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<img src="/sites/default/files/migration/icem/InBrief100.jpg" width="100" height="39" alt=""/>
The European Mine, Chemical, and Energy Workers’ Federation (EMCEF) and the European Metalworkers’ Federation (EMF) joined together on 22 April in a Brussels manifestation, demanding a secure future for industrial sites across the 27 Member States of the European Union. 
 
Marching under the banner “Power to Jobs in Europe! Time to Act!” 1,200 people marched and then leading figures of EMCEF, EMF, and the European Trade Union Confederation (ETUC) met with EU Employment and Social Affairs Commissioner László Andor and Industry and Entrepreneurship Commission Antonio Tajani to stress the impact that climate change, energy prices, and high raw material costs have on jobs. 

<img src="/sites/default/files/migration/icem/1005.emcef.reibsch.jpg" width="240" height="180" alt=""/>
EMCEF General Secretary Reinhard Reibsch 
 
Photo: Andy Michaelis
Demonstrators in Europe’s capital city also called for stricter regulation of financial markets and the necessity to add needed social dimensions to EU emission-trading schemes. 
 
A simultaneous EMCEF/EMF manifestation occurred in the German city of Duisburg, home to the large German steelmaker ThyssenKrupp. 
 
Buses and trains replete with industrial workers waving the colours of their unions descended into Brussels. One busload of workers came from Scunthorpe in the Yorkshire region of the UK, where the steel-maker Tata Corus has shed jobs. 
 
“We are uniting in Brussels to ensure workers come before profits,” said Unite the Union National Steel Officer Terry Pye. “Rising electricity prices are damaging our already weakened industries, making windfall profits for electricity companies. Pressure on raw material prices is also heightened by financial market speculators trying to make a quick buck on the back of our industries.” 

<img src="/sites/default/files/migration/icem/1005.igmetall.jpg" width="200" height="150" alt=""/>
Photo: Andy Michaelis
Belgian ACV-CSC Metea President Marc De Wilde said industrial production in the Benelux country dropped by 30% in 2009, with a 10% reduction in the number of workers as a consequence. He said previously, suppliers and others provided long-term contracts that assured steady pricing and workplace stability. “Now, only short-term contracts” are given and that means instability for both workers and enterprises. 
 
EMCEF General Secretary Reinhard Reibsch spoke at the manifestation. He said, “We need a clear policy of the European Union that is in the interest of our jobs and the economic future of Europe.” Reibsch added that the economic success of Europe has historically been the industrial model, and that industrial production must remain the basis for creating a just and equitable society. 
 
Reibsch, EMF General Secretary Peter Scherrer, and ETUC Secretary Jozef Niemiec then met with EU officials. An open letter from the European labour federations to Commission President José Manuel Barroso, European Council President Herman Van Rompuy, and the heads of government of all 27 Member States stated that the time to act for preservation of industrial enterprises is now.

EMCEF, EMF Join to Demand European Preservation of Industrial Sectors

<img src="/sites/default/files/migration/icem/InBrief100.jpg" width="100" height="39" alt=""/>
A relentless, two-year campaign by ICEM US affiliate, the Utility Workers Union of America (UWUA), against Covanta gave 140 workers in the state of Massachusetts their first labour agreement effective 15 April. The collective agreement, actually two contracts with one giving workers huge retroactive backpay and bonus awards, punctuates a capitulation by the American waste-to-energy company in resisting full workers’ rights following a successful organizing drive. 
 
That recruitment drive by UWUA Local 369 at an incinerator in Rochester, Massachusetts, that burns solid waste for conversion to electricity occurred in May 2008. Following the union vote, conducted by the US labour board, Covanta did what so many American companies do following union certification: they engage in “surface bargaining,” never intending to reach a first labour agreement, and they punish workers for voting union by withholding scheduled pay gains. 

<img alt="" src="/sites/default/files/migration/icem/covanta-smoke-4-copy.jpg" width="216" height="160"/>
Under US labour statute, after a one-year period has elapsed from the certification vote, workers have an option to de-authorise the union as bargaining representative. 
 
But at Covanta in Massachusetts, the UWUA would have none of it. The Washington, DC-based union began an unyielding campaign that blocked the publicly-traded Covanta from expanding its waste-to-energy business into Canada, Ireland, the UK, and the Netherlands. That meant engaging trade unions, civic organizations, and environmental groups as Covanta sought to gain municipal contracts to collect trash and the necessary permits to built incinerations in those countries in order to sell power to electric grids. 
 
UWUA impeded Covanta both at home and abroad by highlighting the company’s negligent health and safety ledger, its environmental record, and its appalling labour relations conduct, which included serious and malicious breaches of US labour law (see earlier ICEM dispatches <a href="/en/78-ICEM-InBrief/3694-UWUA-Wins-US$1-Million-Judgment-for-Covanta-Workers- " type="internal">here</a>, <a href="/en/78-ICEM-InBrief/3532-US-Labour-Board-Issues-Stern-Injunctive-Relief-against-Covanta " type="internal">here</a>, and <a href="/en/78-ICEM-InBrief/3039-Covanta-Energy-Violates-US-Labour-Law " type="internal">here</a>). 
 
The end result was a three-year collective agreement, plus a separate contract granting workers sizeable backpay and bonus payments that had been withheld. Local 369 members at Covanta’s SEMASS facility voted to accept the pair of agreements by a wide margin on 22 April. The pay and other gains are exceptional, and the working agreement now in place contains the best features of US union contracts. 
 
The backdated bonus and pay accord gives the 140 workers a retroactive wage increase of 3% to early 2009; an incentive bonus of 8.1% of total wages for 2008; an annual wage increases backdated to 1 January 2010 of 2.7%; and a further missed incentive bonus of 4.85% of total wages for 2009. Added up, these retroactive gains average US$17,000 per worker. 

<img alt="" src="/sites/default/files/migration/icem/0810Mike%20LangfordPrezUWUA.jpg" width="200" height="133"/>
UWUA President D. Michael Langford
And on top of that, comes the three-year pay, bonus, and other union protection items which took effect in mid-April. That includes a 2.8% increase each year, a ratification bonus of US$1,250 per worker, additional incentive bonuses of up to 7% in each year of the contract, as well as new safety and health protections, including a medical surveillance programme to monitor workers’ blood levels from the handling of hazardous materials, and limits on sub-contracting. 
 
The ICEM considers UWUA’s campaign and the end result of the Local 369-Covanta contract exemplary and an inspiring example inside America on how best to fight a recalcitrant employer attempting to deny its employees their lawful rights. In congratulating UWUA President D. Michael Langford, General Secretary Manfred Warda termed the initial labour agreement an excellent one that “all UWUA members – in fact, all union members in America – can be justly proud of.” (See the full letter <a href="/sites/default/files/migration/icem/33%20Letter%20to%20UWUA%20Presiden%20-%20Michael%20Langford.pdf" type="internal">here</a>.) 
 
In a joint release issued by UWUA Local 369 and Covanta, Local 369 President Gary Sullivan stated, “Our UWUA Bargaining Committee has done an outstanding job pressing for a fair and just contract. We are hopeful this is the first step to a productive relationship with Covanta.”

Utility Workers of America Gets Excellent First Labour Pact with Covanta

<img src="/sites/default/files/migration/icem/InBrief100.jpg" width="100" height="39" alt=""/>
The month of May has been designated by United Steelworkers Local 6500 in Canada as “anti-scab” month, a reference to the strikebreakers that the Brazilian mining company Vale is using in efforts to break a ten-month strike in the provinces of Ontario and Labrador/Newfoundland. 
 
Some 200 steelworkers and other supporters rallied in Queen’s Park, Toronto, on 29 April to support introduction of legislation in the Ontario Parliament that would outlaw the use of striker replacements during economic strikes or lockouts. Many of the steelworkers arrived after long bus rides from Sudbury, Ontario, where they experience first-hand the family hardships and community strife brought on by the bargaining intransigence of a company content to use scabs to regain partial production. 

<img src="/sites/default/files/migration/icem/1005.usw.ken.neumann.jpg" width="205" height="154" alt=""/>
ICEM Vice President, Ken Neumann
On 29 April, the Private Member’s Bill that again would prohibit companies operating in Ontario from using scabs passed a first reading in Parliament by a 32-3 vote. The bill was introduced by New Democratic Party legislators France Gelinas and Peter Kormos. 
 
Somewhat surprisingly, 21 members of the ruling Liberal Party joined with eight New Democrats and three Progressive Conservatives to pass this first reading. The bill must proceed through two more hearings before becoming law, and that could happen by year’s end. In Canada, most labour code is enacted at the provincial level. 
 
Quebec and British Colombia are currently the only two provinces that prohibit the use of replacement workers during strikes or lockouts. In Ontario, such a prohibition was on the books from 1992 to 1995, but was repealed in 1995 when Liberals took control of the Parliament. Gelinas presented proof that legislation banning companies from using replacement workers leads to shorter strikes, less volatile picket-line scenes, less family and community stress, and overall, better labour-management relations. 

<img src="/sites/default/files/migration/icem/1005.usw.andrea.horvath.jpg" width="154" height="205" alt=""/>
Andrea Horvath, NDP Ontario Chair Person
The 3,100 victimised miners and nickel and copper smelter workers at Sudbury and Port Colborne, Ontario, as well as another 250 workers that are on strike against Vale in Voiseys Bay and Goose Bay, Labrador, are current examples on why the ban is needed. Their lives have been turned upside down by a profitable employer demanding deep cuts in their collective agreements. 
 
In Sudbury on 28 April, the City Council firmly sided with the interests of the community by passing a resolution condemning Vale for using replacement workers. The resolution also calls on the provincial legislative body to enact the ban and urges Vale and the USW to return to the bargaining table. Previously, the city has charged Vale with violating zoning bylaws by housing scab workers inside an industrial complex. 
 
In Voiseys Bay last month, USW Local 9508 aligned with the Nunatsiavit First Nations People to prevent a Vale vessel from entering a port to collect copper ore concentrates. Union leaders also met with the Labrador/Newfoundland Minister of Natural Resources to express safety concerns over replacement workers utilizing mining and other equipment without the proper training.

Canadian Nickel Strikers Rally for Renew Anti-Scab Law in Ontario Province

ICEM Contract and Agency Labour Newsletter

Trade unions in four important industrial sectors of Sweden – metal, pulp and paper, forestry, and food service – achieved ICEM-heralded contract language protecting the rights of full-time and permanent workers in wage negotiations in March and April 2010. The first-of-its-kind language, covering 550,000 workers in these sectors, will serve as a major deterrent in utilizing temporary workers hired through labour agency companies. 
 
The language, varying in minor degrees from one sector to the other, was proposed as a bargaining priority by LO-Sweden, the Swedish Trade Union Confederation. It will serve as a very effective restraint, the ICEM believes, for the recent rush by Swedish employers to use temporary labour. 
 
Prior to 1992, all such labour was provided by government-operated job centres. But a change in law that year, in effect, privatised such centres. Yet, the growth of the mega-agencies was slow to catch on in Sweden over the next decade, mainly due to a Nordic social ethic that rightfully grants life-long work and retirement benefits. 
<img alt="" src="/sites/default/files/migration/icem/SwedenFlag.gif" width="180" height="113"/>
In the early years of the last decade, that slowly began to change. And with the coming of the financial crisis in mid-2008, the trend clearly shifted. Mass layoffs became the norm and in the second half of 2009, when even the slightest uptick in a company’s business caused a need for added staff, company after company relied on employment agencies to fill that need. 
 
Swedish labour unions clearly saw their own need to protect the rights of full-time workers who were victimized by the crisis. 
 
Language in the new collective agreements stipulates that employers have the obligation to negotiate with the respective union before turning to labour-hire companies. Those negotiations are to occur on the local level and must take into account permanent workers who have been made redundant and are on re-hire lists. If such workers are qualified for the jobs that an employer seeks to outsource to an agency, those workers must be re-hired or else the employer faces steep financial penalties. Thus, the effective deterrent is in place inside the collective agreements. 
 
If the trade union and employer cannot agree on qualifications, the case goes to the national level where a joint panel will decide. (In one sector agreement, the national panel also consists of an independent mediator in the event the joint labour-management panel cannot agree.) 
 
Employers face the risk that, if no agreement is made at the local level, and they do bring in agency workers and the national panel rules in favour of the redundant worker, the company ends up paying double salaries, with the redundant worker, in some cases, getting up to a SEK 65,000 judgment award. The employer generally has five days to halt the use of agency labour when such employment is challenged before the penalty applies. 
 
One sector agreement contains a joint labour-management committee to monitor this specific aspect of the agreement in order to shape a “good practices” standard of employment regarding short-term contract and agency labour that is also intended to assure that there are no violations of the language. 
 
All in all, this Swedish model to restrict temporary employment, curtail the exploitative nature of labour agency firms, and promote the concept of decent work through permanent and sustainable jobs is a good one. It is also a model that trade unions in other countries should closely examine.

Sweden’s 2010 Collective Agreements Give First-Ever Language to Stem Agency Labour 

The Zambian Labour and Social Security Minister, Austin Liato, has publically criticised some employers for using temporary workers to fill traditionally permanent positions simply to evade paying statutory employment benefits to workers. Speaking at the opening ceremony of the Mineworkers Union of Zambia’s (MUZ) 12th quadrennial conference on 27 April, Mr. Liato said this trend is found not only in the mining industry but other sectors as well. 
<img alt="" src="/sites/default/files/migration/icem/Austin%20C%20Liato%20MP.%20Zambia.png" width="83" height="107"/>
MP Austin Liato
Mr. Liato said that despite the Government’s commitment to halt the casualisation of employment, the situation has not improved. "The Government has always led a campaign against casualisation. This state of affairs can't be allowed to continue and I urge labour leaders to be vigilant. We should not turn permanent jobs to temporary jobs," he said.

Zambia’s Labour Minister Decries Labour Casualisation at MUZ Conference 

Miners locked out of Rio Tinto’s site in Boron, California for refusing to give in to demands by the company that could threaten their ability to work and support their families are highlighting their plight as shareholders attend the global mining giant’s AGM in London today (Thursday). 
 
Almost 600 workers, all members of the International Longshore and Warehouse Union (ILWU) Local 30 branch, were refused entry to the Borax mine and processing plant owned by Anglo-Australian corporation Rio Tinto when they showed up for work on 31st January. This followed their refusal to accept the imposition of a new contract that threatened to convert good jobs into temporary, part-time or outsourced positions. 
 
Rio Tinto has used a firm with a notorious reputation for union busting, J.R. Gettier of Delaware, to bus replacement workers across picket lines to mine and process borates. Borates are used in numerous products, including detergents, glass, building materials and as an ingredient in chemicals. 
<img alt="" src="/sites/default/files/migration/icem/1004.rio.tinto.london.3.jpg" width="205" height="154"/>
In negotiations Rio Tinto sought to agree to a new contract which would give the company the right to award jobs to outside contractors; require miners in dangerous occupations to work overtime; and require the workers’ themselves to pay for the company’s legal penalties, fines and damages if the company violates state and federal labor laws. 
 
Dave Irish, one of the locked out miners protesting at the AGM, said: 
 
“After working the mine for generations, families are being jeopardized by a newly-proposed system of insecure working patterns and conditions, and dog eat dog struggles for jobs I believe. Rio Tinto wants to starve us into submission, forcing us to accept a contract that we fear will destroy decent, family-supporting jobs. When we tried to use our legitimate negotiation rights, we were locked out of our own jobs and replaced by union busters. We’ve been forced to survive on unemployment insurance and handouts ever since. We are determined to fight for our jobs, our families and our community. 
 
“Having us back in our jobs is in the best interests of shareholders, too. As experienced workers, we are much better able to guarantee the quality and quantity of production to meet customer demand. We hope the shareholders will listen to us and demand that the corporation ends the lock out and negotiates a fair contract with us so that we can get back to work.” 
<img alt="" src="/sites/default/files/migration/icem/1004.rio.tinto.london.5.jpg" width="163" height="231"/>
Dave Irish left, locked out Local 30 worker, and ILWU VP Ram Familathe 
Ray Familathe, International Vice-President of the ILWU, said: “We have come to London to highlight the courage of ordinary workers and their families in standing up to a powerful global business. The Boron miners simply want to work hard and to be treated fairly and with respect. This seems the latest example of appalling behaviour by Rio Tinto around the world in terms of the way it treats its workers, communities and the environment. This is not just a problem for the small community in Boron, California which relies on the mine for its survival but a global threat when a corporate giant such as Rio Tinto gets away with riding roughshod over its employees.” 
 
The action against Rio Tinto is a joint initiative of the International Transport Workers’ Federation (ITF), which is based in the UK; the International Federation of Chemical, Energy, Mine and General Workers' Union; and the International Metalworkers’ Federation (IMF). It is supported by a range of other organisations, including the London Mining Network. 
 
ITF General Secretary David Cockroft said: “The lockout is the lowest reaction of the employer to a workforce that strives for dialogue. We support the fight of the miners and applaud their strength and courage and support the ILWU’s call for an end to the lockout and proper negotiation to reach agreement on staff contracts.” 

<img alt="" src="/sites/default/files/migration/icem/1004.rio.tinto.london.4.jpg" width="205" height="154"/>
Four Rio Tinto executives were found guilty of bribery and commercial espionage by a Chinese court at the end of March. This follows a case against the company by residents of Bougainville, Papua New Guinea accusing it of complicity in human rights abuses by the operation of its copper-gold mine. Rio Tinto has also been alleged to have colluded with the Apartheid government in South Africa and some of the world’s most despotic regimes, including Suharto’s in Indonesia. 
 
Workers from South Africa, Australia, Turkey, New Zealand, Canada, Europe and Papua New Guinea have expressed solidarity with the locked out Boron miners in the USA. 
View the Fact Sheet on the Rio Tinto lockout in Boron <a href="/index.php?id=5&la=EN&doc=3705" type="internal">here</a>. 
 
 
For further information, please contact: 
• about the Boron lockout – Craig Merrilees, Communications Director, ILWU, on +1 (0) 415 775 0533 ext 113 or <a href="mailto:craig@ilwu.org">craig@ilwu.org</a>   
• about the AGM protest or to interview Dave Irish or Ray Familathe – Dee Sullivan on 020 8613 8071, 07949 010639 or <a href="mailto:dee@greenshootsconsultants.co.uk">dee@greenshootsconsultants.co.uk</a>

Unions Protest Rio Tinto's US Lockout at AGM

<img alt="" src="/sites/default/files/migration/icem/InBrief100.jpg" width="100" height="39"/>
The ICEM’s Sub-Sahara Africa Regional Organisation (SSARO), at its Executive Committee Meeting in Dakar, Senegal, 6 April, adopted a resolution of strong solidarity and support for the striking Canadian Vale workers. 
 
The Resolution marked the Vale ‘Week of Action’ of 5-11 April, called to denounce to denounce Vale Inco’s attacks on workers in Canada and throughout the world. Vale, the second biggest mining company in the world, operates in 36 countries. 
 
More than 3,000 Steelworkers in Sudbury, Port Colborne, and Voisey’s Bay, Newfoundland, Canada, are into the ninth month of a strike, the longest ever at Inco. While the company persists with its demands on profit-sharing, pensions, job security, outsourcing, and seniority rights. Vale continues to refuse to enter into a binding arbitration, as instructed under Canada’s labour laws. 

<img alt="" src="/sites/default/files/migration/icem/Senegal.png" width="250" height="115"/>
The SSARO Resolution comes in light of the 50/50 joint venture between Vale and African Rainbow Minerals (ARM), a South African mining company that will act as a gateway for Vale to Africa’s mineral resources. 
 
ICEM SSARO affiliates resolved to lobby their governments, national centres, NGOs, and communities, to condemn and take concrete actions in support of the struggle. 
 
View the Resolution in its entirety <a href="/sites/default/files/migration/icem/1004.ssaro.resolution.vale.pdf" type="internal">here</a>. 
 
View the USW Vale strikers’ campaign website <a href="http://www.fairdealnow.ca/">here</a>.

SSARO Meeting Vale Resolution in Support of Canadian Strikers

<img alt="" src="/sites/default/files/migration/icem/InBrief100.jpg" width="100" height="39"/>
Each of the three Industrial European Trade Union Federations has given their leaders a mandate to move towards a merger. ICEM’s sister organisation, the European Mine, Chemical and Energy Workers’ Federation (EMCEF), the European Metalworkers’ Federation (EMF), and the European Trade Union Federation for Textiles, Clothing and Leather (ETUF:TCL) seek to create a single European industrial trade union federation. 
 
On 25 March 2010, the presidents and general secretaries of the three organisations met in Berlin, to discuss next steps in the merger process. A merged organisation will bring together 8 million workers in the manufacturing industries, and united they will be stronger. Other factors cited include continued integration of countries in Europe, globalisation, the recent financial and economic crisis, and several significant recent mergers at the national level. 

<img alt="" src="/sites/default/files/migration/icem/1004.emcef.merger.png" width="201" height="151"/>
The three presidents and three general secretaries, present at the Berlin meeting, underlined their belief that the combining of their resources would increase efficiency and strength, in their role of representing and protecting European workers throughout the industrial sectors. 
 
The leaders of the three federations agreed to oversee intensified discussions within their statutory bodies over the creation of a joint EMF-EMCEF-ETUF:TCL organisation. 
 
A joint Working Group for building the new organisation was created, and will now produce a timetable for the process.

Discussions Advance in Building Single European Industrial Trade Union Federation

<img alt="" src="/sites/default/files/migration/icem/InBrief100.jpg" width="100" height="39"/>
RadioLabour, the online news radio service of international trade unionism, interviewed ICEM General Secretary Manfred Warda, last week, on the ICEM Global Campaign on Contract and Agency Labour (CAL). 
 
As companies throughout the world, and in every sector, continue to outsource their workforce in the race to lower costs, the significance of the campaign grows. As directly employed jobs are lost to sub-contracting companies or agencies, workers find themselves with little or no job security, inferior benefits, and with substandard working conditions. This is leading to a two-tier workforce with fewer and fewer directly employed workers, and increasing numbers employed through contracts or agencies. 
 
As Warda stated in the interview with RadioLabour presenter, Marc Bélanger, “In some countries, we must unfortunately say that contract and agency labour has almost become the ‘regular’ employment situation”. 

<img alt="" src="/sites/default/files/migration/icem/Marc.Belanger.png" width="101" height="134"/>
Marc Bélanger
Use the audio player below to listen to part of Manfred Warda’s interview with Marc Bélanger, or click <a href="http://www.radiolabour.net/ICEM/cal-warda.mp3 ">here</a> to find the interview on the RadioLabour website. 
 
RadioLabour reports on events of interest to unionists via "The Solidarity Report", a half hour audiocast of international union news every Sunday morning. Part of Manfred Warda’s interview can be heard on yesterday’s <a href="http://www.radiolabour.net/">Solidarity Report</a>. Marc Bélanger also presents "RadioLabour 5", a five minute global labour news update, every Friday morning. 
 
RadioLabour is an important instrument in the building of international solidarity amongst unionists, also serving as a model and source of expertise for unionists who want to start a service similar to RadioLabour in their country or for their organization. Contact us if you need advice or assistance in developing a labour-based audiocasting service. 
 
Canadian national, Marc Bélanger, producer and host of RadioLabour, is a labour union educator. He worked for the Workers' Activities Programme of the training centre of the ILO in Turin, Italy, from 2000-2008. He was head of the Programme from 2007-2008. The Programme operates the largest international union education school in the world.

RadioLabour Interviews Manfred Warda on CAL

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