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<img height="40" alt="" src="/sites/default/files/migration/icem/InBrief 1.gif" width="100"/> 
Following failed bargaining between negotiators for the United Steelworkers (USW) and the Goodyear Tire & Rubber Co. from 14 to 17 November, the ICEM North American affiliate has heightened its safety and awareness campaign against the US tyre-maker. 
 
On 2 December, the USW will dispatch hundreds of strikers and supporters to 13 cities in the US and Canada to handbill Goodyear retail outlets. The effort, following a similar one on 18 November, will call attention to possible safety defects of Goodyear tyres to be sold in America. The company is attempting to run production at several of the 16 plant sites that are currently on strike with managers and temporary workers. 
<img height="109" alt="" src="/sites/default/files/migration/icem/0611GoodyearAlert.jpg" width="350"/>
The USW has erected an “Investor Alert” website, <a href="http://www.usw.org/goodyearalert">www.usw.org/goodyearalert</a>, aimed at some 15,000 industry analysts, in an effort to drive the company’s stock price down. The site calls into question Goodyear’s third-quarter earnings report, and gives a truthful account of the company’s future while skilled crafts-people are on strike. 
 
A total of 55% of the company’s outstanding shares is owned by ten institutional investors.
The USW has also begun using a video-sharing site called YouTube to educate the public about the strike and the safety concerns stemming from union members being out. That site can be found at <a href="http://www3.youtube.com/watch?v=QDKGJu5eMZo">http://www3.youtube.com/watch?v=QDKGJu5eMZo</a>. 
The union has moreover begun targeting the NASCAR racing circuit, which is 100% supplied by Goodyear, providing high-quality and expensive race car tyres. USW begins a renewed radio advertising campaign this week, targeting consumers in the New York City area with the safety alert. 

<img height="50" alt="" src="/sites/default/files/migration/icem/CanadaFLAG.gif" width="100"/>        <img height="53" alt="" src="/sites/default/files/migration/icem/USAFlag.gif" width="100"/>
That alert is reminiscent of the campaign the union engaged in against Bridgestone/Firestone some 11 years ago. After that lockout, researchers at Princeton University in the US state of New Jersey examined the causes of the Ford Motor recall of 14.4 million Firestone tyres, and linked it to the temporary workers utilised during the dispute. 
 
These tyres were later linked by the US National Highway Safety Transportation Authority to some 271 road fatalities and more than 800 injuries. 
The Goodyear strike at the 16 US and Canadian tyre and auto accessory plants by 15,000 steelworkers began on 5 October, after America’s biggest rubber company proposed harsh concessions and refused to guarantee job security at the unionised plants. 
<img height="80" alt="" src="/sites/default/files/migration/icem/ICEMrubber.JPG" width="80"/>       
The proposed concessionary terms include closing company-paid health care coverage for retirees and a two-tier wage scheme in which new employees will be paid US$13-per-hour with no future opportunity to make what current rubber workers earn. The company also seeks to close at least one tyre-making plant, in Tyler, Texas, where 1,100 workers are employed. 
 
In the mid-November bargaining – the first talks since the strike began – Goodyear proposed to create a US$600 million trust fund for retiree health care. The Akron, Ohio-based company, however, carries a US$1.2 billion liability for retiree care. The proposed US$600 million trust would only provide current retirees with six years of coverage, leaving nothing for future retirees. 
 
The USW has promised to escalate the campaign to an even higher level if the strike is not settled by the first of 2007. The Steelworkers’ general website on all Goodyear related activity can be found at <a href="http://www.gkdsolidarityexpress.org">http://www.gkdsolidarityexpress.org</a>.

Steelworkers Ramp up Campaign Surrounding North American Goodyear Strike

<img height="40" src="/sites/default/files/migration/icem/InBrief 1.gif" width="100" alt=""/>
Balloting is underway among paperworkers represented by three UK unions to turn the page on the adversarial relationship that has dominated the country’s papermaking industry. 
 
A new framework “Partnership Agreement” has been agreed to by senior industrialists and national officers of Amicus, the Transport & General Workers Union (TGWU), and GMB, together with Britain’s Confederation of Paper Industries, an employers’ grouping of pulp, paper, and converting companies. 
<img height="62" src="/sites/default/files/migration/icem/UKAmicus.jpg" width="120" align="middle" alt=""/>      <img height="70" src="/sites/default/files/migration/icem/UKGMB.gif" width="70" align="middle" alt=""/>       <img height="55" src="/sites/default/files/migration/icem/UKTGWU.gif" width="100" align="middle" alt=""/>
The agreement sets out modern approaches to the employment relationship across the sector, and includes as its motto “Work Together, Grow Together, Stay Together.” The three unions briefed local branch leaders on the agreement earlier in November, and union leaders are recommending that workers now accept the concept. 
 
"The new agreement is an important step in securing modern working terms across the industry, such as work-life balance, actively promoting learning and skills, providing safer workplaces, promoting dignity at work and giving employees an opportunity to be informed and consulted, and actively involved in improving the performance of their workplace," said Amicus Assistant General Secretary Tony Burke. 
<img height="102" src="/sites/default/files/migration/icem/ICEMpaper3.jpg" width="100" alt=""/>
According to the independent chairman of CPI, Professor Frank Burchill, “The agreement provides an essential framework for all the parties to work as partners in tackling the challenges in securing a healthy future for the papermaking industry." 
 
The agreement, if passed, is expected to take effect in early 2007. 
 
UK’s papermaking industry employs over 10,000 people in over 60 worksites, but has struggled to remain competitive in the face of reduced output coupled with high energy costs. Papermaking, along with printing in the UK, is one of the few industries to have industry-wide bargaining.

UK Unions Could Embark on New Partnering Relationship in Paper Sector

<img height="40" alt="" src="/sites/default/files/migration/icem/InBrief 1.gif" width="100"/>
ExxonMobil workers in Belgium returned to work on 21 November after a week-long strike in protest of the unfair dismissal of five workers at a refinery in Virton. Work continued inside the refinery behind closed plant gates, preventing any trucks from driving in or out. 
 
On 23 November, workers were forced to reopen the gates after the company had sought and won a legal injunction. According to Belgian union representatives, industrial actions will continue as workers pledge to do whatever it takes to get the US-based oil multinational to respect their rights. 
The spontaneous strike started when it became known that the five workers had been dismissed for “not respecting the ethics of the company.” Reportedly, the workers were found to have exchanged pornographic e-mails. In addition to the five employees that were dismissed, ten others were temporarily suspended for four days.
<img height="90" alt="" src="/sites/default/files/migration/icem/Belgiumaccg.jpg" width="80" align="middle"/>    <img height="29" src="/sites/default/files/migration/icem/BELGIUMSETCA1.jpg" width="97" align="middle" alt=""/>    <img height="36" alt="" src="/sites/default/files/migration/icem/belguimCNE.jpg" width="100" align="middle"/>
While acknowledging that company e-mail networks are not to be used for distribution of erotic material, ICEM affiliated unions from both national centres, FGTB and CSC, claim management’s reaction was completely out of proportion. The dismissals are extreme and drastic punishments, condemning workers and their families to hardship. The unions contend that ExxonMobil has suffered no moral or financial harm as a result of the e-mails. 
The unions’ statement said that there are privacy laws in Belgium which ExxonMobil can not violate. Workers and unions denounced the company’s radical position on the matter, saying it can, under no circumstances, agree with a company that believes it owns the right to decide what is right and what is wrong. 
 
The unions have taken the matter to court and demand the reinstatement of the workers. They also call on ExxonMobil to bring its “code” before the unions for discussion. The code, FGTB and CSC believes, must conform to Belgian law.

Belgian ExxonMobil Workers Strike after ‘Unethical E-mail’

<img height="40" src="/sites/default/files/migration/icem/InBrief 1.gif" width="100" alt=""/>
UK ICEM affiliate Amicus denounced French multinational Saint-Gobain’s decision to reduce the number of workers at its Stanton Iron Works plant in Ikeston, Derbyshire. The company announced on 5 December that is was cutting 220 of 400 jobs, beginning in April 2007, citing price increases in scrap steel and high energy costs. 
 
Amicus called the holiday-season announcement “a heavy blow to the workers who face an uncertain few months ahead,” and the union immediately scheduled meetings with management to discuss the need for redundancies and to begin enhanced severance talks. 
Saint-Gobain’s announcement said it would retain flange pipe making at Stanton, and keep customer servicing staff based in Derbyshire. But the community loses the production of water pipes, which it has been supplying to the UK’s water-delivery system for decades. The Paris-based company said the work will now be done in France and Germany. 
<img height="153" src="/sites/default/files/migration/icem/UK.png" width="150" alt=""/>
Amicus said that the loss of 220 jobs in Ikeston will lift November’s job-loss totals in the East Midlands to nearly 1,000. Amicus has been campaigning and lobbying the government to introduce better employment laws that protects UK workers and assist more in alternative job placements. 
 
Amicus has also been calling for a statutory entitlement to be established that provides workers with a skills and training agenda, as well as for a statutory employer investment fund for training. Amicus says the current tone and level of the debate over jobs and training is “largely irrelevant” next to the tens of thousands of high-skilled and well-paid jobs that have left the UK. 
 
Amicus Assistant General Secretary Tony Burke provided a stark reminder on why the UK was in such a jobs crisis: “Employers have neglected to invest in the skills of their workforces for decades. This under-investment means that we now have to run to stand still in terms of up-skilling.”

Amicus Refutes Saint-Gobain’s 50% Reductions in UK Pipe Manufacturing

<img height="40" alt="" src="/sites/default/files/migration/icem/InBrief 1.gif" width="100"/>
In Iran, Mansour Osanloo was arrested again, on 19 November. Osanloo is the head of the trade union of Workers of the Tehran and Suburbs Bus Company,. 
 
He was detained outside his home, by plain-clothed security officials, a day before he was summoned to appear in court. Officials beat him and forced him, at gunpoint, into a car. Osanloo is said to be held at the Evin Prison, where he may be in need of urgent medical treatment. He had had eye-surgery only days before he was detained, the result of injuries suffered during his previous arrest, earlier this year. 
<img height="56" alt="" src="/sites/default/files/migration/icem/Iranflag.gif" width="100"/>
On 26 November, Osanloo appeared before an Iranian court, in the absence of his lawyer. No specific charges were cited, however. Osanloo had been released in August 2006, after an international campaign led by the International Transport Workers’ Federation (ITF). See: <a href="/en/78-ICEM-InBrief/1661-Iranian-Bus-Drivers-Given-Global-Union-Support" type="internal">/en/78-ICEM-InBrief/1661-Iranian-Bus-Drivers-Given-Global-Union-Support</a>. 
 
According to a press communiqué by the Tehran union, also known as Sherkat-e Vahed, three other unionists were also arrested on 3 December: Seyyed Davoud Razavi and Abdolreza Taraazi, members of the Executive Board, and Gholamreza Gholam-Hosseini, a union activist. The three men were detained as they were distributing leaflets. The first two were released later the same day. Gholamreza Gholam-Hosseini was only released this weekend. 
 
The three men are among the 50 bus workers that are currently still without pay since a January 2006 strike. In July, the ITF and the ITUC already lodged a formal protest before the ILO over Osanloo’s initial detention, and over the crackdown on the union Sherkat-e Vahed.
<img height="92" alt="" src="/sites/default/files/migration/icem/Maps/Iran.png" width="200"/>
The ITF has called the re-arrest an “outrageous attempt to crush both a brave individual and all attempts to assert basic trade union rights in the country.” The ICEM fully supports the call of the ITF to continue to apply pressure on Iranian authorities over human and labour rights. 
 
For more information, including the possibility to take action, please click here: 
<a href="http://www.itfglobal.org/solidarity/Osanloo.cfm">http://www.itfglobal.org/solidarity/Osanloo.cfm</a>.

President of Tehran Bus Company Union Arrested Again

Please send a message to 
(with a copy to the ICEM - <a href="mailto:info@icem.org">info@icem.org</a>) 
 
François YAO 
General Secretary SYNASEG 
E-mail : <a href="mailto:ykokora@cie.ci">ykokora@cie.ci</a> 
Fax :+225 21 23 38 25 
 
 
 
 
Dear Colleagues, 

Re: Your strike against CIE 
We have learned through the ICEM that you will be on strike against CIE from October 30 to November 1. 
 
We understand that for a long time, CIE has been using the following tactics in an attempt to weaken your union 
 
• Refusal to enter into dialog, and applying dilatory measures 
• Hindered union freedoms by prohibiting the posting of union notices, and refused to allow holding union meetings, etc. 
• Violated the union fees check-off agreement, by withholding fees, abusively use fees that have been collected in favour of third parties. 
• Arbitrary creation and use of a Mutual Investment Fund (FCP in its French acronym) supposed to benefit employees but which proceedings are not used in favour of workers whereas they are the only contributors. 
 
We fully support your decision to call for a strike this week and demand that CIE immediately open unconditional negotiations with SYNASEG. 
 
In Solidarity,

Model support letter for SYNASEG campaign

<img height="40" alt="" src="/sites/default/files/migration/icem/InBrief 1.gif" width="100"/>
ICEM Canadian affiliate Power Workers’ Union (PWU) supports the efforts of a Canadian company to build more nuclear power capability in the province of Ontario. Bruce Power, a privately held electric generating company based in Ontario, announced recently that it would begin the licensing process with federal and provincial regulators to construct more nuclear reactors. 
“The government of Ontario is clear on its direction to keep nuclear generation in Ontario’s electricity mix,” said PWU President Don MacKinnon. “We support any actions that begin the process of planning for the future of nuclear power.” 
<img height="48" alt="" src="/sites/default/files/migration/icem/CanadaPWU.jpg" width="269"/>
Bruce Power currently operates six nuclear reactors, with two other units currently under re-construction and expected back on line in 2009. The company is the source of 20% of Ontario’s power supply and has the capability to generate 6,200 megawatts. Bruce Power is seeking regulatory and licensing approval from the Canadian Nuclear Safety Commission under the country’s Environmental Assessment Act to conduct more reactors that would begin operation after 2015. 
PWU is the largest electricity union in Ontario, and has union membership in all of the provinces nuclear and coal-fired power plants. The PWU also represents workers in hydroelectric, gas, oil, and biomass generation plants, as well as in regulatory and research aspects of the industry.

PWU in Canada Supports Efforts to Build More Nuclear Reactors

The 20-million-member International Federation of Chemical, Energy, Mine & General Workers Unions (ICEM), the Global Union Federation for oil and gas workers, condemned today the hostile actions of Iran toward a Romanian-owned oil rig in the Persian Gulf. On Tuesday, 22 August, Iranian gunboats fired on the rig Orizont, owned by Grup Servicii Petroliere (GPS), before boarding the vessel and holding 26 workers hostage. 
 
The violent and life-threatening actions by Iran were over a commercial dispute in which GPS had terminated services to a Dubai-based company, Oriental Oil Company, which had sub-leased development and production in the Iranian South Pars gas fields, off Hengam Island, to Petro Iran Development Company (Pedco), a subsidiary of the National Iranian Oil Company (NIOC).
<img height="67" alt="" src="/sites/default/files/migration/icem/Iranflag.gif" width="120"/>         <img height="67" alt="" src="/sites/default/files/migration/icem/RomaniaFlag.gif" width="100"/>
Nineteen of the workers are members of ICEM-affiliated trade union Federatia Sindicatelor Libere si Independente din Industria Petroliera (FSLI Petrom) of Romania, while seven are of Indian descent and working for a catering company. 
 
“It is totally unacceptable and reprehensible to place innocent workers’ physical safety at risk, as Iran’s armed forces did in this matter,” said ICEM General Secretary Fred Higgs. “We understand that a commercial dispute was in progress between the companies, and this dispute must be settled through negotiation and the civil process.” 
 
The Orizont rig was under maintenance at the time, in Iranian waters and a very short distance from international waters. After boarding the vessel, Iranian armed forces kept the crew on the rig’s heliport for several hours without food and water. They then allowed the crew to return to other quarters, but cut off all communications between the workers and GPS. 
 
“The Iranian forces had no right to threaten our union members in this way,” said FSLI Petrom Vice President Florin Bercea. “It is an unnecessary demonstration of force by Iran, and our union condemns these hostile actions by the government of Iran.” 
<img height="123" alt="" src="/sites/default/files/migration/icem/RomaniaPetrom.jpg" width="300"/>
Bercea added that workers’ families are deeply concerned over the safety of their loved ones, and the Romanian trade union has reached out to them in order to facilitate direct communication with the oil workers. 
 
The commercial dispute between GPS and Oriental Oil occurred after the Romanian company terminated a contract in April 2006 after Oriental failed to get a renewed bank letter of credit for work this year. Prior to Iran taking military action on Tuesday, the dispute over the removal of Romanian rigs from Iran’s gas fields to maintenance facilities elsewhere had been taken up in Iranian courts, as well as brought before other international bodies. 
 
The ICEM represents the global interests of 379 affiliated trade unions in 123 countries.

Condemnation Towards Iran on Attacking Romanian Oil Rig

Nigerian oil workers’ unions NUPENG and PENGASSAN demand the immediate release of a comrade recently kidnapped in Bayelsa State. Nelson Ujeya, the Community Liaison Officer for Shell Petroleum Development Company Ltd, a trade union member of white-collar PENGASSAN, was abducted on 8 August following an official visit to the Letugbene community to examine community projects. 
 
A NUPENGASSAN union communiqué said the kidnapping occurred “in the full glare of a team of senior Bayelsa State Government officials” following the coordinated visit with officials to Letugbene. 
The two ICEM affiliates demanded in the statement “that the Government and good people of Bayelsa should immediately produce our member whom they invited to a Community-related assignment.” 
<img height="135" alt="" src="/sites/default/files/migration/icem/NigeriaNupeng.gif" width="130"/>     <img height="126" alt="" src="/sites/default/files/migration/icem/NigeriaPengassan.JPG" width="120"/>
“On our part, considering the escalation of kidnapping and other violent acts in the Niger Delta Region, we are under tremendous pressure to take action that will guarantee the safety of lives and properties of our members.” 
 
In Nigeria, NUPENG and PENGASSAN have been consistent in the call for a stop to the senseless kidnappings of oil workers’ of any nationality, but also for state and federal governments, as well as oil industry enterprises, to do more inside Niger Delta communities. 
 
The two unions, operating under the aegis NUPENGASSAN, call for education and skill development, and other meaningful social protections that improve the quality of life in these oil-rich areas. The ICEM stands behind the efforts of NUPENGASSAN, and applauds their trade union voice on this extremely serious problem in the global oil industry.

Call for Release of Kidnapped PENGASSAN Member in Nigeria

<img height="40" alt="" src="/sites/default/files/migration/icem/InBrief 1.gif" width="100"/>
In New Zealand, protest and resistance became the formula to beat back a piece of proposed legislation that would have made it easy for employers to hire and then sack temporary workers during their first 90 days of employment. Last week, on 23 August, just as 5,000 trade unionists assembled in Auckland’s Aotea Square to protest the National Party’s anti-worker bill, Members of Parliament from the Maori Party announced they were shifting course and would not support the measure. 
 
For the past three months, trade unionists of ICEM affiliates Engineering, Printing & Manufacturing Union (EPMU) and the National Distribution Union (NDU), have been leading the opposition against the business-friendly proposal under the banner “Work Rights …Our Right!” The campaign generated mass support among New Zealanders. 
<img height="193" alt="" src="/sites/default/files/migration/icem/0608NewZealand.jpg" width="290"/>
The bill had cleared a first reading in Parliament earlier this year with a 63-58 vote, with three of the four Maori MPs supporting the measure. With those four votes now opposing the measure, the ruling Labour Party, Green Party and Maoris now have the leverage to stop the anti-worker bill during a second reading. 
 
Maori Party co-leader Pita Sharples said the minority Maori people, with an 18% jobless rate, have too many low-end jobs on the employment ladder. “So, it’s really important that, one, Maori get employed, and two, that Maori are protected,” Sharples said. “The bill was solely to encourage employers to employ like hell in the knowledge that they could get rid of their workers if it didn’t work out.” 
<img height="193" alt="" src="/sites/default/files/migration/icem/0608NewZealand1.jpg" width="290"/>
EPMU National Secretary Andrew Little rejoiced with the workers’ victory. “This bill has been beaten by workers acting together through their unions. It just goes to show the power of collective action.” 
 
Little added, “We’ve done more than just defeat this vicious piece of legislation. We’ve demonstrated our strength as a movement and we’ve made it clear to the National Party that ‘Work Rights are Our Rights,’ and that they are not up for negotiation.” Trade unions will now ask MPs of the NZ First and United Future Parties to examine their working-class priorities in order to stop any future reappearance of the National party bill. 
 
The New Zealand Council of Trade Unions estimates that, had the bill gone into law, a class of disposable workers numbering 300,000 would have been at risk of losing their jobs in each 90-day period.

New Zealand’s Trade Unions Block 90-day Temporary Workers Bill

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