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After six weeks of intense demonstrations and strikes, through which millions of workers and students voiced their aversion of a new French law aimed, at least according to the government, at getting more young people working, the French Prime Minister decided on Monday that enough was enough. 
Dominique De Villepin announced that the “first job contract law” (contrat première embauche – CPE) will be replaced, after it had become apparent that earlier attempts by the government to scale it down were just as firmly rejected by the protesters. 
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The French trade unions, who, together with French student organisations, had successfully managed to stage a few of the largest demonstrations the country has seen for decades, said they were pleased with the result. The proposed CPE would have made it possible to dismiss workers under 26 in their first two years of employment without any reason given. 
Several demonstrations were held in a number of major French cities this week after the announcement on Monday, as the organisations want to keep the pressure on the government to make sure the suggested replacement proposition is of a higher quality. 
Yesterday, the French National Assembly (the lower house of parliament) adopted a compromise to replace the CPE. The focal point would now be on providing assistance for young people that face the most difficulties in gaining access to the job market, through measures such as more training, internships and subsidies for hiring youths with lower qualifications.

French Prime Minister Gives in to Trade Unions and Students

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Pharmaceutical workers, members of US affiliate United Steel Workers (USW), were locked out off their jobs by Medco Health Solutions on 5 April. Some 500 pharmacy technicians at Medco's prescription mail-order business in Las Vegas, Nevada, are faced with an illegal and unilateral reduction of health care benefits. 
The lockout has been deemed illegal when the US National Labor Relations Board issued an unfair labour practice complaint against the company on 31 March for retaliating against technicians who took part in solidarity actions, protesting the health care cuts. 
Some 25% of the company's prescription business is done through union-sponsored health care plans, and Medco itself admits that six million union workers in the US are covered under Medco prescription plans. The USW has mounted a campaign among unions tied to those plans to protest directly to the Medco's CEO.

Union Prescription Drug Provider Locks Out USW Members in US

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Twenty-two workplace leaders from BASF chemical plants in South America convened 21-24 April in Buenos Aires, Argentina, for ICEM’s Latin American BASF Network. Trade union leaders from Argentina, Brazil and Chile, together with German Works Council members and IGBCE union officials, met amongst themselves from 21-23 April and then on the final day, entered into social dialogue with BASF management. 
 
Trade union priorities included giving aid and support to a Peruvian chemical workers’ union in its efforts to organise a BASF factory, and adopting ICEM’s stand over contract and agency labour. 
 

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Works Council members from BASF’s huge Ludwigshafen complex in Germany, presented the challenges facing that body there, and IGBCE’s Michael Vasiliadis gave a report on the changing chemical industry relating to globalisation and the necessity to press global companies on their social responsibilities. 
 
On 24 April, senior BASF managers reported on which priorities from last year’s social dialogue talks had been fulfilled. In follow-up discussions, led by ICEM Latin American/Caribbean Chair Sergio Novais of CNQ-CUT in Brazil, BASF South American managers agreed to accommodate efforts to organise the Peruvian plant. 
 
The discussions were hailed on both sides as promoting an atmosphere of trust, and it was agreed to begin planning more formal rules for the annual process.

ICEM’s BASF Network in South America Meets

EPS Trade Union of Serbia-Montenegro elected new officers last week. Elected president was Miroslav Veličković, and elected to serve as vice president was Žikica Đorđević.
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Veličković had been a union vice president who got his start in union matters shortly after EPS Trade Union was founded in 1992. He served as president of the Niš branch of the union, and began working in the Electric Power Distribution Co. of Niš in 1977. 
He has a background in electrical engineering. Veličković is a founder and acting president of a democratic and free trade union confederation of unions serving public enterprises in the Balkan country.

EPS Trade Union in Serbia Elects New Officers

Mr. Mahmoud Ahmadjinejad 
President of the Republic 
The Presidency, Palestine Avenue, Azerbaijan Intersection 
Tehran 
Islamic Republic of Iran 
 
By Fax: + 98-21-66.48.06.65 and + 98-21-649.58.80 
 
 
Brussels, 13 February 2006 
 

Dear Mr. President, 
 
 
Re: Sherkate Vahed (Tehran Bus Company) 
 
The ICEM, the International Federation of Chemical, Energy, Mine and General Workers' Unions, after having been informed by the International Transport Workers’ Federation (ITF) and the International Confederation of Trade Unions (ICFTU) about the recent developments in regard to the dispute between the Iranian authorities and the workers of the Sherkate Vahed in Tehran, adds its voice, in the name of the 20 million members that it represents in 122 countries around the world, to the world-wide protest against the hostile and brutal repression of the Sherkate Vahed workers at the occasion of the International Day of Action, on 15 February 2006. 
 
Following a series of arrests late last year, combined with a new wave of repression at the end of January, a large number of Sherkate Vahed trade union members reportedly still remain in detention, many of them arrested during a demonstration on 28 January 2006. This harassment of trade union members and officials is most definitely in breach of the internationally recognised fundamental trade union rights. 
 
The ICEM is also very concerned about the continued detention of Mansour Osanloo, the President of the Executive Board of Syndicate of Workers of Tehran and Suburbs United Bus Company (Sandikaye Kargarane Sherkate Vahed Otobosrani Tehran va Hoomeh). Our concern is not only that Brother Mansour Osanloo is imprisoned for none other than doing standard trade union work, but also that he is detained while in bad health. 
 
Together with the ICFTU, the ITF and the other Global Unions partners, the ICEM urges you to release Mansour Osanloo at once and drop all charges against him. Also, an immediate end needs to be put to the unjustified pressure that the Sherkate Vahed workers are facing. All trade unionists that remain detained because of their participation in regular trade union actions need to be released as a matter of urgency. Finally, genuine discussions with the representatives of the workers need to be restarted so that a fair solution can be found to this crisis. 
 
I trust you will take these matters seriously and urgently act in accordance. 
 
Sincerely Yours, 
 
Fred Higgs 
General Secretary 
ICEM

ICEM letter in support of the Iran Sherkate Vahed workers

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The ICEM is fully supportive of French affiliates Filpac-CGT and FCE-CFDT, and the French paper workers, in their manifestation Saturday, 17 December, in Lille, France. The unions are protesting against the actions of several multinational paper companies, who are firing workers and closing mill and paper converters, or have plans to do so, in the Nord/Pas-de-Calais area of northern France. 
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According to Filpac-CGT, paper companies are creating “a genuine social earthquake” with job losses and closures in the region. 
Paper companies Stora Enso of Sweden and Finland, International Paper of the US, Cascades of Canada and Smurfit-Kappa of Ireland and The Netherlands have all announced harmful restructurings in the Nord/Pas-de-Calais area. Over 1,000 jobs might be lost in total. 
Companies are ignoring their social responsibilities and cite external causes, such as surplus capacity, the overall economic situation or global energy costs. 
 
According to the unions, however, the real reasons lie elsewhere. Stora Enso is pursuing its Profit 2007 initiative aimed at adding another €300 million to its annual pre-tax profit in 2007. FCE-CFDT reminds us that Stora Enso, as part of this initiative, intends to get rid of 2,500 work places world-wide, with 500 of them in France, for the sole purpose of making more profit. 
Cascades is equally seeking improved profitability of its boxboard unit, while pointing to capacity build-up in China and the pressures of Asian exports as the reason for the possible closure. 
International Paper (IP) first refused to sell its Maresquel mill to a potential buyer earlier in the year and then gave local managers just two months to find investors, demonstrating that it is more interested in closing this operation than having to live with a potential competitor. Lastly, the closure of a paper converter in Gravelines, along with another converting plant in Cevennes, was announced by a Smurfit subsidiary immediately after the merger between Smurfit and Kappa Packaging. 

The manifestation on 17 December begins at 9h00. For more information, visit Filpac-CGT’s website at <a href="http://www.filpac.cgt.fr">http://www.filpac.cgt.fr</a> or FCE-CFDT's site: <a href="http://www.fce.cfdt.fr/n1/2005/12/bra%5Fpacart%5F97.doc">http://www.fce.cfdt.fr/n1/2005/12/bra%5Fpacart%5F97.doc</a>.

Paper Multinationals plan to eliminate jobs in France

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Senzeni Zokwana won re-election as president of South Africa’s National Union of Mineworkers (NUM), while Frans Baleni was elected general secretary. Those and other elections were part of a spirited 12th National Congress of the NUM, held 24-27 May in Midrand, near Johannesburg. 
 
Over 1,000 delegates to the NUM’s triennial Congress passed resolutions prioritising the issue of wage compensation, and convene a special summit to deal with the issue; to openly engage employers to reopen mines to enhance employment; and for leadership of the 300,000-member NUM to develop a discussion document on its important role inside COSATU related to labour’s strained relationship as part of the African National Congress (ANC) Alliance. 
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The Congress also vowed to maintain NUM’s bank as a workers’ asset, set in motion an aid and support plan for striking security guards in conjunction with the Transport & Allied Workers’ Union, and commemorated the 1946 strike by the Black Mineworkers Union, with events leading up to the 60-year anniversary of the strike in the Witwatersran on 12 August of this year. 
The Congress closed by paying a rousing tribute to Gwede Mantashe, NUM’s general secretary since 1998 who retired at this Congress. 
In opening the Congress, Zokwana, ICEM president, now in his third term as a NUM national office bearer, demanded of ANC leadership, including President Thabo Mbeki, that more anti-retroviral medicines be made available to workers in the fight against HIV/AIDS. “This human culling must stop,” he said. “South Africa has the resources to assist us and it must do so.” 
 
Baleni, a miner who rose through NUM leadership ranks as a national organiser and then national education coordinator, has been the union’s chief negotiator prior to his 27 May election. He headed the Production Pillar of the NUM. Zokwana joined NUM in 1983 as a shaft steward in a Free State gold mine, and rose through the ranks to regional chairman in 1993 and national vice president in 1994. 
 
Other national office bearers elected at the 12th Congress: Crosbi Moni, deputy president; Oupa Komane, deputy general secretary; Derick Elbrecht, treasurer general; Helen Diatile, chairperson of Education; Zwelitsha Tantsa, secretary of Education; Peter Bailey, chairperson of Health and Safety; and Eric Gcilitshana, secretary of Health and Safety.

NUM Elects Leaders at Energised South African Congress

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Things are definitely changing in the industrial gases sector. Mergers and acquisitions are decreasing the number of global players. In addition, there is a rising demand in industrial gases for the steel and petrochemical sector, with the biggest investments in new plants taking place in Eastern Europe, the Middle East and Asia. 
 
At the conference on industrial gases, organised by ICEM affiliates Centrale Générale (Belgium) and FNV Bondgenoten (Netherlands), in Blankenberge, Belgium, on 14-15 December 2005, the ICEM presented an overview of the economic situation in the sector, as well as of the big 5 global players. The presentation also includes a brief forecast for the next years. 
 
The continuous growth in the industrial gases sector and the many new applications for industrial gases, for example in the medical sector, are good news for employees. The shift from manufacturing plants to so-called low-cost countries, however, is a real challenge for the workers and their unions. 
 
The presentation explains how workers in the sector from different countries can cooperate and how a communication network can be built between the workers’ representatives in the different European countries. Another important question that is touched upon is how the different systems of industrial relations work in each country of the EU. 
 
Click <a href="/sites/default/files/migration/icem/0512michaelindgases.ppt" type="internal">here</a> for the complete presentation.

ICEM Powerpoint Presentation on Industrial Gases

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In Nepal, GEFONT along with two other labour federations and the Teachers’ Union of Nepal have called on the Maoist Communist Part of Nepal to continue its cease-fire. The unions also ask the same from the monarchist regime. A four-month cease-fire by the Maoist front ended New Year’s Day. 
Nepal’s labour unions are in the lead calling for a peaceful restructuring of society toward democracy. The autocratic King Gyanendra has refused to listen to such a call. Instead, he is turning his back on initiatives from a 7-party coalition seeking peace and restoration of democracy. “We demand with both the regime and Maoists not to push the nation and people towards bloodshed and the game of death again,” read the declaration by the trade union federations.

Nepalese Unions Take Lead for Peace, Democracy

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Contract talks between a branch of Communications, Energy, Paperworkers (CEP) of Canada and Stora Enso were extended until 11 January in efforts to avert a lockout at a 660-worker pulp and paper mill in Port Hawkesbury, Nova Scotia. 
The Swedish-Finnish paper company last week extended a nine-day holiday shutdown of the mill that began on 24 December 2005. On 30 December, Stora Enso’s North American management issued a 48-hour lockout notice under provisions of the provincial labour code. Early in December, workers passed a strike vote by 98%. Last ditch bargaining efforts to find a resolve began on 3 January, ran through the week including Saturday, and will resume 11 January. 
The key issue in talks now is said to center on contracting out issues. Members of CEP Local 972 have been without a current contract at the magazine papers and newsprint mill since June 2004.

CEP, Stora Enso Still Engaged in Canadian Paper Talks

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