English

Español

Français

Aerospace

Automotive

Base metals

Chemical, pharmaceutical and bio-science

Energy

Glass, cement, ceramic and associated industries

ICT, electrical and electronics

Mechanical Engineering

Mining and DGOJP

Pulp and paper

Rubber

Shipbuilding and shipbreaking

Textile, garment, shoes, leather and textile services

Sectors

Action Plan 2025-2029

Action on textile and garment industry

Clean up shipbreaking

Ratify ILO C176

United for a just future - time to pay up!

Disinvest from Myanmar

Campaigns

Global Framework Agreements

Union building

White-collar workers

Health & safety

Industry 4.0

Women

Youth

LGBTQI+

Gender, equality, diversity and inclusion (GEDI)

Just Transition

Organizing with industriALL

What we do

Affiliates

Statutes

Elected Officials

Executive Committee

Geneva head office

South East Asia

Eastern Europe, Central Asia and the Caucasus

Latin America and the Caribbean

Middle East and North Africa

South Asia

Sub-Saharan Africa

Regional offices

About us

Global worker No1 2022

Global worker No2 2022

Publications

Resources

Press

Members of Canadian affiliate Communications, Energy and Paperworkers (CEP) Local 689 struck Finnish papermaker UPM Kymmene 16 December in Miramichi, New Brunswick, over the firm&rsquo;s refusal to table the paper industry&rsquo;s pattern agreement for eastern Canada. Some 790 CEP members at a kraft pulp mill and a fine papers mill are striking to gain the pattern set when CEP signed a six-year accord with Abitibi-Consolidated last July.

CEP in Canada Strikes Finnish Paper Company UPM Kymmene

Belgian affiliate CG-FGTB held a day of manifestation 21 December followed by strikes at glass plants in protest to Glaverbel&rsquo;s decision to eliminate 284 out of 840 jobs. The protests, which included the white-collar Belgian union SETCa-FGTB and FNV Bondgenoten of The Netherlands, come as Glaverbel rapidly expands in eastern Europe and Russia. Glaverbel, Europe&rsquo;s second largest flat glass maker, is owned by Japanese petrochemical producer Asahi Glass, which bought a majority stake of the firm in 1981, upped its share to 90% in 2001 and purchased the remaining 10% a year later.

Belgian Unions Protest Japanese Glass Restructuring

The UK&rsquo;s Transport &amp; General Workers Union (T&amp;G) says French-based Imerys has unilaterally decided to implement pension scheme concessions on its 2,500 UK workers. Without consultation with the union, the company says it will eliminate the final salary scheme for new hires and terms of the scheme for existing workers will be downgraded. T&amp;G points out that Imerys &ldquo;had taken a three-year pension holiday&rdquo; from 2000-03 that cost the scheme &pound;9 million. Imerys also announced it would cut 80 jobs in the UK by next spring.

Transport &amp; General in UK Has Pension Issues with Imerys

ICEM affiliate USWA, meanwhile, achieved a first collective agreement in the US for 130 Goodyear Tire &amp; Rubber workers in Statesville, North Carolina. Workers there chose USWA for representation last February through a newly instituted card-check/neutrality agreement signed between the union and US rubber-maker in 2003 negotiations. The first labour agreement for the 130 at the tyre mold plant means they will come under the network of job security provisions agreed to in those 2003 negotiations, including the company&rsquo;s commitment to utilize USWA members before reaching outside for contract labour. The USWA is still negotiating at two other Goodyear plants where workers chose union representation through the card-check, or showing of interest procedure spelled out in the 2003 labour agreement with Goodyear. Those plants are a steel tyre cord plant in Asheboro, North Carolina, employing 350 workers, and a Goodyear textile plant in Utica, New York, employing 160.

USWA Reaches Agreement with Goodyear at Newly-Organized Site

The United Steelworkers of America (USWA) and German-based Continental Tire are in disagreement over severance and health care benefits for 700 workers about to be sacked due to a plant closing in Mayfield, Kentucky. The company announced earlier this year it was discontinuing manufacture of auto and light truck tyres effective 31 December 2004 in Mayfield. The USWA on 17 September submitted a US$20 million costs-savings proposal to Continental, but the company rejected it, stating investment and lower-cost tyre production from Brazil, Mexico and China is the firm&rsquo;s priority. Continental will maintain warehousing and a mixing unit in Mayfield, employing only 200 workers.

USWA Takes Issue with Continental Tire’s US Plant Closing

The long, bitter dispute between ICEM US affiliate PACE and Continental Carbon is over. After a three-and-a-half-year lockout by the Taiwanese-based firm of 86 workers who make carbon black for the rubber industry in Ponca City, Oklahoma, PACE members ratified a new labour agreement this weekend that includes a satisfactory back-to-work agreement.

US Affiliate PACE, Taiwanese Continental Carbon Reach Terms

FCE-CFDT also announced the draft of a social responsibility agreement with Electricit&eacute; de France (EdF), discussions which have involved the ICEM. Besides standard language upholding health and safety standards, social conditions and consistent policies on worker training and mobility, the draft contains commitments by EdF to provide access to electricity to those least able to afford it, careful and demanding selection of contractors, and stringent defence of the environment with the necessary equipment to promote energy efficiency.

French EdF Signs Social Responsibility Pact in Electric Sector

French union and ICEM affiliate FCE-CFDT has all along suspected that the August 2004 takeover by Aventis of Sanofi-Synthelabo creating Sanofi- Aventis, the world&rsquo;s third largest pharmaceutical maker, would have dire consequences on employment. The French union did not have to wait long for proof. In order to meet its goal for shedding &euro;1.6 billion in operating costs by 2006, the merged firm&rsquo;s first attack on workers will make redundant 431 pharmaceutical sales representatives and support staff, close Aventis&rsquo;s Strasbourg headquarters idling 230 workers, and the spin-off of Research and Development of infectious diseases will cost even more jobs. FCE-CFDT says the company&rsquo;s selective approach to early retirement is wrong, and the French company must negotiate with the union on age-related and across-the-board early-out packages.

Chemicals Merger Between Aventis and Sanofi Will Cost Jobs

Members of ICEM affiliate BMWU took to the streets in Selebi-Phikwe, Botswana, 3 December over another mining dispute. This one is with Bamangwato Concession Ltd. (BCL), a copper, nickel and cobalt miner in eastern Botswana that sacked the entire 16-member bargaining committee of the BMWU branch last July following negotiations. 
The company sacked the union team because they possessed financial information on the firm&rsquo;s mining operations. Such information is generally considered essential for unions in bargaining. 
Although most of the branch leaders have been recalled, BCL still refuses to rehire four&mdash;bargaining chairman and Deputy BMWU National Chair Golekanye Mogende, Kabelo Oitsile, Abel Bukha and Kealeboga Keakantse. BMWU timed the mass protest in which 2,000 turned out with BCL&rsquo;s unveiling of a new company logo.

Copper, Nickel Dispute Now Concerning Botswana’s Miners

Union leaders at DeBeers&rsquo; operations in Botswana, Namibia and South Africa met in Cape Town the week of 22 November for a globalisation school, and concluded the week with strong support for workers victimized by Debswana, the joint venture between DeBeers and Botswana&rsquo;s government. At a Diamond Employees Network meeting on 27-28 November, the leaders pledged to work through individual DeBeers worksites in the three countries to urge the company to drop charges against 451 Debswana workers, members of the Botswana Mining Workers&rsquo; Union (BMWU) who participated in a strike last August.

Union Leaders from DeBeers Hold Conference

Archive

CEP in Canada Strikes Finnish Paper Company UPM Kymmene

Belgian Unions Protest Japanese Glass Restructuring

Transport & General in UK Has Pension Issues with Imerys

USWA Reaches Agreement with Goodyear at Newly-Organized Site

USWA Takes Issue with Continental Tire’s US Plant Closing

US Affiliate PACE, Taiwanese Continental Carbon Reach Terms

French EdF Signs Social Responsibility Pact in Electric Sector

Chemicals Merger Between Aventis and Sanofi Will Cost Jobs

Copper, Nickel Dispute Now Concerning Botswana’s Miners

Union Leaders from DeBeers Hold Conference

About IndustriALL

Follow us

Contact us