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The US-based International Association of Machinists &amp; Aerospace Workers (IAM) gave full proof last week that collective bargaining is value-added, and Boeing workers no doubt in South Carolina took notice of pay, pension and job security provisions won by 28,000 aircraft manufacturing workers primarily in the state of Washington. 
 
IAM District Lodge 751 reached terms in a ten-months-early labour agreement in US states Washington, Oregon and Kansas with Boeing that not only gives machinists improved work and life stability, it deflates a political flashpoint that became the biggest threat to the independent integrity of the US National Labor Relations Board (NLRB) in the government agency&rsquo;s 76-year history. 
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The award-winning IAM contract, which will receive wide acceptance when workers vote on it on 7 December, means the IAM will withdraw a vile discrimination complaint issued by the NLRB against Boeing for public statements it made when opening a production line of the 787 Dreamliner aircraft in North Charleston, South Carolina, this year. 
 
The NLRB determined that Boeing violated US labour code by boldly stating its anti-union bias in opening a factory in union-repressive South Carolina. Boeing&rsquo;s action unleashed a political venom by Republican Party politicians both nationally and in South Carolina that turned into nothing less than a witch hunt to destroy the NLRB as the governing agency for American US labour law. 
 
The IAM agreement now closes that debate and a new discourse should begin on the benefits and values of a collective agreement, particularly for Boeing workers in South Carolina right now who do not have one and will see their numbers increase from 1,500 to 5,000 as production on the 787 Dreamliner ramps up. 
 
Pacific Northwest IAM Lodge 751 President Tom Wroblewski said the early agreement &ldquo;secure(s) thousands of jobs while raising machinists&rsquo; pay and pensions.&rdquo; The agreement preserves jobs by guaranteeing that Boeing will make the 737, 747-8, and US military aircraft tanker aircraft in IAM-represented shops in Washington and Oregon. 
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IAM Lodge 751 President Tom Wroblewski
In recommending the four-year contract extension to 28,000 skilled workers, IAM Local 751 said to membership: &ldquo;What has resulted is an unprecedented commitment by Boeing to Puget Sound and Portland for the 737 MAX and the related manufacturing that&rsquo;s currently being performed here. This will generate long-lasting security for our members. It also resulted in a Boeing commitment to the success and continuation of the other airplane programs where our members have shown time and again their expertise, productivity and quality, resulting in increased profits for the company.&rdquo; 
 
The agreement contains 2% yearly wage increases, and a US$5,000 ratification bonus, as well as continued cost-of-living escalators in the four years. It includes pension enhancements that will lift the monthly retirement benefit by US$91 through the life of the agreement. 
 
And perhaps most significantly &ndash; and especially noteworthy to newly-hired South Carolina Boeing workers &ndash; the IAM negotiated and won job and work rights&rsquo; protections at full benefit levels for all future Boeing employees. 
 
IAM and Boeing agreed to continued dialogue by creating bi-lateral committees to address opportunities and conflicts. IAM Vice President Rich Michalski predicted such an &ldquo;approach and these committees can guide the new relationship going forward.&rdquo; 
 
Boeing&rsquo;s main Puget Sound facility, in Renton, Washington, is the world&rsquo;s longest-tenured aircraft factory, and the new labour contract will ensure 737 production and associated parts work in the area for two decades to come. 
 
Boeing&rsquo;s move to South Carolina and the NLRB&rsquo;s labour law complaint saw Republican lawmakers spew unseemly rhetoric against both US trade unions and the US regulatory framework that governs labour-management relations. 
 
The Republican-dominated US House of Representatives passed in September the reactionary &ldquo;Protecting Jobs from Government Interference Act&rdquo; that if enacted would de-fund the NLRB and strip the agency of remaining powers. The IAM labour agreement effectively blocks this draconian bill from getting heard in the US Senate.

Early Boeing Accord Eases US Labour Law Tensions

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By acclamation, Senzeni Zokwana was re-elected President and Manfred Warda re-elected General Secretary of the 20-million-member International Federation of Chemical, Energy, Mine and General Workers&rsquo; Union (ICEM) at the Global Union Federation&rsquo;s 5th Statutory Congress in Buenos Aires on 25 November. 
 
Some 800 delegates from over 200 national trade unions are attending the ICEM&rsquo;s Congress, which closes today with an address by Argentina Labour and Social Security Minister Dr. Carlos Tomada. Delegates also elected, by region, a 59-member governing Executive Committee that includes 20 Vice Presidents. 
 
The Congress postponed electing representations from the Middle East / North Africa Region due to political unrest in several countries, with statutory representation from the MENA region expected to come at the regional conference in March 2012. (The complete <a href="/wp-content/migration/icem/1111.ICEM_EXCO_PRESIDIUM_LISTS_FINAL[1][1].pdf">listing of ICEM Executive / Presidium members</a> can be found here.) 
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Newly re-elected ICEM General Secretary Manfred Warda, President Senzeni Zokwana
Day two of the Congress on 25 November also saw delegates adopt a forward-looking Action Plan that is meant to continue the trade union activism of the ICEM as it enters integration next year with two other GUFs &ndash; the International Textile, Garment, Leather Workers&rsquo; Federation (ITGLWF) and the International Metalworkers&rsquo; Federation (IMF). The ICEM Congress today will pass a definitive resolution to dissolve the ICEM in June 2012, followed by a founding Congress of a new industrial trade union organization. That will occur from 18-20 June in Copenhagen. 
 
Zokwana, the President of the powerful National Union of Mineworkers (NUM) of South Africa, begins his second full term at the helm of the ICEM. First elected in a special election in October 2005, he began his trade union activism in 1980 in apartheid-era South Africa at the President Steyn gold mine in the Free State. 
 
He at first was a shift overseer on safety matters and in 1995 he joined the NUM staff as a Safety Officer, after proving himself a forceful advocate of modern mine safety techniques. In 2000, he was elected President of the 300,000-member NUM and besides his leading global role today on mine safety matters, he is an outspoken anti-poverty campaigner throughout Africa. 
 
Warda has served as General Secretary of ICEM since 1 January 2007, and began his trade union career in 1971 with Germany&rsquo;s Mineworkers' Union in his home city of Bochum, North Rhine Westphalia. After serving as assistant and then Head of the President&rsquo;s Office, he was head of the International Department of the country&rsquo;s Industrial Mining and Energy Union (IGBE) from 1991-1997. Following the merger of IGBE and IG Chemie in 1997, he was named head of the International Department of IGBCE. 
 
The Congress concludes today with debate on resolutions regarding furthering the ICEM&rsquo;s work in the MENA region, particularly with Iraqi and Palestinian unions; on an active response to the financial crisis and support for a Financial Transaction Tax; labour rights in Colombia; repressive postures of governments in Hungary and other European countries; European-based companies hampering trade union and human rights in Turkey; electric energy; the Trans-Pacific trade partnership agreement; and on support to the striking PT Freeport Indonesia Workers&rsquo; Union in Papua Province in their courageous struggle against the multination Freeport-McMoRan.

Zokwana, Warda Re-elected ICEM Leaders at Buenos Aires Congress

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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 &amp; Energy Division of the Construction, Forestry, Mining &amp; Energy Union (CFMEU) of Australia, opened the session by proclaiming ICEM awareness to the issue. 

&ldquo;Until men stop perpetrating violence against women, it will continue. It won&rsquo;t stop until men stand up and put a stop to it,&rdquo; said Maher, who explained Australia&rsquo;s <a href="http://www.whiteribbon.org.au/">White Ribbon</a> anti-violence campaign to the 800 ICEM delegates.
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Tony Maher&nbsp;
Maher added: &ldquo;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.&rdquo; 

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 &ldquo;Violence Against Women in Eastern Democratic Republic of Congo: Whose Responsibility? Whose Complicity?&rdquo; 

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 &ndash; the Mirabal sisters &ndash; 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&rsquo;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

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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&rsquo;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&rsquo;s tyre plant, in Texarkana, Texas. 
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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&rsquo;s lockout unprovoked and a harmful retaliatory action by Cooper. 
 
The lockout is also a bitter stab at USW&rsquo;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&rsquo;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

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Some 6,000 members of the Pascagoula Metal Trades Council &ndash; four US union organisations &ndash; have an early three-year contract extension with shipbuilder Huntington Ingalls Industries at work-yards in the state of Mississippi. That came off because of a 60% ratification vote by unionised workers on 1 December. 
 
Huntington Ingalls, a spin-off of major US defense contractor Northrup Grumman, builds and maintains the US Navy&rsquo;s surface combatant fleet at Pascagoula, a coastal city on the Gulf of Mexico. 
 
The agreement covers workers who are members of the International Brotherhood of Electrical Workers (IBEW), the International Association of Machinists &amp; Aerospace Workers (IAM), the Office Professional Employees Union (OPEIU), and a security workers&rsquo; union, and comes four months before the March 2012 expiry of the current agreement. 
 
Journeymen workers will see a US$.60-per-hour rise in their base wage on 9 January 2013, with another US$.60 coming a short two months later on 11 March. Effective 10 March 2014, a US$.70-per-hour increase will occur. 
 
Workers will receive a one-off US$1,000 payment early in 2012 to forego a 2012 cost-of-living adjustment but the COLA will return in the other years. Workers will absorb some increases in their health care insurance coverage in the new pact. 
 
Huntington Ingalls is a major contractor to the US Navy and Coast Guard and besides Pascagoula, where it is responsible for 70% of US surface fleet, it operates the Newport News, Virginia, shipyards, where it builds both nuclear and non-nuclear ships and submarines for the US government. It also controls AMSEC LLD and Continental Maritime of San Diego (CMSD). 
 
Huntington Ingalls is currently partnering in Newport News with French nuclear specialist Areva in building a US$360 million facility for construction of heavy components used in nuclear reactors.

Shipbuilders at Pascagoula, US Mississippi, Ratify 3-Year Contract Extension

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Settlement was reached on 25 November to end the conflict between ICEM affiliated Sintracarb&oacute;n 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">resounding vote to strike</a> by 1,200 miners after repeated efforts to bargain with company management toward a new collective agreement failed.&nbsp; 
 
The Calenturitas mine is located in Cesar department&rsquo;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. 
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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&rsquo;s cost structure, only 5 pesos are spent on their payroll.

Colombia Prodeco Mine Dispute Settled

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The International Federation of Chemical, Energy, Mine and General Workers&rsquo; Unions (ICEM) today signed a Global Framework Agreement (GFA) with Petr&oacute;leo Brasileiro SA, or Petrobras, the world&rsquo;s third largest energy company. The agreement, the 20-million-member ICEM&rsquo;s 16th since 1998, was signed at the Brazilian company&rsquo;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&rsquo; 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&rsquo;s global operations. 
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ICEM General Secretary Manfred Warda signs Petrobras GFA
&ldquo;This is ICEM&rsquo;s fourth such agreement with an oil and gas concern,&rdquo; said Warda, &ldquo;and it embodies many of the social principles that we expect companies in extractive industries to adhere to.&rdquo; 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&rsquo; 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. 
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ICEM, Petrobras, FUP
The GFA states that Petrobras &ldquo;will strive to get all service providers to comply&rdquo; 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 Jos&eacute; 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 manufacturing sector in the United Kingdom is under attack from the Tory government and its destructive policy of austerity cuts. ICEM&rsquo;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. 
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Tony Burke, Unite
The need for this investment is even greater, according to Burke, as Tory Chancellor George Osborne&rsquo;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&rsquo;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: 
&bull; Build a framework of policies to defend strategically important industries. 
&bull; Continued financial support through interventionist policies. 
&bull; Targeted support for small and medium sized enterprises. 
&bull; Better use of government purchasing power to secure manufacturing jobs in the UK. 
&bull; Maximising the opportunities that the low carbon revolution offers. 
&bull; Delivery of an education and skills framework, which meets all industry&rsquo;s needs. 
&bull; Creating a university structure, which builds on the science base so necessary to secure high skilled jobs. 
&bull; Create right investment environment for research and development. 
&bull; Creation of a level playing field to deliver security and fair pricing for energy. 
&bull; A framework of legislation, which promotes transparency and engagement for all stakeholders in the future of manufacturing. 
 
&ldquo;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,&rdquo; stated Burke, &ldquo;If this government is serious about rebalancing the economy, we need to invest in the UK&rsquo;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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Members of the International Association of Machinists &amp; Aerospace Workers (IAM) Lodge 778 will begin returning to work this week after ratifying a six-year labour agreement last night, 20 November, with Honeywell Federal Manufacturing &amp; Technologies LLC. in Kansas City, Missouri. 
 
The vote by a wide margin ends a 42-day strike by 940 workers against Honeywell at the US government owned Bannister Federal Complex, where the company makes non-nuclear components for the government&rsquo;s nuclear weapons system. 
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Although contract terms were not immediately known following last night&rsquo;s late vote, it is believed much of the American company&rsquo;s original offer was accepted. That includes a two-tier pay scheme for new workers hired after 1 January in which such workers come in at lower hourly rates and fall into slower wage progressions than current workers. It also will see reductions to retiree health insurance coverage for those retiring after 8 October 2017. 
 
The contract also contains higher out-of-pocket health care costs for staff. Current workers will see a 13.5% wage increase over the six-year period, and an 11.7% pension hike also will be realized in that period. 
IAM Lodge 778 had given Honeywell with four different proposals up to 17 November through a US federal mediator, but all were rejected by the company. Finally on 17 November, the Federal Mediation and Conciliation Service (FMCS) official presented the six-year deal and Lodge 778&rsquo;s bargaining committee recommended it last night to membership. 
 
The 840 workers will return to Honeywell&rsquo;s payroll this week by undergoing four-hour re-orientation training, and all staff will resume their normal job functions effective 28 November.

US Machinists End 42-Day Honeywell Strike in Missouri

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Five days of bargaining last week failed to resolve the 53-day strike between 1,200 Peruvian miners of ICEM-affiliated National Miners&rsquo; and Metalworkers&rsquo; Union (FNTMMSP) and Sociedad Minera Cerro Verde, Peru&rsquo;s third largest copper produce that is 53.7% owned by US-based Freeport-McMoRan. 
 
According to the branch General Secretary of the FNTMMSP at Cerro Verde, Leoncio Amudio Pe&ntilde;a, bi-lateral talks brought the two sides no closer to agreement, and the legal strike in Peru&rsquo;s southern Arequipa region likely will last another two-to-three weeks while the union waits for the company to give it financial documents related to the operation. 
 
Cerro Verde management has offered a 3% pay increase and a US$735-per-worker bonus in the first year, while the union is seeking a 6-7% increase in the first year and a 5-6% hike in the second. Other unresolved issues include a union demand for proper food distribution, medical insurance, fixed working hours and restructuring of job classifications. 
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While management has offered to submit the dispute to private arbitration, the union rejected that offer because doing so under Peruvian law would mean the FNTMMSP branch would have to suspend the strike during the arbitration process. The union prefers continuation of mediation by the Arequipa Region labour ministry. 
 
The strike started on 29 September and the very next day the government declared the strike legal. Cerro Verde is using some 600 &ldquo;volunteer&rdquo; workers and management staff to continue ore supply to the leaching platform and the mine&rsquo;s concentrator, but use of such scab workers during a lawful work stoppage is illegal. The government of Peru has termed this a &ldquo;serious infraction&rdquo; of the law and the company faces fines of between US$15,000 and US$26,383. 
 
Daily production of copper and its by-product molybdenum averaged 303,000 metric tonnes in 2010. Freeport-McMoRan has reported to markets that the strike will reduce average output this year by one-third, or 200,000 tonnes per day, which likely is a high estimate. The mine produced a net profit of US$1.05 billion last year. 
 
Besides the majority ownership that operator Freeport-McMoRan holds in Cerro Verde, SMM Cerro Verde Nederlands, a unit of the Japanese Sumitomo Corp., owns a 21% stake, while Peru-based Compania de Minas Buenaventura owns 19.3%.

FNTMMSP Continues Copper Strike Against Freeport-McMoRan in Peru

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