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In New Zealand, offshore energy and drilling workers belonging to ICEM affiliate Engineering Printing & Manufacturing Union (EPMU) are expected to ratify a new multi-employer collective agreement that will merge separate onshore and offshore agreements into one agreement. 
 
EPMU issued a strike notice to the five drilling companies and several oil firms involved. The strike was to have started on 24 May. Employers responded by filing a court injunction preventing a work stoppage. 
 
But two weeks ago, employers presented a revised two-year pay offer that EPMU’s oil and gas negotiating committee was recommending for ratification to the 200 workers. Voting is expected to conclude on the contract proposal in the near future.

New Zealand’s Offshore Oil and Gas Workers Get Tentative Agreement

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Mission to Ghana – Breakthrough in ICEM Pilot Project 
 
Key elements of the ICEM Global HIV/AIDS Project are the pilot projects. In identifying areas where we can make a real contribution, the ICEM has developed the concept of such projects in cooperation with major mining companies. 
These projects target health clinics operated by the companies, which provide functioning medical services to their workers and immediate dependents. The clinics can be used to expand their services to the broader community in the area and provide voluntary counselling and testing (VCT) as well as antiretroviral treatment (ART). 
 
The ICEM concept has now received recognition at the AngloGold Ashanti mine in Obuasi, Ghana. Building on discussions between the ICEM and management in Johannesburg, AngloGold Ashanti is now involved in a public-private partnership with the Ministry of Health. The project is intended to provide HIV clinic services, including voluntary counselling and testing (VCT) and antiretroviral treatment (ART) to employees, their dependents and the community of Obuasi. 
In a good example of a co-investment project, the company makes the infrastructure of the hospital and the medical staff available. It provides VCT and ART to its employees and their dependents at its own cost and gets reimbursed for such services provided to the community. 
 
During a joint mission with representatives of the Global Fund to Fight AIDS, Tuberculosis and Malaria (GFATM), the ICEM Global HIV/AIDS Coordinator visited the Obuasi mine. Members of the delegation were briefed at the company’s Edwin Cade Memorial Hospital on the HIV/AIDS programme. Weekly health briefings at the Obuasi office of the Ghana Mine Workers’ Union will involve the union in the programme. 
The delegation also visited the Malaria Control Centre which was opened by the President of Ghana on 28 April. The malaria control programme covers the spraying of all houses in Obuasi. 
 
The joint ICEM/GFATM mission was a first for the global union movement. Representatives of the Ministry of Health/Ghana Health Service, as principal recipient of the grants, and members of the Country Coordinating Mechanism were briefed on the advantages of public/private sector co-investment projects for the implementation of Global Fund grants. 
In all meetings the point was made that the private sector includes business and unions. The ICEM can take credit that this concept has been recognised by the Global Fund when exploring further co-investment projects in other countries. 
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United Nations High Level Meeting on AIDS 
 
Heads of state and government, ministers and more than a thousand representatives of civil society and the private sector gathered in New York for the follow-up to the 2001 UN General Assembly Special Session (UNGASS) and a comprehensive review of the progress made in achieving the targets agreed by member states five years ago when the Declaration of Commitment on HIV/AIDS was adopted. 
 
Trade unions attending the event have urged government representatives and HIV/AIDS activists to focus on workplace strategies to address stigma and discrimination attached to HIV/AIDS. 90% of the 40 million people who are HIV infected are found in the working age population. Many of them live in daily fear of losing their jobs. 
The workplace is particularly well-positioned to combat discrimination in society and it holds tremendous potential for awareness-raising, prevention, treatment and counselling. More attention must be directed to the ILO Code of Practice on HIV/AIDS and the world of work, which speaks directly to the need for partnership and social dialogue in the workplace. 
 
Trade union representatives have also approached government delegations to seek support for the creation of a high-level G8 Working Group on HIV/AIDS. This ongoing campaign had already targeted health ministers attending the World Health Assembly of the WHO in Geneva in May. It will continue at the International Labour Conference of the ILO in June. 
 
As reported in the May issue of this e-bulletin, the UN produced two reports prior to the meeting, which can be accessed on the UNAIDS website <a href="http://www.unaids.org">www.unaids.org</a>. On the eve of the High Level Meeting, UNAIDS launched the 2006 Report on the global AIDS epidemic. This special edition, marking the 10th anniversary of UNAIDS, contains the most in-depth date from countries to date, based on progress reports from 126 countries. 
(The outcome of the Conference and the UNAIDS 2006 Report will be given more detailed attention in the July issue of this e-bulletin). 
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Global Fund Calls for Round 6 Proposals 
 
The Global Fund to Fight AIDS, Tuberculosis and Malaria has issued its Sixth Call for Proposals. The application form and support documentation are available in six languages at <a href="http://www.theglobalfund.org/en/apply/call6">www.theglobalfund.org/en/apply/call6</a>. Proposals have to reach the Global Fund by 3 August. 
 
The Global Fund does not have offices in any country. The application process is devolved to the national level. All proposals have to go through the Country Coordinating Mechanisms (CCM). The composition of the CCMs is supposed to be representative of all stakeholders in the fight against HIV/AIDS, including civil society, the private sector and organisations of people living with HIV/AIDS (PLWHA). 
Very few CCMs include trade unionists. This should not prevent trade unions to work through members of the CCM who are sympathetic to their cause and to find cooperating partners who can develop workplace-related project ideas into proposals for the CCM. 
 
The role of the workplace in the fight against HIV/AIDS is recognised. No workplace activities can be efficiently implemented without unions. The role of national unions and their international bodies, the Global Unions Federations, is acknowledged by international organisations such as the ILO, the WHO and UNAIDS. 
 
The Global Fund is keen to build public/private partnerships and to implement co-investment projects. Without the involvement of the private sector, universal access to voluntary counselling and testing (VCT) and to anti-retroviral treatment (ART) is not possible or will be further delayed. The private sector is business and trade unions as the workers’ representatives. 
The ICEM has worked with the Global Fund to establish this principle in public/private co-investment projects. 
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FNV Report Acknowledges Contribution of ICEM Projects 
 
In a report entitled “Trade union support in the struggle against HIV/AIDS”, FNV Mondiaal, the international trade union development organisation of the Dutch national centre FNV, stresses the importance of HIV/AIDS as a trade union issue. 
FNV Mondiaal is currently supporting 12 HIV/AIDS-related projects in cooperation with Global Union Federations and national unions. Fighting the pandemic is one of the priorities of its business plan 2005-2008. 
 
The report cites the ICEM project, which also enjoys the support of the Swedish LO/TCO, as a good example of integrating HIV/AIDS issues in collective bargaining and global framework agreements. 
The report gives credit to the ICEM’s efforts to build partnerships, especially in Ghana, to decrease the incidence of HIV/AIDS in mining companies and to upscale VCT and ART. It further acknowledges ICEM’s role in working with the Global Fund to Fight AIDS, Tuberculosis and Malaria and national Country Coordinating Mechanisms to involve unions and generate additional funds. 
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Australia and AIDS 
 
Two initiatives have been launched in Australia to try to stop the spread of HIV infections in Asia, from where 40% of the disease’s growth is forecast to come over the next few years. 
The first is a partnership between the Australian government and the Bill Clinton Foundation. Australia will provide USD 18 million to work with the Foundation in China, Vietnam and Papua New Guinea to provide test kits and antiretroviral drugs. The government-Clinton coalition will work with a second cooperative effort involving Australian companies that have operations in Asia. 
(Source: The Economist, 1 April 2006) 
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South Africa: May Day Focus on HIV/AIDS 
 
Along with a number of trade unions throughout Africa, the Congress of South African Trade Unions focussed its 1 May activities on HIV/AIDS under the theme “AIDS – The New Struggle”. It emphasised breaking the silence and building solidarity with the slogan “Each one teach one! Test, Treat and Fight for Life”. 
Sectoral summits with employers and other stakeholders are planned during 2006 and mining companies will be asked to create a fund to assist with the scaling up of access to care and treatment in Lesotho and Mozambique, where the pandemic has been fuelled by migrant labour to the mines. 
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Fighting HIV/AIDS – Lessons from Brazil 
 
In the history of the response to the HIV pandemic, Brazil is best known for its pioneering decision in 1996 to offer free combination antiretroviral treatment to all citizens. 
The government-funded treatment programme has improved the health and extended the survival of countless Brazilians, has saved the country billions in hospital cost and has inspired similar efforts elsewhere – including the US President’s Emergency Plan for AIDS Relief and the WHO’s 3x5 Initiative. 
Between 1996 and 2005, the government spent a total of USD 3.5 billion in response to HIV and AIDS, including USD 2 billion for antiretroviral drugs. All the money for drug treatment has come from internal funds; about 11% of total expenditure has come from World Bank loans, spent chiefly for prevention programmes and to establish a national laboratory network for the clinical monitoring of patients. 
 
Brazil’s persistent and aggressive efforts to prevent new HIV infections have probably played an equal if not greater role than treatment in slowing down the spread of the virus and containing the country’s epidemic. At the beginning of the 1990s, the epidemics in Brazil and South Africa were at a similar stage, with a prevalence rate of about 1.5% among adults of reproductive age. 
 
However, by 1995, the year before Brazil’s treatment programme was established, the epidemic in South Africa began to explode with a prevalence already greater than 10%, whereas the infection rate in Brazil had declined by half. The early success of prevention efforts allowed its national treatment programme to be feasible logistically and financially by limiting the number of people infected. 
In turn, access to free treatment has made Brazilians more willing to be tested and has made it easier to address the types of behaviour associated with transmission. 
 
In Brazil, during the week before Carnival, citizens who ventured to catch a bus, buy a beer or mail a letter were likely to be reminded by their government to use condoms. Postal costumers received condom brochures along with their stamps. Public health officials, contracted with Coca-Cola distributors, delivered condom posters to bars along with the soft drinks. Prevention efforts targeting high-risk parts of the population have achieved impressive success, particularly among injection-drug users and commercial sex workers. 
 
An important factor in making the programme affordable was the expertise of the domestic pharmaceutical industry, which allowed the country to produce generic versions of antiretroviral drugs with patents that had been registered before 1996, predating Brazil’s signing of the TRIPS agreement. 
For newly developed drugs, Brazil may still decide to issue compulsory licenses in the future on the basis of the WTO Doha declaration that the TRIPS agreement should be interpreted and implemented by member countries “in a manner supportive of WTO members’ rights to protect public health, and in particular, to promote access to medicines for all”. 
 
(Source: The New England Journal of Medicine, No. 19, 11 May 2006) 
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News from ILOAIDS 
 
A new brochure “The workplace: gateway to universal access”, published in April, gives a succinct overview of the role of the ILO in reducing discrimination and increasing access to HIV/AIDS prevention and treatment. 
 
Published in May, “Saving lives, protecting jobs” is an interim report of the International HIV/AIDS Workplace Education Programme, also known as Strategic HIV/AIDS Responses by Enterprises (SHARE) and financed by the US Department of Labor. Under the programme, almost 2,800 government officials and key members of workers’ and employers’ organisations have received in-depth training on developing policies and implementing programmes on HIV/AIDS. Over 2,000 workers have been trained as peer educators. 
 
Both publications can be accessed at <a href="http://www.ilo.org/aids">www.ilo.org/aids</a>. 
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REMINDER TO ICEM AFFILIATES 
 
This is your newsletter – contribute to it! 
 
ICEM affiliates are already engaged in a wide range of activities; some have formal agreements with companies; others run education and awareness programmes at the workplace. 
 
To spread the information on new agreements and campaigns and to build on best practices, affiliates and project coordinators are invited to send news and information to hiv.aids@icem.org. Any feedback on the format and contents of the e-bulletin is also welcome.

ICEM HIV/AIDS e-bulletin - No. 9

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The refusal by oil service companies doing business in Norway’s oil patch to harmonise a national agreement with other collective agreements in the oil industry has caused selective strikes. The strikes began on 21 June by ICEM affiliate NOPEF, and threaten to disrupt North Sea oil production, as well as impacting development and well maintenance work. 
 
NOPEF called 87 workers out on strike after arbitration between the union and the Oil Industry Association (OLF) failed on 20 June to achieve a new two-year pay deal. The oil service companies struck include Halliburton, Baker Hughes, Schlumberger, Weatherford and Oceaneering. The companies affected primarily maintain wells, aid new drilling exploration, and assist drilling production operations in the North Sea. 
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NOPEF's Lars Myhre
NOPEF is seeking to harmonise the oil service agreement with other national agreements covering testing, drilling, tug-piloting, catering and other operational areas, agreements that already have common working conditions. “Oil service companies do not want staff on regular weekly schedules and regular rotations,” said NOPEF’s Lars Myhre, ICEM’s Energy Section chairman, adding, “They are only interested in their own flexibility demands.”

NOPEF Seeks Harmonisation of Norwegian Oil Contracts by Striking Service Companies

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In Peru, 800 iron ore miners, members of Sindicato de Obreros Mineros, an affiliate of Federación Nacional de Trabajadores Mineros, Metalurgicos y Siderurgicos del Peru (FNTMMSP) began a strike 19 June against Chinese state-run Shouda Iron and Steel Group (Shougang). 
 
The strike at Peru’s only iron ore mine at Marcona, 350 kilometres south of Lima, was caused when managers of Shougang Hierro Peru failed to meet wage demands of miners, who are among the lowest paid in the country’s mining industry.
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The mine union, connected with ICEM affiliate FNTMMSP, is seeking wage increases equivalent of US$1.69-a-day, while Shougang offered only the equivalent of US$0.42-a-day. Shougang’s miners earn a salary of only US$13-a-day, far below the average Peruvian mining salary of US$33-a-day, according to Peru’s National Society of Mining, Petroleum and Energy. 
 
Union members at the mine last week blocked the entrance, preventing the company from using contract work to continue the work. Meanwhile, Peru’s government has declared the strike a legal one, meaning the company must continue negotiating with the union and the Labour Ministry can impose an increase to workers’ salaries if work is to be re-started. 
 
Shougang declared force majeure on all iron ore exported from Peru, the majority of which is destined for Japan and China. The Chinese state company bought the mine in 1992 from a state-run Peruvian company for US$118 million, and has increased production since 2002 by an average of 20% per annum. 
The increased production has caused numerous safety concerns, which have not been addressed, and Peru’s Energy and Mines Ministry says the company has not met investment commitments tied to the sale.

Miners Strike Chinese Iron Ore Operations in Peru

ICEM affiliate IGBCE has proposed mediation conducted by well-respected German politicians now that talks broke off between the union and Continental Tyre. Negotiations failed on 11 January in efforts to prevent 320 job cuts by year end at the Stöcken plant in Hannover, as announced by the company in November. 
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IGBCE was outraged by press remarks made by Continental CEO Manfred Wennemer at the outset of those talks in which he predicted German workers in the future will work 42.5 hours a week, and have two weeks less of vacation. Wennemer also remarked that the world could not care less about Conti’s broken agreement made with IGBCE last spring in which the company gained flexible work rules and a 40-hour week in exchange for a pledge of no job cuts.
IGBCE board member Werner Bischoff, vice president of Conti’s Supervisory Board, said Wennemer “poured oil on to the fire” with his comments, and called on the CEO to apologise. On 13 January, the company’s European Works Council members pledged to interpret with scrupulous accuracy the council’s constitution and legal rules, intending to make Conti’s normal business practices impossible. The central works council in Germany also took action by refusing to allow overtime work and opening health and safety inspections to civil authorities. 
A mass demonstration protesting the company’s broken promise takes place today, 23 January, in Hannover, with workers’ meetings also occurring today at all Continental plants to discuss Wennemer’s remarks and the Stöcken situation

Continental Tyre: Wennemer’s Remarks Outrage IGBCE

The Communications, Energy, Paperworkers (CEP) of Canada on 16 January conducted 14 separate demonstrations across the North American country to protest the jobs crisis in the forest industries sector. Last week’s actions came seven days before Canadians go to the polls in national elections today.
The protests were aimed at demanding government aid for stricken communities, as well as government subsidies tied to maintaining and creating jobs in forest products sectors.
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CEP President Brian Payne
“These jobs and communities are worth fighting for, and it’s about time the politicians joined our fight,” stated CEP President Brian Payne. Some 7,600 jobs have been lost due to shutdowns and cutbacks in the past year in Canada, and 40,000 over the past five years.

Canadian CEP Union Calls for National Action Over Forest Sector Jobs

Paperiliitto President Jouko Ahonen of Finland, ICEM’s Paper Sector Chairman, has questioned whether the current paper employers’ frenzy to contract out jobs is in the best interests of the companies’ own future financial health.
Because of the agreement that ended last year’s bitter lockout in the Finnish paper sector, mill-level negotiations on outsourcing are underway at some 30 enterprises, work capably done now by Paperiliitto members. Ahonen told the Finnish press that employers would be wise to consider that such practices might backfire on them in the future.
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Paperiliitto President Jouko Ahonen
If mill-level talks on sub-contracting do not reach mutual accord, the matter goes before a national arbitration panel that includes Paperiliitto, the employers’ federation, and an impartial chairman. All final decisions by such a panel must be unanimous.

Paperiliitto President Predicts Finnish Outsourcing Will Backfire

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CEP members at a Stora Enso paper mill in Port Hawkesbury, Nova Scotia, will vote tomorrow and Wednesday, 24 and 25 January, on a company contract proposal. Rejection likely will mean 660 members of CEP Local 972 will face a lockout effective 26 January. 
Following eight days of non-stop bargaining that ended late on 18 January, Local 972 members met with union leaders on 21 January to review proposed terms, which includes job losses, contracting out provisions and changes in seniority procedures.
Stora Enso issued the mandatory 48-hour lockout notice on 30 December, and has had its only Canadian pulp and paper mill closed since 23 December, with nearly all workers on layoff status

Canadian Stora Enso Workers to Vote on Contract

French multinational Saint-Gobain in Thailand is using contract employees as well as logistics and maintenance workers to continue a lockout at an auto-glass assembly plant in Rayong province.
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After Saint-Gobain Sekurit presented, on 5 January, a pay offer that included an inferior bonus payment for 2005, some 300 workers protested outside the plant. The company locked out the workers the next day.
The plant has increased production since Saint-Gobain Sekurit gained auto-glass assembly contracts from General Motors Holden in Australia last year, a move inspired by the Howard government’s free-trade agreement with Thailand that cost 120 jobs at two Pilkington auto-glass factories. The plant also fits glass for Toyota and Ford automobiles.
Thai union members at Saint-Gobain Sekurit, affiliated with the Federation of Thailand Automobile Workers’ Unions, are facing management proposals calling for reductions in Sunday overtime pay, a reduction from five days to three on “private leave,” and extending the retirement age.

Saint-Gobain Lockout in Thai Glass Sector

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Five subcontractors at a Taiyo Oil Co. refinery in Imabari, Japan were burned to death 17 January inside a 100,000 kiloliter oil storage tank. An explosion and fire occurred when two contractors were preparing the tank for cleaning.
Investigators are looking at safety management practices of the two contractors, Taiyo Techno Service and Fukasaki-Gumi, and suspicion of negligence on their part.
The Taiyo Oil Workers’ Union, affiliated with JEC Rengo, is monitoring in the investigation. The union represents refinery workers at the 120,000 barrel-per-day Taiyo refinery, but not contract workers. Two other contract workers were injured in the blast and subsequent fire.

Contract Workers Killed at Japanese Oil Refinery

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