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<img src="/sites/default/files/migration/icem/InBrief100.jpg" width="100" height="39" alt=""/>
An inquiry into the fatal helicopter crash that killed 17 workers and crew headed to Canadian offshore oil platforms on 12 March 2009 continued earlier this month. In the days following the early February continuation, former Labrador-Newfoundland Supreme Court Justice Robert Wells, who heads the inquiry undertaken by the nation’s Transportation Safety Board, issued immediate procedural changes a full seven months before his commission’s report. 
 
Those changes are based on testimony from local union officers and staff of Communications, Energy, Paperworkers (CEP) Union, which represents 700 workers at two of three offshore platforms some 300 kilometres off Newfoundland. 
 
One mandate calls on the Canada-Newfoundland and Labrador Offshore Petroleum Board, the agency regulating the offshore oil industry, to ensure that a fully equipped search-and-rescue helicopter is on standby at St. John’s, Newfoundland, and ready to respond within 15 to 20 minutes of any mayday call. It took the charter service contractor, Cougar Helicopters Ltd., between 45 minutes to an hour to equip and launch a rescue helicopter last year on 12 March. 

<img src="/sites/default/files/migration/icem/CanadaFLAG.gif" width="150" height="75" alt=""/>
The other instruction by Wells restricts night flights to only emergencies until a dedicated helicopter is available that is equipped with an auto-hover and forward-looking infrared device in the event a rescue mission is necessary at night. Both recommended changes were accepted by the Offshore Petroleum Board and the agency was informing lead oil companies at the platforms of the directives last week, including ExxonMobil, Suncor, Husky, Chevron Canada, and ConocoPhillips. 
 
The immediate precautionary changes stem from testimony that CEP leaders gave on 9 February, and also last October and November when the inquiry began. Officers of CEP Local 2121, representing workers at the Hibernia and Terra Nova platforms, expressed concerns that response time, non-fitting survival suits, and lack of underwater breathing devices typify a corporate culture that is lax on transport safety. They testified that in the North Sea oilfields, a separate agency singly monitors air transport to the platforms and a 15-minute response time in the event of an emergency is mandated. 
 
The union also pointed out that Cougar’s operations in the Gulf of Mexico provides search-and-rescue emergency service in 20 minutes time. 
 
The CEP also brought to question why no 24-hour military search-and-rescue helicopters are stationed at St. John’s, the closest point and major port serving the offshore rigs. Such military craft, called Cormorants, are located in Gander, in central Newfoundland, a travelling time of up to two hours air time to the flight paths used by Cougar. Canadian military officials have neglected to address this issue, or to join the inquiry. 

<img src="/sites/default/files/migration/icem/ICEMoil3.JPG.JPG" width="120" height="119" alt=""/>
Also of concern to oil workers, according to Local 2121 President Sheldon Peddle and Vice President Brian Murphy and the lone survivor of the March 2009 ditching, Robert Decker, is the fact that Cougar’s Sikorsky S-92A helicopters are equipped with a large fuel tank inside the cabin that complicates emergency exiting. Decker testified at the Wells inquiry on 6 November 2009. 
 
Peddle said that simulators used for worker safety exercises do not have such cabin impediments. 
 
On 12 March 2009, a Cougar Sikorsky S-92A helicopter carrying two crew members and 16 oil workers ditched into North Atlantic waters, eight minutes after oil pressure readings dropped from instruments that monitor the helicopter’s engine gearbox. Two of the 18 on board managed to get out of the cabin after the crash, with only Decker managing to survive in the frigid waters. 
 
The issue of helicopter safety is of utmost importance to the ICEM-International Transport Workers’ Federation (ITF) Joint Onshore-Offshore Task Force, particularly in view of recent tragedies. On 1 April 2009, 16 workers died tragically in the North Sea when a Eurocopter Super Puma AS 332L2, operated by Bond Offshore Helicopters, ditched on its way to BP’s Miller platform in the ETAP oilfields. 
 
On 26 February 2008, the same make craft crashed in southern Atlantic waters, killing five of 17 workers and crew heading to a Petrobras rig. That caused members of ICEM-affiliated FUB, the Oil Workers’ Federation of Brazil, to boycott the Super Pumas for the next six months. Two other Super Pumas also crashed in the South China Sea in January 2007 and November 2006. And two other ditchings occurred in North Sea waters in the first half of 2009 where, miraculously, nobody was killed.

CEP Testimony in Canadian Offshore Helicopter Crash Leads to Changes

Noting that: 
 
Since Vale, the second largest mining company in the world, acquired nickel miner Inco in 2006, there has been a downward spiral in labor relations globally. 
 
In 2009 labor negotiations with USW, Vale claimed they needed deep concessions despite $13.2 billion (USD) net profit in 2008 and generous compensation for top execs. 
 
3,500 USW members responded by going on strike in mid-July. Since USW struck Vale, the company has hired replacement workers in an attempt to operate the facilities without the striking workers. 
 
Vale has refused to negotiate in good faith since the strike began. When they did meet with the USW, Vale has remained completely inflexible and unwilling to reach a fair and equitable settlement. 
 
The ICEM and its affiliates, working together with the IMF, have played an instrumental role in a global campaign for justice at Vale. This has included campaigning on behalf of Brazilian, Indonesian and Canadian Vale workers in their struggles for new labor agreements. 
 
ICEM affiliates in South Africa, United Kingdom, Australia, Germany, Sweden, Indonesia, Liberia, Zambia and throughout the ICEM Sub-Sahara Region have offered particularly critical support in this campaign. 
 
The global campaign has already improved conditions for workers in Brazil and Indonesia. 
 
The final outcome of this struggle will have implications throughout the global mining industry and beyond. 
 
Affiliates resolve: 
 
We condemn the actions of Vale to refuse to negotiate a fair and just settlement to the dispute in Canada. 
 
We will support the ongoing struggle for justice for workers at Vale, including the struggle for fair new labor agreements in Canada, in every way possible.

Resolution in Support for Struggle for Justice at Vale

<img alt="" src="/sites/default/files/migration/icem/InBrief100.jpg" width="100" height="39"/>
Some 60,000 trade union members of five Romanian union confederations manifested in Bucharest’s Victoriei Square on 19 May, demanding that the government not implement its planned cuts on public-sector wages, pensions, and social services. 
 
Trade unions, civil society groups, and doctors, teachers, and ordinary citizens promise a general strike that could begin tomorrow, 31 May, if the center-right government of Prime Minister Emil Boc moves ahead with its plan to cut public-sector pay by 25%, pensions and unemployment benefits by 15%, and public services by 15% on 1 June. 
 
The cuts were made in a letter of intent to the US-based International Monetary Fund (IMF) in exchange for a US$20 billion loan from the IMF and the EU in order to balance the country’s budget. Prior to the 19 May manifestation, the IMF made public its concern against such drastic cuts, expressing a preference for a balance between public curtailments and new revenue sources such as taxes. 
<img alt="" src="/sites/default/files/migration/icem/1005.romania.public.jpg" width="250" height="188"/>
19 May Manifestation in Victoriei Square
Trade unions are calling for a system of progressive taxation, with the right to retain a decent job, the right to education opportunities, and the right to retire in dignity without fear of dire poverty. The trade union confederations propose that Romanian government ministries cut their bureaucracies. 
 
The government’s austerity programme includes a 15% cut in child and child-rearing allowances. Currently, women workers receive 85% of their pre-maternity average pay after childbirth. The government’s proposed cuts would slash that to 60%. In an already understaffed national medical system in which doctors earn average monthly pay of only €350, the cuts would mean another 10% of doctors would leave Romania for countries that have higher salaries. Education has already been affected. Some 15,000 teachers will be sacked this year because of the austerity plan. 
<img alt="" src="/sites/default/files/migration/icem/1005.romania.public.2.jpg" width="250" height="188"/>
For ICEM affiliated trade unions in the public sector, including FSLI-Petrom at the state oil company, Chimie-Petrochimie Lazar Edeleanu, Chimie-Petrochimie CSI, and Centrala Nationala Minera Federation, the cuts could be devastating since some 80,000 public-sector jobs would be lost, and there is sure to be a spin-off effect into private sector employment. 
 
The five labour confederations resisting the government’s wide-ranging social cuts comprise unions in the mining, metallurgical, chemicals, agriculture, textile, transportation, and education sectors. They include the Fratia National Confederation of Free Trade Unions (CNSLR-Fratia), the Cartel Alfa National Trade Union Confederation (CNS Cartel Alfa), the National Trade Union Bloc (BNS), the Meridian National Trade union Confederation, and the Democratic Trade Union Confederation of Romania (CSDR). 
 
The trade union confederations have already declared 19 May as a historic day of national solidarity against injustice in the central European country, and vow that any attempt by the government to impose its terms will bring the nation to its biggest social crisis of the past 20 years.

Proposed Austerity Cuts Bring Mass Protests Inside Romania

<img alt="" src="/sites/default/files/migration/icem/InBrief100.jpg" width="100" height="39"/>
The ICEM was shocked and angered by the arrests of labour and political rights advocate, Somyot Pruksakasemsuk, and Associate Professor Suthachai Yimprasert, in Thailand, and will be detained until earliest 6 June.
The pair presented themselves to police on hearing of their arrest warrants. Neither of them were members of the core Red Shirt group, they were following events closely in their capacity as journalist and academic.
Both friends of the international labour movement, Somyot and Suthachi are detained at the Adisorn Army Base in Saraburi, 115km north of capital Bangkok. Suthachai is on hungar strike in protest of his arrest.
ICEM affiliates and supporters around the world are requested to write to your local Thai embassies and call on the release of both men.
Somyot is a former ICEM project coordinator in Thailand. 
The arrest warrants were issued in connection to the incident on 21 May 2010 at 13.00, when Somyot and Suthachai, in the name of the 24th of June Democracy Group, held a press conference in front of the House No. 111 Foundation. This was a completely peaceful event.
The ICEM joins calls for the immediate release of both men.

ICEM Angered by Thai Arrests

Some 2,000 Mexican federal troops used force last night to gain control over the Cananea copper mine. The federal police used tear gas and executed arrest warrants for union leaders of Section 65 of ICEM-affiliated Mexican National Miners’ and Metalworkers’ Union (SNTMMSRM) in northern Sonora state. 
 
Mexican troops overtook striking miners at 20h00 on 6 June at the gates to the mine. Reports early this morning said that troops stormed Section 65’s union hall early on 7 June, also tossing tear gas that dispersed women and men present inside the building. 
 
The ICEM today issued another letter to Mexican President Felipe Calderón, insisting that he “stop the violent actions taken yesterday and today by your government against trade union members and their families.” (The full letter can be seen <a href="/sites/default/files/migration/icem/64.ICEM.Emergency.Cananea.7June.pdf" type="internal">here</a>.)
<img alt="" src="/sites/default/files/migration/icem/Mexico.SNTMMSRM.jpg" width="90" height="109"/>
It was the second time that the ICEM has sent a letter to Calderón urging him to use restraint in this volatile labour dispute. In February 2010, the ICEM and International Metalworkers’ Federation (IMF) cautioned Mexico against using force to break the strike. 
 
The arrest warrants that arrived last night were for Section 65 Secretary-General Sergio Tolano Lizarrágo and Juan Gutiérrez Ballesteros, a National Executive Member of SNTMMSRM, or Los Mineros. 
 
The Cananea copper mine, owned by Grupo México, has been shut since April 2007 when 1,200 miners began a strike over health and safety concerns and trade union rights. 
 
The ICEM is calling on trade unions to send a similar letter to the Mexican government as the one linked above, or use the model letter <a href="/index.php?id=5&la=EN&doc=3840" type="internal">here</a>.

ICEM Calls on Mexico to Halt its Violence at Cananea

7 June 2010 
 
 
Felipe de Jesús Calderón Hinojosa 
President 
United States of Mexico 
Residencias Oficial de los Pinos 
Case Miguel Alemán 
Col San Miguel Chapultepec 
11850 Mèxico, D.F. 
 
Sent to fax numbers +52 55 5093 4901, +52 55 52772376, 
e-mail <a href="mailto:felipe.calderon@presidencia.gob.mx">felipe.calderon@presidencia.gob.mx</a>  
 
Dear President Calderon: 
 
On behalf of our --- members, I urge you to stop the violent actions taken yesterday and today by your government against trade union members and their families of Section 65 of Mexican National Miners' and Metalworkers' Union (SNTMMSRM) in Cananea, Mexico. 
 
The ICEM has continually urged a negotiated end to the conflict in Cananea, and we condemn your decision to send in federal police and attack trade union members. 
 
We call upon you to immediately withdraw your forces, and seek a peaceful and negotiated end to the conflict. 
 
Sincerely,

Calderón Model Letter

<img src="/sites/default/files/migration/icem/InBrief100.jpg" width="100" height="39" alt=""/>
The Associated Mine Workers’ of Zimbabwe (AMWZ) suspended its five-day strike today after receiving a show-cause order from the country’s Labour Ministry late on Friday, 14 May. “It is necessary for us to inform miners to return to their jobs or they could face dismissal,” said AMWZ President Tinago Ruzive. 
 
The Labour Ministry will hold a hearing on 20 May to determine the validity of the strike, a walkout the ICEM declared justified last week because several mining houses affiliated with Zimbabwe’s Chamber of Mines failed to deliver on wage adjustments that came in an arbitration award last year. 
 
That arbitration award should have meant a total salary increase of US$140.00 for the final three months of 2009, but most employers failed to enact the increase. For the vast majority of Zimbabwe’s mineworkers, they have seen no increase in wages in over a year. 

<img src="/sites/default/files/migration/icem/ICEMminingsector.JPG" width="110" height="110" alt=""/>
Upwards of 20,000 miners struck some 45 different mining companies on 12 May, shutting down a good portion of Zimbabwe’s platinum, diamond, gold, and production. This came after the AMWZ filed the necessary 14-day intent-to-strike notice in April. The Chamber of Mines did petition the Labour Ministry for a show-cause order then, but after two meetings, the Chamber’s offer of a US$9.50-per-month increase was insufficient. 
 
Some mining houses, including Imperial Platinum’s Zimplats Holdings and Aquarius’ Mimosa Investments, did pay salary increases and were not part of last week’s strikes. But others, including certain operations of Rio Tinto, Metallion Gold, Duration Gold, Redaurum’s River Ranch mine, and Pan African Mining’s Maligreen gold mine, saw production curtailed by the strike. 
 
The AMWZ has proposed a current wage adjustment of US$496 on top of miners’ total salaries. The union also insists that mining companies which have neglected to remit contributions to the Mining Industry Pension Fund, monies owed to the National Employment Council for the Mining Industry, and to the AMWZ for subscriptions be forced to meet these obligations. 
 
Depending on the outcome of the 20 May hearing, the AMWZ could issue another 14-day strike notice and resume strike activity in June, said Ruzive.

Zimbabwe Mine Strike Suspended by Decree of Labour Ministry

<img alt="" src="/sites/default/files/migration/icem/InBrief100.jpg" width="100" height="39"/>
In manifestations scheduled for today and tomorrow, the Hungarian Union of Mining and Energy Industry Workers (BDSZ) and the Federation of Trade Unions in the Electric Energy Industry (EVDSZ) will turn out hundreds of workers and supporters to preserve the Vértes Power Station in northwestern Hungary. The electric generation plant, and adjoining coal mine, both subsidiaries of Hungarian Power Companies Ltd. (MVM), are in jeopardy. Today, the board of the state-run utility is meeting with bankruptcy and liquidation of Vértes the sole point on the agenda. 
 
Today’s demonstration will take place in Budapest where the board of directors meet, while tomorrow’s will take place at the Orasźlany power plant, part of the Vértes company complex. 
 
In a joint declaration by BDSZ President Ferenc Rabi and EVDSZ President Gál Rezső, the two national Hungarian trade union leaders said the decision to place immediate closure on the agenda comes without providing the necessary information to local trade unions and without full consultations. The threat of liquidation could mean the loss of 2,500 to 3,000 jobs in the region. 

<img alt="" src="/sites/default/files/migration/icem/1005.hungary.jpg" width="300" height="169"/>
The Vértes Power Station consists of the Márkushegy mine and the Orasźlany plant, capable of generating 240 megawatts of power. The two unions insist that the power plant be maintained until at least 2014, and that the mine continue producing until the year 2020. Rabi and Rezső said the wishes of the local trade unions at the sites should be respected. Those unions have proposed an energy mix that will safeguard the environment and provide job security. 
 
The two unions, in the declaration call, on Hungary’s National Assembly today to issue a resolution supporting their actions to preserve the power plant and mine. 
 
The ICEM issued a letter of support today to Vértes workers and the two unions. In it, General Secretary Manfred Warda said, “Your manifestations today and tomorrow to preserve jobs, livable standards for families, and to keep local business enterprises around the Márkushegy mine and Orasźlany plant operable is exactly the rallying cry that workers worldwide must make to ensure sustainable futures. With a global trade union sustainability conference coming soon to Canada, your rallying cry to achieve a balance between clean environmental methods and security of employment is a leading example to all of us.”

Hungary’s Electric, Mining Unions Oppose State Liquidation of Power Company

<img alt="" src="/sites/default/files/migration/icem/InBrief100.jpg" width="100" height="39"/>
A general strike in Yemen on the Arabian Peninsula that started on 15 May got the ICEM’s attention and immediate support today. Called by the General Labour Union (GLU) of Yemen, the strike started because Prime Minister Ali Mujawar did not respond to demands for higher wages in the face of rampant inflation and a devalued currency. 
 
The strike started with one-hour work stoppages on 15 May and again yesterday, and will escalate to three-hour stoppages today and Tuesday, 18 April. If the government still does not respond in a week’s time, the strike will occur over the whole day on 24 May. 
 
“Following the sharp rise in prices and cost of living that has been afflicting Yemeni citizens in the last two years, GLU demands a rise in wages and salaries and the establishment of a minimum wage of at least US$300, instead of the current monthly salary of less than US$100,” stated GLU President Mohamed al-Jedri. 

<img alt="" src="/sites/default/files/migration/icem/Yemen.png" width="250" height="115"/>
The GLU is also demanding a reduction in taxes, improved health conditions for workers, giving fixed and permanent jobs to contract workers, and improvements in living conditions. The government earlier had agreed to set up a joint committee to address GLU concerns, but that has never materialized. 
 
The strike was called for all workers in the public and private sectors, with the exception of emergency health workers, electricity, water, and air traffic control workers. The ICEM-affiliated General Union of Oil, Mining, and Chemicals Workers’ were expected to join the strike. 
 
The GLU consists of 12 general unions, 15 branches in various governorates, and totals 520,000 workers as union members.

General Strike in Yemen Gains ICEM Support

<img alt="" src="/sites/default/files/migration/icem/InBrief100.jpg" width="100" height="39"/>
Global trade union and civil society outrage was heard loud and clear last week by the latest setback to reconstruction in Iraq. The Iraqi government, on 20 July, invoked a ministerial order to shut and seize all offices and property of electrical workers’ trade unions. 
 
Within a day of the order, police were inventorying equipment, furniture, and files of several electrical workers’ union across Iraq, including those of two ICEM affiliates – the Electrical Power Workers’ Union of the Federation of Workers’ Council Unions of Council (FWCUI) and the General Union of Electricity Workers and Technicians (GUEWT), affiliated to the General Federation of Iraqi Workers (GFIW). GUEWT President Hashmeya Muhsen Al-Saadawi said the police were polite, yet forceful in cataloging and closing offices. 
 
In Iraq, issuance of the order and implementing it within a day is a record. Normally, administrative orders can take weeks and months to put in place. In this case, the anti-union bias of Oil Minister Hussain al-Shahristani is evident. He has only recently been appointed Acting Minister of Electricity. The order states that trade union leaders who stand in the way of the closures will be charged under Iraq’s 2005 Terrorism Act. 
<a href="http://www.iraqitradeunions.org/cgi-bin/campaign1.cgi"><img alt="" src="/sites/default/files/migration/icem/1004.iraq.campaign.2.jpg" width="320" height="184"/></a>
-Click for campaign website 
 
Last week’s targeting of electrical trade unions stands as a malicious muscle-play by the government to keep a ban on all public-sector unions. That ban, Order 8750, was imposed by the occupation forces in August 2005, and, in turn, had upheld a Saddam law from 1987 that banned free and independent trade unions. The electrical raids also serve as stark reminder that meaningful labour law in Iraq will be very difficult under leaders of this government. 
 
The ICEM and many other unions and NGOs, including Amnesty International, immediately protested. On 22 July, ICEM General Secretary Manfred Warda wrote to Iraqi Prime Minister Nouri Al-Maliki: “This order is a direct affront to all trade unions in Iraq, particularly trade unions such as the GUEWT that ICEM and its affiliated unions across the world have been working with in order to establish free and democratic institutions for the betterment of all Iraqi people.” (The full letter is <a href="/sites/default/files/migration/icem/76.ICEM.Iraq.Electric.22july.pdf" type="internal">here</a>.) 
 
In another letter, this one to new UK Foreign Secretary William Hague by Trades Union Congress (TUC) General Secretary Brendan Barber, the decree was labeled “a violation of the Iraqi constitution, and one of the most draconian acts by the Iraqi Government since the fall of Saddam. It comes from Hussain al-Shahristani, the Minister for Oil, who has recently taken over the electricity portfolio and has a worrying track record of using Saddam-era labour laws against trade unions.” 
 
The TUC began a campaign on LabourStart to protest this willful action, and that can be joined <a href="http://www.labourstart.org/cgi-bin/solidarityforever/show_campaign.cgi?c=740 ">here</a>. 
 
In Iraq by week’s end, there was discrimination against trade union leaders who attempted to gather to discuss the sudden closures and seizures. At one such gathering that took place outside the offices of an electric enterprise, police came by to verbally assault trade unionists. In Basra on 22 July, union leaders did meet with some members of the Basra Governorate Council to discuss the aggressive and illegal, under Article 22 of the Iraqi Constitution, ministerial order 
 
The ICEM urges trade unions and activists to engage the Iraqi government by joining the LabourStart campaign.

Outrage at Iraq’s Raids Closing Electrical Workers’ Offices

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