 
Safety issues were a main reason behind a strike by the mine’s 200 workers last February. After a January 2011 mine explosion killed one worker, management sacked two low level managers and police in the city of Tkibuli arrested them for safety negligence. Miners then engaged in an open-ended strike on 2 February in support of them and in protest to the company’s safety inadequacies.
<img alt="" src="/sites/default/files/migration/icem/1110.georgia.jpg" width="125" height="166"/>
Kutasi Meeting, October 2011: Mineworkers' Union Leaders Present 
That strike ended when the company agreed to a labour contract empowering the Metallurgical, Mining, and Chemical Workers’ Union to assist with safety improvements. The mine then experienced another fatality on 9 September 2011. 
 
As for November’s fatalities, the union is involved in the investigation, but Metallurgical, Mining and Chemical Union President Tamazi Dolaberidze said many of the facts are being distorted by people who were present during the cave-ins. He said the managing director is also disturbed by this. 
 
The result has been reinforcement of the terms ending the strike, with a joint labour-management safety committee established for better process control of safety and labour protection systems. Dolaberidzi said he is confident this will positively impact preventative measures. 
 
Geo-Coal, or Saknakhshiri, has granted each of the miners’ families with the equivalent if US$7,000 and paid for all funeral expenses. The company also took out an insurance policy last February that went into force on 1 November. The policy insures Geo-Coal for up to five fatal accidents per year, and it gave the families of the three miners who perished last month each with US$25,000. 
 
The union also assisted families of dead miners with stipends.

Deaths Continue To Plague Georgia’s Tkibuli-Mindeli Coal Mine

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The US-based United Autoworkers’ Union (UAW) exhibited exemplary trade union solidarity with the Korean Metal Workers’ Union (KMWU) recently when American autoworkers turned out to picket and handbill Hyundai auto dealerships in the US. 
 
Customers at some 75 Hyundai dealerships on 30 November learned of the injustice afforded a contract worker at a Hyundai Motor Group factory in South Chungcheong province, who was sacked after she filed a sexual harassment lawsuit with the National Human Rights Commission (NHRC) of Korea.
<img alt="" src="/sites/default/files/migration/icem/HyundaSexH.jpg" width="260" height="171"/>
The UAW took on the mid-day action at Hyundai dealerships from California to New York to inform American car buyers of this contract worker’s current plight. The KMWU, affiliated to the Korean Confederation of Trade Unions (KCTU), is championing the 45-year-old woman’s case especially after the Korea Workers’ Compensation and Welfare Service, in investigating the complaint, inexplicably added to the harassment in outrageous questioning of the woman. 
 
Hyundai claims it is not responsible for liability, since the 14-year service worker was employed by Glovis, a symbiotic contractor of Hyundai. Among other forms of harassment in 2010, the woman had received inappropriate text messages and late night telephone calls from supervisors. 
 
Following the NHRC awarding her compensation of nine million won (US$7,725), Glovis fired her and has since refused to pay her the penalty. The woman has been holding a protest vigil in Seoul since June of this year. 
 
Said UAW President Bob King, “The UAW has embraced a global vision of social justice and will mobilize its membership to defend labour rights here and in other parts of the world.”

UAW Pickets US Hyundai Dealers over Sexual Harassment in Korea

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Members of the United Steelworkers Local 207L numbering 1,050 are livid that management of Cooper Tire and Rubber in Findlay, Ohio, broke good-faith negotiations and locked them out on 28 November. They showed their anger on Saturday, 17 December, by manifesting strongly with other state and regional trade unionists in the northern Ohio town. 
 
To be sure, descendants of the founders of the company that gave birth to Cooper Tire are also unhappy with current management over the lockout. In a letter to top executives of America’s fourth largest tyre maker on 9 December, Janet Clinger and Lingel Winters wrote that their grandfather “Claude Hart adhered to the standards … believ(ing) that the company had a responsibility for the well-being of not only the shareholders, but the workers and the community.” 
 
The <a href="/en/78-ICEM-InBrief/4808-Cooper-Tire-and-Rubber-Locks-Out-Steelworkers-at-Ohio-Factory" type="internal">lockout began</a> after workers rejected a concession-loaded proposal in late November and after the USW requested to continue work and continue bargaining. Cooper’s lockout was sudden, unprovoked, and now damaging both to labour relations and workers’ lives. Within days of the lockout, the company proudly announced it would re-start production with managers and temporary scab workers.
<img alt="" src="/sites/default/files/migration/icem/1112USWcopperchain.jpg" width="75" height="75"/>
Lockout: War on Families
Cooper’s war on rubber workers at its flagship factory was evident at the 17 December manifestation. USW Local 207L President Rod Nelson lamented misguided managers who weathered the 2008-09 US manufacturing downturn with no small help from workers’ pay-check concessions, and now return for more economic cuts from workers when profits are good and executive bonuses are back. 
 
“Cooper hasn’t been fair with us at the bargaining table,” said Nelson, refuting a management that has lost touch with the company’s founding principles. “We don’t lock people out of their jobs, we work through our problems.” 
 
USW Secretary-Treasurer and ICEM Rubber Sector Chairman Stan Johnson told the rally that the union has responded globally and immediately received support from Serbian union Nezavisnost. That came within days of Cooper’s 8 December announcement that it would buy early next year a tyre factory from Trayal Korporacija AD near Krusevac, Serbia. 
 
The USW also received an assist from its trans-Atlantic partner Unite the Union in bringing the lockout to the attention of workers at Cooper’s Melksham, Wiltshire, UK. Unite has flooded the shop floor of former Avon Tyres Ltd., which Cooper bought in 1997, with leaflets, posters and details of the American lockout.
<img alt="" src="/sites/default/files/migration/icem/0905.rubber.conf.1.jpg" width="110" height="136"/>
Stan Johnson
“This lockout is about greed and gluttony,” said Johnson at Saturday’s rally. “It’s about a shiny new jet (Cooper’s new purchase) and it’s about multi-million-dollar bonuses.” 

It is also about abandoning the traditions of social responsibility, judging from the letter by descendants of founders Claude Hart and John Schaefer. Expressing disappointment, Clinger and Winters wrote, “Locking out employees who helped the company during hard times and hiring scab workers to replace them subverts the purpose of collective bargaining. “ 
 
USW Local 207L and Cooper did return to the table on 13 December in talks supervised by US federal mediator Kevin Moyer. But those negotiations produced no trace of Cooper reconciliation, or rescinding of harsh contract terms. 
 
The stakes will now get higher between the USW and Copper as a contract expires on 20 January 2012 between USW Local 752L in Texarkana, Arkansas, and the Findlay-based company. The 1,500 workers there have voted to give their union committee a mandate to strike if necessary.

Steelworkers in Lockout Manifest against Copper Rubber in US

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