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US oil supermajor ConocoPhillips has defied both Australian and East Timorese oil and maritime workers by employing a flag of convenience ship to transport liquid natural gas from Australia to Japan. The company, which owns 64% of the Bayu-Undan gas field in the Timor Sea, was set to send it first shipment of LNG to Japanese utility customers last week from Darwin, in northern Australia. 
The company has hired no Timorese or Australian crew members to work on the vessel, said the Maritime Workers Union of East Timor. ConocoPhillips had earlier ignored East Timor government initiatives to build a gas processing facility on East Timor soil for the new field, choosing instead to build a 500-kilometre pipeline to Darwin. 
The Bayu-Undan field is in disputed East Timorese waters off the country&rsquo;s southern coast. The Maritime Union of Australia has pledged to get East Timorese workers involved in Bayu-Undan&rsquo;s new production, and both unions promise an international campaign against ConocoPhillips. This will become a topic of the newly-organised Joint ICEM-ITF Oil and Gas Trade Union Alliance.

ConocoPhillips Snubs Union Labour in Shipping

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Contract workers, employed by some 400 companies providing services to world leader copper producer Codelco in Chile, are striking for bonuses to gain a fair share of rising copper prices that have reached record highs on international markets. 
The 28,000 contract employees, working from food service to transport, struck all four divisions of state-owned Codelco&rsquo;s across Chile two weeks ago and are seeking bonuses totalling US$970. On 4 January, police used tear gas to disperse strikers from roads leading to the El Teniente mine, the world&rsquo;s largest underground copper mines and one of the four divisions. 
Contract workers earn less than half of what the 15,000 full-time, unionised workers of Codelco earn. Copper currently is selling at a record high of US$4,575 a tonne, and Chile through its Codelco earnings realized US$5.3 billion in profit through export of copper in 2005.

Contract Workers in Chilean Copper Mines Strike

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Industrianst&auml;llda I Norden, or Nordic IN, is the new name of a merged labour union federation covering five Nordic countries&mdash;Denmark, Finland, Iceland, Norway and Sweden.
Two federations&mdash;Nordic Metal and NIF, representing workers in chemicals, paper and textile industries&mdash;merged 1 January in a move bringing 22 national unions into a single Nordic industrial federation.
Nordic IN intends to safeguard the Nordic social model, characterized by modern and efficient social security systems, equality, democratic influence, and bargaining structures at both the local and national levels. Former ICEM Officer Jyrki Raina is the general secretary of the new federation.
&nbsp;

Five-Country Nordic Industrial Trade Union Federation Forms

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Some 6,000 trade union members of UK affiliate GMB have voted by a four-to-one margin for industrial action against British Gas, wholly-owned by British-based Centrica Plc. 
The workers are resisting company attempts to close the final salary pension scheme to new workers. GMB has offered to review the pension scheme at the next actuarial valuation, but Centrica is insistent on achieving &pound;200 million in costs savings immediately and final salary pension benefits for new hires is on the company&rsquo;s hit list. 
The 6,000 are technicians and engineers who install, service and repair domestic furnaces. GMB shop stewards will decide this week on dates of action.

British Gas Engineers Vote for Industrial Action

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Protests in Thailand against contract and agency labour continue in efforts to amend the New Labor Protection Act of 1998, which disproportionably created a mass of contract workers that possess no rights and no direct employee-employer relationship with the actual companies for which they work. 
On 20 November, 1,000 workers protested in front of Government House in Bangkok and, on 24 November, a similar protest in front of the Labour Ministry in the Dindaeng section of Bangkok occurred when Prime Minister Thaskin Sinawatra visited the ministry. This latter rally, attended by 500, called attention to Goodyear Tire and Rubber&rsquo;s misdirected decision to shift contract workers in its rubber stock and warehouse operations from its own employment rolls to a contract agency following months of pressure by the ICEM. 
The two protests were preceded by a forum sponsored by the Thai Labour Solidarity Committee entitled &ldquo;An Unjust Labour Contract: Stop Contract Labour System and Poverty.&rdquo;

Thai Workers Protest to Government on Contract and Agency Labour

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Nigerian affiliate NUPENG held its First Delegates&rsquo; Conference in Benin City, Edo state, this month, and took unprecedented action toward peace and stability for the oil and gas sector of the country. 
The union issued a mandate that all refineries and other government assets that currently are up for privatisation need to maintain 10% stakes held by workers. NUPENG called for only &ldquo;credible and competent&rdquo; investors to take 51% stakes in enterprises, with 39% holdings held by the Nigerian government. 
The union&rsquo;s Delegate Assembly also called on oil exporting companies to build new refineries in Africa&rsquo;s most populous country, and pledged industrial actions between January and June, 2006, to address the issue of casualisation and contract labour. 
Specifically, NUPENG condemned the non-existent screening and auditing of expatriate worker quotas by the government&rsquo;s Directorate of Petroleum Resources. Such standards exist now in memorandums of agreement. 
Peter Akpatason was re-elected as NUPENG President; Ikechi Pius was re-elected as First Deputy; and Wosu Goodluck won election as Second Deputy. In elections for vice presidents, Osai Eddy was elected for Warri Zone, Okeke Basil elected for Port Harcourt Zone, Bako Joseph won re-election in Kaduna Zone, and Fakumoju K. in Lagos Zone. Elijah Okougbo remains NUPENG&rsquo;s General Secretary.

NUPENG Promises Industrial Actions over High Contract Labour Use

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Workers at Mauritanian contractor El Majabaat El Koubra Tours (MKT) remain on strike due to the oil services firm&rsquo;s sacking of union activists. 
The Energy and Petroleum Workers&rsquo; Union (CGTM) of Mauritania conducted a march and demonstration against MKT on behalf of the strikers on 18 November in the capital city of Nouakchott. The event drew over 1,000 protestors. 
The ICEM brought the dispute to international attention and on the day of the rally, MKT, a transport and logistic provider to Australian-based Woodside Petroleum, directed a four-page letter to the global union federation. The company admitted to the firings, but failed to justify reasons why the workers were sacked. 
In early October, MKT and the union reached a protocol agreement over terms, which included union elections for workers. But within days, the company sacked 16 workers, provoking the start of the strike on 14 October. A day later in efforts to reconcile the dispute, MKT agreed to take back ten workers, but not six others who were counted on by fellow workers to stand for election to union positions. 
The ICEM will continue to press MKT and Woodside for justice and recognition of legitimate trade union rights.

Contract Service Workers Remain on Strike in Mauritania

Led by ICEM German affiliate IGBCE, 3,000 protestors on 23 November demanded that tyre maker Continental rescind its decision to fire 320 workers at its St&ouml;cken plant in Hannover. 
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A day before the rally that occurred at the company&rsquo;s headquarters in Hannover, Conti chief executive Manfred Wennemer reneged on a deal to maintain jobs and production levels by stating growth rates at the plant were not high enough. Despite profitability and cooperation from the IGBCE on workplace matters, Wennemer&rsquo;s announcement stung workers and politicians alike, particularly in view of prior production shifts to plants in eastern European countries. 
IGBCE board member Werner Bischoff, vice president of Continental&rsquo;s Supervisory Board, promised the matter will get full attention at the Supervisory Board&rsquo;s 6 December meeting, and said any further cooperative efforts with the company are now in danger.

German Union Protests Continental Tyre Decision

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By way of introduction to the full ICEM background report on the Pulp and Paper Industry, the ICEM prepared a presentation on globalisation in the pulp and paper sector for the ICEM World Conference for the Pulp and Paper Industry, in Brussels, on 15-16 November 2005. 
The presentation builds upon the background document, highlighting the latest sector&nbsp;statistics, unavailable at the time the document went to press. It also provides a few examples of recent labour disputes in the sector, and makes suggestions towards solutions at the global level. 
 
For the presentation, click <a href="/wp-content/migration/icem/0511EugenePaper.ppt">here</a>. 
 
For the full report, click <a href="/?id=147&amp;doc=1513">here</a>.

ICEM Presentation on globalisation in the pulp and paper industry

23 November 2005 
 
His Excellency Dr Thaskin Sinawatra 
Prime Minister 
Kingdom of Thailand 
Government House 
Pitsunalok Road 
Bangkok 10300 
Thailand
Dear Sir, 
 
I write on behalf of the 20-million-member ICEM on a serious labour matter affecting your country. It is the unregulated and unceasing use of contract and agency labour by major employers in Thailand. 
 
In assessing a number of labour disputes in Thailand, some of which are in ICEM sectors such as energy and rubber, others in sectors such as metals and food, covered by other, fraternal Global Union Federations, the issue of extensive use of contract labour is at the forefront. I ask you to consider the harm such labour practices bring to the overall social development in Thailand. 
 
I write this prior to a group of trade unionists&mdash;many of whom are members of trade unions affiliated to the ICEM&mdash;bringing this issue forward in a rally outside the Ministry of Labour, and I implore you to hear their voice as it calls forth the ill-effects brought to workers, their families and entire communities when permanent jobs are replaced by contractors and agencies. 
 
I invite you to meet with these trade unionists, and I invite the Thai Government to initiate discussions on this critical issue affecting workers and the communities in which they live. 
 
The ICEM is leading a global campaign on contract and agency labour. We would be quite willing to join a dialogue between your government and trade unionists in Thailand who are recognising the dangers, and rightfully speak out on this issue. The ICEM realizes that it is not practical to call for a total ban on contract and agency labour. 
 
But what we do seek is that contract and agency labour be properly controlled to avoid the unnecessary displacement of direct workers and when there is a need to utilize contract or agency arrangements, trade union representatives be consulted and dialogue occur prior to contracts being signed. The logic to this in terms of productive enterprises, and well-being of workers, families and the communities in which they live is clearly evident. 
 
The ICEM is promoting such simple and precise language for employers, governments and inter-governmental institutions to adopt. Again, I respectfully request that your government give this labour issue serious attention, and I and the ICEM stand ready to assist in any manner possible. 
 
Sincerely, 
 
 
Fred Higgs 
General Secretary 
 
CC Mr Somsak Thepsuthin, Labour Minister, Thailand

ICEM letter to the Prime Minister of Thailand on Goodyear Contract labour problems

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