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<img alt="" src="/sites/default/files/migration/icem/InBrief100.jpg" width="100" height="39"/>
The global ICEM family last week congratulated the victory by South Africa’s National Union of Mineworkers (NUM) to block Brazilian mining group Vale’s efforts to invest in the country, and to operate elsewhere in the region. Vale’s anti-union behaviour throughout the world, most notably against the United Steelworkers (USW) in Canada, led NUM General Secretary Frans Baleni to describe the company as “one of the world’s leading labour exploiters.” 
 
The base-metals mining company Metorex, listed on the Johannesburg Stock Exchange, had been a long-term acquisition target for Vale. The South Africa-based miner has extensive copper and cobalt mining operations, and prospective growth projects, in the Democratic Republic of Congo (DRC) and in Zambia. 
<img alt="" src="/sites/default/files/migration/icem/0610NUMFransBaleni1.jpg" width="100" height="142"/>
Frans Baleni
The announcement that Vale were pulling out of the Metorex bid, due to strong pressure from the union, was welcome news on 12 July. If the mining multinational had continued its pursuit, NUM was set to challenge the takeover in the South African Competition Commission. 
 
The alternative bidder for Metorex, the Chinese company Jinchuan, also has a negative labour relations history and is not being welcomed by the NUM. The defeat of Vale will give a stark warning to Jinchuan of the NUM’s strength. Baleni warned Jinchuan that “when in South Africa, do as South Africans do.” 
 
ICEM General Secretary Manfred Warda congratulated Baleni on the victory, describing it as “another example of the strength of Africa’s predominant trade union.” 
 
Jinchuan has offered R 9.1 billion (€930 million) for Metorex, and the company’s board has recommended that shareholders accept the offer.

NUM Succeeds in Blocking Vale’s Bid for Metorex in Southern Africa

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The manufacturing sector in the United Kingdom is under attack from the Tory government and its destructive policy of austerity cuts. ICEM’s UK affiliate Unite at its National Sector Conferences last week set out a new strategy to revive and rebuild the industry. 
 
The strategy document, put forward by Unite Assistant General Secretary Tony Burke, underlines the vital importance of the manufacturing sector to the British economy, a sector built on a highly skilled workforce. The strategy paper calls for investment in skills, apprenticeships and for full utilization of modern technologies, for a long-term solution. 
<img alt="" src="/sites/default/files/migration/icem/Tony Burke Unite UK.jpg" width="117" height="161"/>
Tony Burke, Unite
The need for this investment is even greater, according to Burke, as Tory Chancellor George Osborne’s austerity cuts are crippling consumer domestic demand. Government policy which seeks to shift the bill for economic failure onto the working men and women of Britain is hitting Unite members across its sectors. At last week’s National Sector Conferences, examples were discussed from Aerospace, Shipbuilding, Engineering, Chemicals, Sciences, Print, Paper, IT, Vehicle Building, Motor Components, Steel, Servicing, Communications, Electronics and Electrical Engineering. 
 
In the document Unite proposes ten pillars upon which a manufacturing revival should be based: 
• Build a framework of policies to defend strategically important industries. 
• Continued financial support through interventionist policies. 
• Targeted support for small and medium sized enterprises. 
• Better use of government purchasing power to secure manufacturing jobs in the UK. 
• Maximising the opportunities that the low carbon revolution offers. 
• Delivery of an education and skills framework, which meets all industry’s needs. 
• Creating a university structure, which builds on the science base so necessary to secure high skilled jobs. 
• Create right investment environment for research and development. 
• Creation of a level playing field to deliver security and fair pricing for energy. 
• A framework of legislation, which promotes transparency and engagement for all stakeholders in the future of manufacturing. 
 
“Manufacturing should be driving our economy, but the government has no strategy for UK manufacturing. This Tory-led government is doing more damage to UK manufacturing than any previous Conservative government,” stated Burke, “If this government is serious about rebalancing the economy, we need to invest in the UK’s manufacturing skills base with a long-term solution.

Unite’s 2020 Vision Calls for Investment in Skills to Protect UK Manufacturing

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US-based Cooper Tire and Rubber surprised rubber workers and their union, the United Steelworkers (USW), by rejecting good-faith efforts to extend a labour agreement and locking 1,050 USW members off their jobs at a tyre factory in Findlay, Ohio. 
 
The lockout against USW Local 207L started on 28 November after workers rejected a concession-laden three-year proposal by a 606-305 vote the day before. The USW then offered to extend the agreement that had expired on 31 October, but Cooper responded by imposing the lockout. 
 
At the weekend, the company said it intended to take 30 days to re-start production using managers and temporary replacement workers. A senior manager of the US’s fourth largest tyre-maker predicted full production in Findlay by then. The company statement is seen as a direct affront to unionized rubber workers at another US Cooper’s tyre plant, in Texarkana, Texas. 
<img src="/sites/default/files/migration/icem/usw local 752L.jpg" width="200" height="112" alt=""/>
USW Local 752L in Texarkana currently is in bargaining with Cooper over a labour agreement that expires early in 2012. The 1,500 workers there have given union leaders a strike mandate through a vote. Bargaining in Findlay saw USW Local 207L not take a strike vote, making last week’s lockout unprovoked and a harmful retaliatory action by Cooper. 
 
The lockout is also a bitter stab at USW’s rubber workers who assisted the company in gaining US trade Section 421 protections against dumping of tyre imports into the US by China. In 2008, in the midst of the US debt crisis that crippled American manufacturing, Local 207L members granted US$30 million in contract concessions to Cooper to keep it operating. 
 
The ICEM condemns the lockout for these reasons, and the fact that it now seeks more givebacks from Findlay’s steelworkers at a time when it has resumed bonuses to executives. Cooper operates seven manufacturing plants, including former Avon Tyre factories in the UK, and start-up plants in Mexico and joint ventures in China.

Cooper Tire and Rubber Locks Out Steelworkers at Ohio Factory

<img alt="" src="/sites/default/files/migration/icem/InBrief100.jpg" width="100" height="39"/>
Birlesik Metal-Is, an affiliate of the International Metalworkers’ Federation, is fighting for basic trade union freedoms at German-based GEA in Gebze, Turkey. In a cynical move, local management locked out 62 workers while claiming they had conducted illegal strike action. That illegal strike action coincided with break times at the company, and separate investigations have proven that no strike action took place. The ICEM joined the growing international campaign calling for an end to the lock-out, full reinstating of four workers dismissed on 31 May, and an end to the police protection being awarded to the company in its anti-union struggle. 
 
The company behaviour in Turkey is in breach of an international minimum standards agreement with the IMF, in which it pledges respect of labour rights throughout its international operations. The IMF reminded the company and locked out workers of this fact at the picket line, as part of a large international solidarity visit to the GEA factory gates. 
<img alt="" src="/sites/default/files/migration/icem/1112.turkey metal.jpg" width="241" height="161"/>
ICEM was also present at the picket, and a <a href="/sites/default/files/migration/icem/ICEM_Letter_to_Workers.pdf">message of solidarity</a> was read out. See also the <a href="/sites/default/files/migration/icem/ICEM%20Letter%20to%20GEA%20Group%20(17%2011%202011).pdf">ICEM letter</a> to the company here.  
 
Support the <a href="http://www.labourstart.org/cgi-bin/solidarityforever/show_campaign.cgi?c=1167">LabourStart campaign</a>, and write to company management here. 
 
The ICEM has been invited and will participate at the Congress of Birlesik Metal-Is on 16-18 December.

Turkish Metal Workers Still Locked Out by GEA

<img alt="" src="/sites/default/files/migration/icem/InBrief100.jpg" width="100" height="39"/>
Like past years, the Communications, Energy, Paperworkers (CEP) Union of Canada held its bi-annual Women’s Conference in the days around National Day of Remembrance and Action on Violence Against Women in Canada on 6 December, the fateful date in 1989 when 14 young women were massacred at École Polytechnique in Montreal in an anti-feminist rage. 
 
Some 350 women attended the CEP’s 9th Women’s Conference in Canada’s national capital, Ottawa, from 4-6 December. The conference, entitled “Imagine,” included workshops on cyberstalking, gun registry, and street-proofing as deterrent for crime and violence against women.
<img alt="" src="/sites/default/files/migration/icem/1112.cep women.2.jpg" width="204" height="160"/>
CEP Women  
 

On the morning of the conference’s final day, former Governor General of Canada Michaëlle Jean spoke and told of battered women’s shelters in Quebec and the urgent need to engage young Canadians on the degradation that violence against women brings on societies. Following her address, delegates marched from the Westin Hotel in Ottawa to Parliament Hill, where a mass demonstration was occurring for gun control in Canada and the National Day of Remembrance of the Montreal Massacre. 
 
“The gun control law is a monument erected in the memory of our daughters,” said Suzanne Laplante-Edward, mother of Anne-Marie, who was slain at École Polytechnique by a lone gunman. The CEP’s Western Region Administrative Vice President, Wendy Sol, also spoke at the Parliament Hill manifestation. 
 
In an ICEM letter to delegates at the opening of the CEP’s Women’s Conference, the federation reminded Canadian women that the Montreal Massacre is rightfully marked in global observance of “16 Days Against Gender Violence,” as designated by the Global Campaign for Human Rights. Those 16 days began on 25 November with the UN International Day for the Elimination of Violence Against Women, and continued across World Aids Day (1 December), the Montreal Massacre (6 December), and finally International Human Rights Day (10 December). 
 
The ICEM letter read: “With the CEP Women’s Conference occurring within these globally recognized 16 days, please tell your delegates that the ICEM is using this time frame and indeed, the entire new year, to remind all that gender equity will remain a major global priority.”

CEP Holds 9th Women’s Conference in Ottawa, Canada

<img alt="" src="/sites/default/files/migration/icem/CAL_en.jpg" width="100" height="45"/>
A global ICEM Conference dedicated to discussing CAL took place immediately prior to the ICEM Fifth Statutory Congress in Buenos Aires on 23 November. The Conference brought together more than 400 delegates from 69 countries to exchange stories of best practice, to evaluate work done on CAL, and to probe the future fight against Contract and Agency Labour (CAL). 
 
The meeting was chaired by Sergio Novais, ICEM Vice President for Latin America/Caribbean, with an introduction by ICEM General Secretary Manfred Warda, who said, “This conference is about an issue that has been one of the highest on the political agenda of the ICEM for many years. But despite our efforts, CAL is still spreading. In some countries it has become the regular employment situation.” 
<img alt="" src="/sites/default/files/migration/icem/1201.CAL sergio.png" width="215" height="160"/>
Sergio Novais
For individual workers, Warda said, there is more job insecurity, less regular hours, lower and irregular pay, fewer benefits, and in many cases no access to social benefits and an increased health and safety risk. There is evidence that CAL is being used by employers to deny workers their right to freedom of association, and in many countries CAL workers are either legally or in practice prevented from joining a union. 
 
The conference began with ICEM CAL Project Coordinators and Jörgen Juul Rasmussen, General Secretary of DEF Denmark, introducing the CAL situation in Asia, Latin America, Sub-Saharan Africa and Europe. Aranya Pakapath, ICEM CAL Coordinator for Asia, shared a number of recent developments in the fight against CAL. In India, following a number of training workshops conducted by the ICEM, the Indian mineworkers’ union managed to negotiate a clause on CAL in a new mining sector agreement. The language states that companies should not engage contract workers on work of a permanent nature and that payment of contract workers will either be by cheque or bank transfer – so there is proof there is a relationship. 
 
In Malaysia, said Pakapath, the government last year attempted to introduce legislation to legalise employment agencies. After a conference the ICEM held with the Malaysian Trades Union Confederation (MTUC), the confederation petitioned the government to withdraw the bill. The bill was withdrawn, but last month was reintroduced and Parliament approved it. Pakapath highlighted the efforts of unions in Indonesia –where the paper unions have been actively organising outsourced workers and succeeded in recruiting 580 workers – and the Philippines where unions have been trying to ban employment agencies through legislation and the industrial courts. 
 
In Pakapath’s home country, she noted that at the Electric Generating Authority of Thailand (EGAT), EGAT-LU, with the solidarity and support of the Danish Electricians’ Union, managed to make fixed term workers into permanent workers, who are now entitled to social benefits. 
 
The ICEM and German affiliate IGBCE supported the Linde union in their struggle to get the industrial gas company to take responsibility for and respect the rights of CAL workers which finally resulted in the signing of an agreement between the company and the union. 
 
Elias Pintado of Brazil – who works together with Rosane Sasse to coordinate the CAL project in Latin America – highlighted some of the work carried out by ICEM affiliates to fight CAL and to improve legislation on outsourcing. Pintado explained that, with the exception of Brazil, all countries in the region have specific legislation to regulate outsourcing. 
 
Often these laws stipulate joint responsibility for employers who use outsourcing. In Brazil, the national congress is currently debating 26 bills to regulate outsourcing, most of which make it possible to outsource almost all functions. Brazilian unions are currently trying to collect one million signatures in support of one particular bill that would safeguard workers. 
 
Other Latin America unions have brought legal cases on the basis of legislation in force in countries, and in some cases have met with success. As a result of the many cases taking place in Brazil, the Higher Labour Court held a consultation on outsourcing. The chemical workers’ union has negotiated a code of conduct with Bayer in Brazil on outsourcing, which states that the employer is required to discuss CAL with the unions and inform the unions of the reasons why certain sectors would be subject to outsourcing. The code guarantees that user enterprises will pay wages and taxes for the CAL workers if the agency fails to do so. 
 
Before agencies can work for Bayer they must prove that they have no responsibility regarding workers’ wage arrears. Pintado informed delegates that on 28 July 2011, the Latin America Day against CAL was launched at a seminar in Colombia. Following the seminar, ICEM affiliates wrote to the head of Mercosur proposing unique legislation in the region on CAL. Many trade unions in the region have modified their statues and set up secretariats dedicated to CAL to monitor implementation of contracts and to represent workers. There are also shop stewards elected from among the CAL workers. 
 
The Sub-Saharan Africa strand of the ICEM CAL project has carried out activities in Senegal, Guinea Conakry, Sierra Leone, Nigeria, Mozambique, Mauritius, South Africa and Namibia. In the multitude of cases, the region has the aim of strengthening union negotiations and campaigns, to find solutions to negative practices, and to influence governments to introduce binding regulations on the use of CAL. 
 
A report by Joseph Toe, ICEM CAL Project Coordinator for the region, highlighted the fact that unions are joining forces on these common objectives. In Guinea, the three ICEM affiliates have formed a CAL Steering Committee; in Nigeria, the two ICEM affiliates in the oil and gas sectors are working closely together, and there is close cooperation between ICEM’s affiliates in South Africa and Namibia. 
 
Toe highlighted how Global Framework Agreements (GFAs) with Anglo Gold Ashanti and Umicore have been used to create space for collective agreements that cover all workers. In Sierra Leone, the Ministry of Labour has an action plan to stop the extension of agencies. In Nigeria, the Ministry for Petrol has published guidelines to control the activities of agencies. 
 
The guidelines cover industrial relations, collective bargaining for CAL workers, employment security and vocational training for CAL workers. In Mozambique, SINTIQUIAF has recruited into their ranks 300 CAL workers – the majority of whom are women aged 18-30. There is excellent cooperation between the labour inspectorate and the leadership of SINTIQUIAF, and labour inspectorate officials have attended all ICEM CAL seminars. The statutes of some unions have been amended – for example, Mauritius and Senegal – to make it possible for unions to recruit CAL workers. 
<img alt="" src="/sites/default/files/migration/icem/1201.CAL conf 2.png" width="213" height="160"/>
Introducing the CAL situation in Europe, Jörgen Juul Rasmussen of Denmark, said that insecure work is the most rapidly-growing form of employment in Europe said that about 14% of all workers in Europe are on precarious jobs. At a company level, said Rasmussen, it is vital that shop stewards address the problem. In Denmark, the unions are fighting at the national level to include language on CAL in CBAs and the labour courts have ruled that when you have an agreement it must also apply to CAL workers. 
 
In Europe, for many years unions have demanded a Directive on agency work – this was agreed in 2008. All EU member states are implementing the Directive, although some countries are finding national solutions. Globally, unions can use ILO Conventions and Recommendations and, where necessary, engage in global campaigns. 
 
European labour organisations EMCEF, EMF, and ETUF: TCL have agreed that CAL is a major negotiating priority. 
 
Rasmussen highlighted some inspirational examples from Europe. For instance in Denmark, there is a major industrial agreement with a paragraph that says CAL workers should have the same rights as permanent workers. In Sweden, the unions and employers have joint committees to authorise the use of agencies and agency workers must have the same average wages as their permanent equivalents. 
 
A 2010 agreement, states that companies cannot hire agency workers if they have dismissed permanent workers over the previous six months. IF Metall in Sweden has agreed that employers must negotiate with the union before taking on agency workers for more than one month. In the construction sector in Belgium, the unions managed to ban the use of one-day contracts through collective agreements. 
 
The second part of the conference saw the exchange of best practice examples, with panels composed of ICEM affiliates from Mauritius, India, the Netherlands, Colombia, Senegal, Malaysia, Turkey and Argentina. Sascha Meijer described how FNV Bondgenoten is working to protect the rights of between 3,000 and 4,000 migrant workers involved in a major construction project in the Netherlands. The migrant workers, the vast majority of whom work through agencies or subcontractors, put in long days for low wages, do not get extra pay for working weekends, and are deducted amounts for accommodation and transport. 
 
The wrong social security regime is being used and the cheapest CBA – the wrong one – is being applied, all amounting to unequal pay for the same work. FNV Bondgenoten in the Netherlands developed a new, flexible approach to organising workers in this challenging context. They are building relationships with the workers, using the media to name and shame the exploitative agencies and employers, and making sure that relevant questions are put to Parliament. 
 
Bondgenoten is establishing better relations with unions in the home countries of the workers, and has signed a framework agreement with the energy employers on CAL matters, which includes a procedure for resolving conflicts and it also necessitates regular dialogue. Meijer highlighted the need for stronger international cooperation between unions to make union membership more worthwhile for migrant workers. 
 
Panellists shared examples of actions being taken at national, company and trade union levels in the fight for permanent direct employment and for equality of treatment. At the national level, Sutids, the industrial workers’ union of Senegal, launched an awareness-raising media campaign, communicated with employers and lobbied the President of Senegal, the national assembly, the Senate and the Ministry of Labour. These actions contributed to the passing of a bill on employment agencies. 
 
The provisions include employers can only use temporary workers to carry out specific tasks, and not for more than two years; that CAL workers must be paid the same as permanent workers; and that at the end of the contract the agency must pay 7% of the total gross remuneration during the whole period of the contract. Sutids also recruited 1,200 new CAL members. 
In Mauritius, in October, the ICEM affiliate SYNDICATRAVAYER signed the first ever collective agreement in the construction sector where permanent and CAL workers are both covered – there is a 15% wage increase for all workers and, most importantly, all workers doing work of the same value must be equally remunerated. 
 
ICEM Turkish affiliate Petrol-Is drew attention to the protocol signed with Tüpraş, Turkey’s largest industrial enterprise, which states that CAL workers must become permanent employees once they have worked at the company for seven months. The Chemical Mazdoor Federation of India reported that an affiliated union managed to recruit all 650 CAL workers in a chemical plant, who then got almost all the benefits given to permanent workers. 
 
At the same time, there are several cases pending in the Indian courts as unions have filed complaints against employers for using “sham and bogus” contracts. For more than ten years, Sintracarbon of Colombia has been organising CAL workers. Some 6,000 of the 11,000 workers at Carbones del Cerrejon, the world’s largest open cast coal mines, are contract workers – they work long days, are far from their families, and are paid the minimum possible. Recently, the union had successes in organising mechanical workers and is working on a set of demands with the supplier company. Now 20% of Sintracarbon’s members are contract workers. 
 
The panellists also discussed actions unions are taking to improve recruitment, active involvement and representation of CAL members. In India, dedicated unions have been established for CAL workers and others have opened their door to CAL workers – for example the Indian National Mineworkers’ Federation has succeeded in organising 10,000 CAL members. In Mauritius, SYNDICATRAVAYER amended their rules and reduced membership fees from 50 Rupees to 1 Rupee. The union constructed a two-story building which members can use, created an IT school were CAL workers and their families can receive free training and established a credit union where members can take out loans. Within 18 months, 3,000 new members have been recruited in the construction sector alone. 
 
The final panel of the day, comprising the General Secretaries of the IMF, the ICEM and the ITGLWF and chaired by the Coordinator of the Council of Global Unions, Jim Baker, discussion centered on future strategies. Jyrki Raina, IMF General Secretary, said that the fight against precarious work must be one of the key priorities of the new global union federation, which will be founded in June 2012. Raina explained that cooperation with the ITUC and all other GUFs is vital as we are facing the powerful lobby of MNEs and Ciett who want to use international institutions to legitimise the spread of precarious work. 
<img alt="" src="/sites/default/files/migration/icem/1201.CAL conf 3.png" width="214" height="160"/>
Employers argue that temporary agencies create new jobs but, said Raina, the fact is that temporary agencies make decent jobs, with social protections, precarious jobs. Unions should work to limit the use of precarious work in all its forms and if precarious work is used unions should work to guarantee the same level of wages and benefits for all workers. 
 
According to ILO figures, 80% of all workers have no social security protection – this has to be a priority for the new global union. ICEM’s Manfred Warda reflected on the First Global CAL Conference in Bangkok in 2007, where the problem of CAL was identified. Since then, Warda said, serious work has been taken by ICEM affiliates and the affiliates of other GUFs, which must form the foundations for future work. 
 
The first task is organise, organise, organise. CAL workers must be included in the bargaining unit, and unions should help them gain permanent employment status. Warda highlighted that factors contributing to recent mining disasters included that workers did not get adequate safety training and were not employed directly. Following the Deepwater Horizon disaster, BP said that the responsibilities were shared by various subcontractor companies. 
 
Klaus Priegnitz, ITGLWF General Secretary, spoke about how conditions in textile plants in countries such as the Philippines and Bangladesh are being driven down even further by the growing use of CAL. The only objective, he said, is to have cheaper and cheaper labour. 
 
He said we must fight this at a national level – organise, recruit and become stronger. We can use GFAs as tools to fight precarious work. We should also use the revised OECD Guidelines for Multinational Enterprises. In summary, the General Secretaries drew attention to the importance of continuing and expanding the joint work carried out through the Council of Global Unions Work Relationships Group. They said that the ICEM, the IMF and the ITGLWF must increase cooperation and the founding of a new GUF is the right next step – the three GUFs will be stronger together.

Affiliates Reaffirm CAL Fight at 2nd Global Conference

<img alt="" src="/sites/default/files/migration/icem/CAL_en.jpg" width="100" height="45"/>
From International Metalworkers’ Federation 
 
At the ILO Global Dialogue Forum on private employment agencies, unions put on record their experiences of employment through agencies being used to drive down wages and prevent agency workers from joining a union and bargaining collectively. 
 
On 18-19 October, representatives of governments, private employment agencies, and trade unions exchanged views on the role of agencies in promoting decent work. The discussions revealed that unions and agencies have completely different views on the impact of the growth of agency labour on employment. 
 
The agencies repeatedly insisted that agency work is decent work, that it creates jobs and that it is never used to undermine or replace open-ended, direct employment. All of these claims were rejected by trade union representatives, who presented a catalogue of situations from a variety of industries around the world that demonstrate that agency employment is being used to systematically replace permanent jobs, lower wages and work conditions and leaving workers with no social protections and no possibility of joining a union or bargaining collectively with their employer. 
 
Worker delegates insisted that triangular employment relationships by their very nature make collective bargaining virtually impossible. 
 
It rapidly became clear that the representatives of private employment agencies were using the meeting to seek legitimacy for their industry, to grow their markets and to be recognized as the sole counterpart for collective bargaining, at the exclusion of user enterprises. 
 
For their part, unions were seeking equal treatment for agency workers and restrictions on the circumstances under which agency employment is permissible, its duration and extent. Unions also wanted action to strengthen freedom of association and collective bargaining for agency workers which included user enterprises and unions representing workers in user enterprises. 
 
At the end of the meeting, a very limited number of potential consensus points were put forward for discussion, but finally the meeting ended with no conclusions when labour hire representatives showed that they are not ready to negotiate in order to reach agreement. 
 
Unions will continue to work within the framework of the ILO to ensure greater protection for agency workers and to limit the spread of agency work and triangular employment relationships.

ILO Meeting on Labour Agencies Exposes Abuses, No Consensus Reached

<img alt="" src="/sites/default/files/migration/icem/InBriefAlert.jpg" width="120" height="59"/>
The ICEM has responded with anger and outrage over the latest cold-blooded murder of a trade unionist in Colombia. Mauricio Redondo, 36, and his wife, Janeth Ordóñez Carlosama, were murdered in their home in the village of Teteyé, in the southern department of Putumayo, on 17 January at 19h30 by two gunmen. 
 
Mauricio Redondo was a provincial leader of ICEM Colombia affiliate Unión Sindical Obrera (USO) and both he and his wife were activists in a community group that advocated for better working conditions, environmental stewardship, and labour and human rights in the booming oil and natural gas fields of the Putumayo basin in southwest Colombia.
<img alt="" src="/sites/default/files/migration/icem/1201.uso assassination.from uso website.jpg" width="240" height="141"/>
In fact, four days before the killings, a meeting in the municipality of Orito, at a forum called Primer Foro Petrolero por el Derecho al Trabajo, la Reivindicación Social y Económica de Orito, Redondo was an active speaker in talks to open public protests over these issues. According to initial reports, the two gunmen were wearing work uniforms of the local oil contracting company Empresa de Energía del Bajo Putumayo, EEEP (Energy Company of Lower Putumayo) and fired multiple gunshots into the couple. Redondo and Ordóñez are survived by five young children. 
 
“Once again we witness the price that dedicated trade unionists in Colombia pay when they attempt to stand up for a dignified way of life,” said General Secretary Manfred Warda, who was in Colombia when the murders happened. 
 
“Along with USO, we mourn the grisly deaths of Mauricio Redondo and Janeth Ordóñez and we call on Colombia’s federal and provincial prosecution teams to expend all efforts in apprehending and bringing to justice those responsible.” 
 
Mauricio Redondo was employed by Medellin-based P.E.I. Energy, an upstream oil and gas drilling company. He was a leader of the 220-member USO committee in Orito, in which 40% are employees of Ecopetrol and 60% employed by contract companies of the state-held energy company. 
 
The deaths of the couple came just days after three other USO Orito leaders – Manuel Coronado, José Socimo Erazo and Julio Vargas – were threatened by calls made to their mobile telephones. It also came after a bomb threat was directed at the USO regional office in Orito.
<img alt="" src="/sites/default/files/migration/icem/GUN.jpg" width="140" height="105"/>
Said Central Unitaria de Trabajadores (CUT) Human Rights Director Alberto Vanegas, the worst aspect of the 17 January heinous crimes are that “five children were left as orphans. This is what we leave with such murders: orphans and widows throughout the country.” 
 
The killings of Mauricio Redondo and Janeth Ordóñez mark the first murders of trade unionists in Colombia in 2012. In 2011, at least 29 trade union leaders were killed in calculated and cold-blooded political assassinations.

ICEM Condemns Assassination of USO Leader, His Wife in Colombia

<img alt="" src="/sites/default/files/migration/icem/InBrief100.jpg" width="100" height="39"/>
On 1 January, Rio Tinto’s aluminium subsidiary Alcan threw 780 Canadian members of United Steelworkers (USW) Local 9490 out of work at the Alma smelter and refinery in Saguenay-lac-Saint-Jean region, Québec. 
 
The callous lockout, as reported here in this <a href="/en/78-ICEM-InBrief/4837-USW-Affiliate-in-Québec-Locked-Out-by-Rio-Tinto-at-Aluminium-Plant " type="internal">ICEM dispatch</a>, came exactly at contract expiration of a prior five-year labour pact and simultaneously, Rio Tinto did little to hide the fact that because global aluminium prices had slumped, a full 11% of Alcan’s workforce would face layoffs. 
 
Last week, the ICEM and the International Metalworkers’ Federation (IMF) lodged a strong complaint with Rio Tinto CEO Tom Albanese over the assault by lockout on Syndicat des Métallos d’Alma members at this most modern of Alcan’s smelting/refining facilities. That letter can be found <a href="/sites/default/files/migration/icem/3.ICEM-IMFletterRioTintoAlma1.18Jan.pdf " type="internal">here</a>. 
<img alt="" src="/sites/default/files/migration/icem/1201.alcan photo lapresse.ca.jpg" width="239" height="160"/>
photo: lapresse.ca
Trade union affiliates across the world are now being asked to also send letters to Albanese. We ask you to take the attachment herein, modify appropriately, place on your letterheads, and fax to Rio’s corporate offices in London and Melbourne. 
 
Those fax numbers are +44 20 7781 1800 (London) and +62 3 9283 3707 (Melbourne). Be sure to e-mail this letter as well to the <a href="mailto:info@icem.org ">ICEM</a>, <a href="mailto:unionrights@imfmetal.org ">IMF</a>, and the <a href="mailto:bdavis@usw.org ">USW</a>. As the USW’s global campaign against Rio Tinto for fairness and justice mounts, more and more activity will ensue. 
 
Already, several Canadian trade unions and a few international ones have reached out to the USW and to Local 9490 to offer aid, assistance and support. One notable example came last week when another union representing metalworkers in the region, Le Syndicat National des Employés de l’aluminium d’Arvida (SNEAA), an affiliate of the Canadian Auto Workers (CAW), presented USW Local 9490 with an interest-free loan of C$1 million. 
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SNEAA President Alain Gagnon and Local 9490 President Mark Maltais
In making the presentation, SNEAA President Alain Gagnon expressed deep concern over Rio Tinto/Alcan’s intransigence in bargaining with fellow Alma metalworkers. 
 
This intransigence is reflected in the single biggest issue in the dispute – the company’s desire to have unlimited contracting out rights. Alcan has substituted the retirement of each full-time, USW-represented worker with a subcontracting employee. Company documentation reveals that the expected ratio of hours worked by subcontractors will go from 10% in 2010 to 27% this year. 
 
When Syndicat des Métallos d’Alma attempted to put a floor on outsourced work, or to put guidelines on addressing subcontract work, Alcan refused to address such issues. And at midnight, 31 December, Rio Tinto/Alcan showed its contempt toward any such dialogue with a lockout. 
 
Make sure your union takes action and registers its protest with Rio Tinto.

ICEM, Metalworkers Urge Action in Rio Tinto Canadian Lockout

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The ICEM has responded with anger and outrage over the latest cold-blooded murder of a trade unionist in Colombia. Mauricio Redondo, 36, and his wife, Janeth Ordóñez Carlosama, were murdered in their home in the village of Teteyé, in the southern department of Putumayo, on 17 January at 19h30 by two gunmen. 
 
Mauricio Redondo was a provincial leader of ICEM Colombia affiliate Unión Sindical Obrera (USO) and both he and his wife were activists in a community group that advocated for better working conditions, environmental stewardship, and labour and human rights in the booming oil and natural gas fields of the Putumayo basin in southwest Colombia. 
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In fact, four days before the killings at a meeting in the municipality of Orito, at a forum called Primer Foro Petrolero por el Derecho al Trabajo, la Reivindicación Social y Económica de Orito, Redondo was an active speaker in talks to open public protests over these issues. According to initial reports, the two gunmen were wearing work uniforms of the local oil contracting company Empresa de Energía del Bajo Putumayo, EEEP (Energy Company of Lower Putumayo) and fired multiple gunshots into the couple. Redondo and Ordóñez are survived by five young children. 
 
“Once again we witness the price that dedicated trade unionists in Colombia pay when they attempt to stand up for a dignified way of life,” said General Secretary Manfred Warda, who was in Colombia when the murders happened. 
 
“Along with USO, we mourn the grisly deaths of Mauricio Redondo and Janeth Ordóñez and we call on Colombia’s federal and provincial prosecution teams to extend all efforts in apprehending and bringing to justice those responsible.” 
 
Mauricio Redondo was employed by Medellin-based P.E.I. Energy, an upstream oil and gas drilling company. He was a leader of the 220-member USO committee in Orito, in which 40% are employees of Ecopetrol and 60% employed by contract companies of the state-held energy company. 
 
The deaths of the couple came just days after three other USO Orito leaders – Manuel Coronado, José Socimo Erazo and Julio Vargas – were threatened by calls made to their mobile telephones. It also came after a bomb threat was directed at the USO regional office in Orito. 
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Said Central Unitaria de Trabajadores (CUT) Human Rights Director Alberto Vanegas, the worst aspect of the 17 January heinous crimes are that “five children were left as orphans. This is what we leave with such murders: orphans and widows throughout the country.” 
 
The killings of Mauricio Redondo and Janeth Ordóñez mark the first murders of trade unionists in Colombia in 2012. In 2011, at least 29 trade union leaders were killed in calculated and cold-blooded political assassinations.

ICEM Condemns Assassinations of USO Leader, His Wife in Colombia

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