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<img alt="" src="/sites/default/files/migration/icem/InBrief100.jpg" width="100" height="39"/>
From the IMF website
ICEM, IMF and ITGLWF will hold the joint event “Cutting emissions - transforming jobs” at the UN climate change conference in Durban (COP17) to discuss a sustainable foundation for Just Transition and develop a common industrial strategy for the future of industrial workers. 
 
GLOBAL: The 17th conference of the parties (COP17) to the UN framework convention on climate change will be held in Durban, South Africa, from November 28 to December 9, 2011. The international trade union movement led by ITUC will urge the governments to agree on a legally-binding climate regime and a concrete climate finance scheme, including provisions for a Just Transition. 
 
To support ITUC's contribution, ICEM, IMF and ITGLWF will hold a joint event, "Cutting Emissions - Transforming Jobs" on November 30 at 14.30-16.00 in the COP17 World of Work Pavilion, at the Civil Society Space - University of KwaZulu, Howard College Campus, King George Av., Berea, Durban. 
<img alt="" src="/sites/default/files/migration/icem/Sustainable Tree.jpg" width="110" height="134"/>
The event will promote a common industrial workers' position to ensure the "greening" of existing jobs, the creation of new, sustainable jobs, and a Just Transition, with concrete policies for green technology innovation and a sustainability fund securing the future for both today's and tomorrow's workers. 
 
The discussions will focus on: 
 
•Post Kyoto framework: Could a second commitment period of the Kyoto Protocol be a solution to avoid a gap in emission reduction commitments and to re-build the legally-binding framework covering all countries in the future negotiation process? 
•Building a Foundation-Climate Finance: How should the funding be designed/realized to achieve sustainable jobs and a Just Transition? What are the components of a strong financing scheme e.g. mandatory contributions from governments, the Financial Transaction Tax (FTT), levy on maritime transportation & aviation, or? 
•Just Transition: What kinds of programme are needed for industrial workers who are most dramatically affected by the climate change issues? How can both today's and tomorrow's workers benefit from the transformation to a sustainable economy? What support will be needed? 
•Developing Industrial Strategy: Industrial strategies which aim towards sustainable production, the transformation and enhancement of existing jobs, and the creation of new, greener jobs are needed at local, national, regional and international levels. How could developed and developing countries be engaged to harmonize/develop respective industrial policies. 
•Union’s role for the future: How should unions get involved to transform industry and create new, greener jobs be designed and implemented with the full participation? 
 
For more information on the ICEM, IMF and ITGLWF event, contact Brian Kohler, ICEM Health, Safety and Sustainability officer (<a href="mailto:Brian.Kohler@icem.org">Brian.Kohler@icem.org</a>) or Kan Matsuzaki, IMF Director of Shipbuilding-shipbreaking, Non-Manual Workers and climate change (<a href="mailto:kmatsuzaki@imfmetal.org">kmatsuzaki@imfmetal.org</a>). 
 
See also ITUC's contribution to COP17 at <a href="http://www.ituc-csi.org/IMG/pdf/ituc_durbancontribution.pdf">http://www.ituc-csi.org/IMG/pdf/ituc_durbancontribution.pdf</a>. 
 
More information on COP17 WoW will be posted at 
ITUC: <a href="http://www.ituc-csi.org/climate-change-and-green-economy.html">http://www.ituc-csi.org/climate-change-and-green-economy.html</a>.

Industrial strategy on climate change to be discussed

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The ICEM opened day two of its 5th Statutory Congress in Buenos Aires with moving observance today, 25 November, of International Day for the Elimination of Violence Against Women. ICEM Executive Committee Member Tony Maher, the General President of the Mining & Energy Division of the Construction, Forestry, Mining & Energy Union (CFMEU) of Australia, opened the session by proclaiming ICEM awareness to the issue. 

“Until men stop perpetrating violence against women, it will continue. It won’t stop until men stand up and put a stop to it,” said Maher, who explained Australia’s <a href="http://www.whiteribbon.org.au/">White Ribbon</a> anti-violence campaign to the 800 ICEM delegates.
<img alt="" src="/sites/default/files/migration/icem/0712CFMEUMaher.jpg" width="80" height="120"/>
Tony Maher 
Maher added: “Unions in male dominated industries have a special obligation to take up the campaign. We are in a unique position to make a significant difference in the workplace.” 

Delegates to the Congress also turned their attention to a <a href="http://www.ituc-csi.org/violence-against-women-in-eastern.html">joint study</a> released today by the ICEM and the International Trade Union Confederation (ITUC) entitled “Violence Against Women in Eastern Democratic Republic of Congo: Whose Responsibility? Whose Complicity?” 

The study inspects violence against women in the DRC, whether domestic, violence on the job, or violence from conflict, where rape is a weapon in war. The ICEM/ITUC study, in part, depicts rape in the context of war as the most striking form of inequality between men and women. 

In the DRC, men seek to conquer other men by attacking and raping women, and women are raped for punishment and for revenge. 

Today marks the 12th year that world civil society has marked the International Day for the Elimination of Violence Against Women, with the UN General Assembly designating the day at its 54th session. The date 25 November was designated because it was that day in 1960 that three political activists in the Dominican Republican – the Mirabal sisters – were brutally assassinated by the regime of dictator Rafael Trujillo. 

Today also marks day one of 16 Days Against Gender Violence, as designated by the Global Campaign for Women’s Human Rights. From 25 November to 10 December, the campaign links the connection between women, violence and human rights, and encompasses 25 November, the 1 December World Aids Day, the Montreal Massacre of 6 December 1989, when 14 female engineering students were gunned down in Canada for being feminists, and 10 December, Human Rights Day.

ICEM Congress Focuses on Halt to Violence Against Women

The repressive Mugabe regime today found six activists guilty on fabricated charges of inciting public violence. They had been arrested a year ago, together with 39 other people for discussing the Arab Spring and viewing video footage on the popular uprising in Egypt. They had initially been charged with treason, but during the course of the court process, the charges were reduced and the other 39 people cleared.

	The six Zimbabwean activists, Munyaradzi Gwisai, Tafadzwa Choto, Tatenda Mombeyarara, Edson Chakuma, Hopewell Gumbo and Welcome Zimuto, face jail sentences of up to 10 years, to be handed down tomorrow. 

	Three of the six, Munyaradzi, Tafadzwa and Tatenda work with the Zimbabwe Labour Centre a non profit organisation that gives legal support to unions and workers on labour matters and  provides educational programmes. 

	The right to meet, discuss events in the world, share ideas and speak openly and freely is a basic human right for which activists should not be victimised and vilified.  

	Send your SMS text message now to the people who can limit the unfair sentence tomorrow.

	Police spokesman Wayne Bvudzijena + 263 712 801 172

	Police Commissioner Augustine Chihuri + 263 712 808 290

	Police Minister Kembo Mohadi +263 712 605 424

	Security Minister Didymus Mutasa +263 0712 200 532

	Send: "Do NOT send the 6 Harare activists to jail!"

Urgent! Send SMS to Call for Justice in Zimbabwe NOW

<img alt="" src="/sites/default/files/migration/icem/InBrief100.jpg" style="width: 100px; height: 39px;" width="390" />

	Schlumberger, the world’s largest oilfield services company, has sent a clear indication of its unwillingness to seek solution to a damaging labour relations situation at its Egyptian operations.

	Management of the French-based company in numerous locations and levels throughout the world responded over the past month to letters of different trade unions and activist organisations with a similar response each time, outlining their supposed readiness to solve the dispute in Egypt and launch an investigation.

	However, when ICEM General Secretary Manfred Warda offered to come to Egypt to meet Amr Essawi, the Area Manager for Schlumberger in Cairo on 8 March, the offer was ignored.

	In May 2011, the process to establish an independent company-level trade union at Schlumberger Egypt was finalised, as part of the Egyptian Federation of Independent Trade Unions (EFITU), the trade union centre established during the final days of the Mubarak regime.

	 <img alt="" height="159" src="/sites/default/files/migration/icem/1202.egypt group.JPG" width="263" /> 

	EFITU Founding Congress, February 2012

	On 11 May, when local management was informed of the new union structure, it responded with threats and dismissed the union branch’s General Secretary Mohamed, Abd Elrahman. On 3 July, the day of the union’s founding general congress, local management then dismissed the union’s President, Brother Essam.

	On 5 July, local management summoned union members to the head office and threatened them with dismissal if they did not leave the union. And then on 7 July, local management followed through on an earlier threat and dismissed the union’s Assistant General Secretary, Ayman Abd Elmonem.

	No reason or dismissal letter was given to Abd Elmonem. He was simply blocked from entering the workplace. On 12 July, another union member was dismissed in similar circumstances, Mr. Hossam Al-deed Mostafa, again with no written dismissal notice.

	ICEM affiliates who represent Schlumberger employees in Europe and North America have approached management at their prospective national level, each have been promised that the company is committed to find a solution and establish mature systems of industrial relations throughout the company’s operations and specifically in Egypt.

	But the leaders of the nascent company-level union for Schlumberger workers in Egypt remain sacked from their positions and refusal to discuss the situation with the ICEM is concerning.

	The ICEM, therefore, intends to expand its campaign with the next phase targeting Schlumberger’s clients, the major oil and gas multinationals. Schlumberger employs 2,500 workers in Egypt, 40% of who work for subcontractors at 10 different worksites. 

	Register your protest to Schlumberger Chairman Andrew Gould, CEO Paal Kibsgaard, and Egypt Area Manager Amr Essawy by clicking <a href="mailto:gould1@exchange.slb.com;%20pkibsgaard@exchange.slb.com;%20AEssawi2@exchange.slb.com">here</a>.

Schlumberger Ignores ICEM’s Offer of Dialogue

<img alt="" src="/sites/default/files/migration/icem/CAL_en.jpg" style="width: 110px; height: 50px" width="390" />

	IndustriALL Global Union, which will be established in June 2012 and will bring together affiliates of the International Federation of Chemical, Energy, Mine and General Workers’ Unions (ICEM), the International Textile, Garment, Leather Workers’ Federation (ITGLWF), and the International Metalworkers’ Federation (IMF), will prioritise the fight against contract and agency labour, and other forms of precarious work.

	<img alt="" src="/sites/default/files/migration/icem/2010.WDDW.logo.jpg" style="width: 120px; height: 125px" width="390" />

	IndustriALL will build on the work which has been done through the ICEM’s Contract and Agency Labour campaign, the IMF’s ‘Precarious Work Affects Us All’ campaign and the ITGLWF’s work on insecure employment in countries such as Peru, Cambodia, India and Turkey.

	The campaign against precarious work will be launched by IndustriALL at its founding congress in June, and the new Global Union will call on all affiliates to mobilise around this issue on the World Day for Decent Work on 7thOctober.

IndustriALL to Prioritise Fight Against Precarious Work

<img alt="" src="/sites/default/files/migration/icem/CAL_en.jpg" style="width: 110px; height: 50px;" width="390" />

	The Global Unions have released an updated set of joint principles on temporary agency work. Although there are varying approaches taken by trade unions in different countries and sectors to dealing with temporary employment agencies, ranging from total bans to partial bans to strict regulation, all Global Unions agree on a number of key principles. They include: • the primary form of employment should be permanent, open-ended and direct; • agency workers should be covered under the same collective bargaining agreement as other workers in the user enterprise: • temporary agency workers should receive equal treatment in all respects; • the use of temporary agencies should not increase the gender gap on wages, social protections, and conditions; • temporary work agencies must not be used to eliminate permanent and direct employment relationships; and • the use of agency workers should never be used to weaken trade unions or to undermine organising or collective bargaining rights.

	<img alt="" src="/sites/default/files/migration/icem/1204-precarios-work.png" style="width: 253px; height: 160px;" width="390" />

	Speaking about the revision of the joint principles Jim Baker, Coordinator of the Council of Global Unions, explained “The major reason why the Work Relationships Group recommended amending the principles on temporary work agencies is that it was clear in ILO meetings that private employment agencies were being treated as a “sector” even though they supplied, and in many cases, employed workers in multiple economic sectors. In that context, “sectoral” collective bargaining might divide them from the sectors in which they were working; resulting in significant differences in salaries and conditions of temporary and permanent workers, who might be performing the same tasks and working side by side.” The updated Principles make explicit that temporary work agencies do not constitute an economic sector and state that agency workers must be specifically guaranteed their right to negotiate the terms and conditions of employment with the user enterprises which effectively control them.

	Continued Baker: “Another change is to make it clear that Global Unions are concerned about the effect on the rights of workers in triangular situations, where the worker does not have an employment relationship with the real employer, regardless of whether the workers are employed on a temporary or permanent basis”.

	The updated <a href="http://cal.icem.org/images/documents/10-03-31%20Amended%20draft%20version%20of%20the%20Global%20Union%20Principles%20on%20Temporary%20Work%20Agencies%20as%20updated%20PR.doc">Global Union Principles on Temporary Work Agencies</a> are available here.

Updated Global Union Principles on Temporary Work Agencies

<img alt="" src="/sites/default/files/migration/icem/CAL_en.jpg" style="width: 110px; height: 50px" width="390" />

	As the use of CAL continues to grow around the world more and more unions and their members are taking to the streets to protest against the degradation of employment relationships.

	An all-India general strike was held on 28th February which brought together workers from various sectors to oppose the neoliberal policies of Prime Minister Manmohan Singh's government. One key demand of the action was to ensure that contract workers are award the same rights and protections as permanent workers.

	The Indian Contract Labour (Regulation and Abolition) Act stipulates that contract workers who perform the same or similar work as permanent workers will be entitled to the same wages and conditions. Under this Act, contract labour ought not to be permitted for permanent or core functions.

	 <img alt="" src="/sites/default/files/migration/icem/1202-holcim-india-press-conference.jpg" style="width: 245px; height: 160px" width="390" /> 

	However, as regularly reported by the ICEM, this Act is widely violated and contract workers in India habitually receive inferior terms and conditions of employment despite performing core tasks. On 12 January, the ICEM joined a complaint to the OECD submitted by its local affiliate Pragatisheel Cement Shramik Sangh (PCSS) regarding the illegal treatment of contract workers in India by the Swiss multinational cement company Holcim. Further information on the complaint is available <a href="/en/7-Asia-Pacific/4900-Holcim-s-Violations-in-India-Taken-to-OECD" type="internal">here</a>.

Indian Workers Mobilise to Protest Against Neo-liberal Policies Including CAL

<img alt="" src="/sites/default/files/migration/icem/CAL_en.jpg" style="width: 110px; height: 50px" width="390" />

	More than 200,000 workers dressed in yellow and red took to the streets in 32 city centres in South Africa in an extraordinary show of worker power against labour brokers.

	A general strike against e-tolling and labour brokers organised by the Congress of South African Trade Unions (COSATU) on March 7, 2012 was a resounding success.

	Addressing tens of thousands of people that gathered in Johannesburg, COSATU General Secretary Zwelinzima Vavi said the protest was not a march, but "an occupation of the city of Johannesburg by the workers". South African unions are resolved to bring an end to the use of labour brokers. "This is a class battle. This is a class war. Labour brokers do not create jobs - they destroy the agenda of decent work," said Vavi.

	<img alt="" src="/sites/default/files/migration/icem/1204-south-africa-cal.png" style="width: 241px; height: 160px" width="390" />

	General Secretary of the National Union of Metalworkers of South Africa (NUMSA), Irvin Jim addressed thousands of strikers in East London in the Eastern Cape. "Decent work is a right. Labour brokering is just like slavery and is causing major problems for the working class," Jim said, "They are taking up jobs from us and I am raising my finger at them. We must take a firm stand and see them banned for good."

	The strike was also organized to protest e-tolling, a toll road system that is being implemented in Gauteng province in April this year which Vavi called "a new apartheid" as the increased cost to travel would restrict people's movement, especially the poor working class.

	Vavi warned that labour was prepared to take action again on the issue. "If they say they will go ahead with the tolling, we will take all the people here, and more, and put them on the highways of Joburg," he said. "If they insist we pay for public roads then, just as we made the apartheid system unworkable, we will make this system unworkable."

	The protest against labour brokers and e-tolling had wide popular support and many civil society groups and ordinary South Africans spoke out in support of the strike. (Story provided by the IMF).

Strike Against Labour Brokers in South Africa 

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	Indonesia’s largest coal producer, PT Kaltim Prima Coal (KPC), through its mine services contractor Thiess Pty. Ltd. of Australia, has brutally attacked members of two ICEM-affiliated mine unions through police and military force. The dispute dates to the fourth quarter of 2011 when miners working for KPC, part of Indonesia’s Bumi Resources, first took strike action when it became obvious that neither Thiess nor KPC intended to grant a renewal collective agreement.

	But the dispute at KPC’s Sangatta mine in Kalimantan province on the island of Borneo turned violent on 24 March when 400 striking workers gathered at the coal company’s office in East Kutai district on the counsel of a local citizens group to offer themselves back to work following a second strike dating to last November.

	They were immediately attacked by a regional military brigade serving the interests of Thiess and KPC. Twenty miners were severely beaten and hospitalised. Another 12 were immediately detained and throughout the night of 24 March and into the next day, police and military rounded up yet another four union leaders and jailed them.

	 <img alt="" src="/sites/default/files/migration/icem/1204 SP KEP Thiess member injuty 2.jpg" style="width: 212px; height: 159px;" width="390" /> 

	By last weekend, most of the unionists had been released but police and regional military are still holding two union leaders, the Vice President of the local branch of ICEM affiliate Chemical, Energy, Mines, Oil & Gas Workers’ Union of FSP-KEP, Sumardi, and the Secretary, Maxi.

	The leader of FSP-KEP, D. Patombong Sjaiful, called the situation now “critical” and pleaded that global trade union attention is given this grievous repression by brute force. In the second time in a fortnight, Jakarta-based FSP-KEP dispatched a mission last Sunday to east Kalimantan province, this time to win the freedom of the two remaining unionists.

	The other ICEM-affiliated organisation with membership at KPC is the regional mining and energy union FPE, part of the Indonesian confederation SBSI. Some 2,200 miners work at KPC’s two open-cast thermal coal mines of Sangatta. FSP-KEP has some 1,400 members, while FPE has 200. KPC also consists of five smaller mines at the nearby Bengalon mine.

	<img alt="" src="/sites/default/files/migration/icem/1204 Thiess worker after medical threatmen due to Police attack.jpg" style="width: 172px; height: 159px;" width="390" />

	The dispute began following the expiration of a two-year agreement on 5 October 2011. Thiess Indonesia management foretold its strategy to eliminate the collective agreement by telling the unions a new agreement would not be valid until after negotiations were complete. And then the stalling began.

	The mineworkers’ only choice was to strike and the first work stoppage occurred from 10 November to 27 December, from which six union leaders were sacked. When the two sides finally did return to bargaining on 28 January 2012, union leaders were summoned to police offices in East Kutai district where they were surprised to see that the police commander representing the company in talks.

	Two days earlier, KPC sent a letter that the status of the six union leaders would not be on the agenda. Miners began a work slowdown resulting in 264 workers getting the sack that, in turn, caused a second strike.

	When Sjaiful and other FSP-KEP leaders visited in mid-March, an agreement was sorted out between the police, a local parliamentarian, and the citizens’ group calling for the strike to cease, recall of the dismissed workers, and a return to negotiations.

	But Thiesse and KPC rejected that. When strikers came to the company’s offices then on 24 March, they were met by police and the mobile brigade wielding batons and other instruments of force.

	The ICEM condemns Thiess, part of Australian Leighton Holdings Ltd. (LEI), whose ultimate parent is the German global construction giant Hochtief AG, for utilising police and military intervention to avert legitimate collective negotiations. It also holds Bumi Resources accountable for this contemptible display of anti-social conduct in its home country.

Thiess, Operating in Indonesia, Uses Police to Bludgeon Striking Coal Miners

<img alt="" src="/sites/default/files/migration/icem/InBrief100.jpg" style="width: 100px; height: 39px;" width="390" />

	The Rubber Workers of Argentina, SUTNA re-elected General Secretary Pedro Wasijko in elections on 20-22 March. With a high turnout in a contested election, the victory for Wasiejko serves as a strong testament to the significant achievements of the union in recent years.

	Important benefits for workers have been achieved such as profit sharing at one major company, the establishment of a Health and Hygiene Committee obliged to meet once a month as stipulated in the new sector-wide collective agreement, a new general clause obliging companies to incorporate women into the production work, and importantly the adoption of the fight against precarious work and outsourcing at a time when almost nobody in the Argentinian unions were prioritising this issue.

	<img alt="" src="/sites/default/files/migration/icem/1204-Pedro-Wasiejko-y-comision-directiva.png" style="width: 266px; height: 159px;" width="390" />

	SUTNA has also made important gains in workers’ salaries in the sector, increasing the purchasing power of rubber workers. Wasiejko pledged to continue this work, continuing to oversee the democratisation of workplaces and to improve working conditions throughout the sector.

	Wasiejko applauded the democratic nature of the appointment, stating that SUTNA’s politically rich, democratic culture stood them apart from many other Argentine unions who often present no choice to members in leadership elections.

Argentina’s SUTNA Re-elects General Secretary Pedro Wasiejko

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