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Asia-Pacific labour and management representatives from BASF met in Singapore on 10 February. The network takes shape following the successful ICEM regional dialogue with BASF managers in Latin America/Caribbean. BASF&rsquo;s Eggert Voscherau called the AP network &ldquo;important and necessary&rdquo; and one that &ldquo;has to be continued.&rdquo; Recently, ICEM, German affiliate IGBCE and BASF teamed up so that BASF workers in Malaysia could have trade union recognition rights in Malaysia.

ICEM’s Regional BASF Network Meets in Singapore

Binda Pandey, ICEM vice president and leader in affiliate Nepal Independent Chemical and Iron Workers&rsquo; Union and national labour center GEFONT, is part of a collective nomination of 1,000 women worldwide nominated for the 2005 Nobel Peace Prize. This year marks the 100th anniversary of the first woman recipient of the Nobel Peace Prize, Bertha von Suttner. The single entry nomination of 1,000 women is meant to mark women&rsquo;s contributions to counter injustice, discrimination, oppression, and violence. Binda Pandey is a trade union leader committed to non-violent means to reverse the Nepalese monarchy&rsquo;s autocratic rule, and she has proven to be a tireless fighter for a return to democracy in the Himalayan country.

Binda Pandey Among Women Nominated for Nobel Peace Prize

ICEM UK affiliate Amicus is in a 90-day consultation period with papermaker ArjoWiggins in efforts to save 150 jobs at the Corpach Mill, near Fort William in Scotland. The company announced closure of the carbonless paper mill last month, but Amicus and two other unions representing workers at the mill are intent to find a buyer for the 39-year-old mill. In 2003, the British government gave the company a &pound;5 million grant for construction of a new biomass boiler system for energy generation, but ArjoWiggins did not go ahead with the project.

Amicus Seeks to Keep UK Paper Mill Open

CEP members ratified by 95% the master paper-mill collective agreement for eastern Canada with Bowater late last week. The agreement follows one with Abitibi-Consolidated last year, and covers 2,400 paperworkers at five mills. The CEP won an unreduced early retirement provision, and 11% pay increases over five years. &ldquo;With this strong ratification vote, our members have achieved the wage and pension improvements in the pattern agreement, and the company has secured five years of labour stability,&rdquo; said CEP President Brian Payne. It was the first bargain between the CEP and Bowater, a US-based newsprint firm that took over the Canadian mills only a few years ago.

Paperworkers in Canada Ratify Bowater Contract

A gas explosion early today in China has killed three and left 81 missing. The incident occurred at the Shenlong coal mine in Fukang city,Xinjiang province. Last week, two separate mine catastrophes killed 18 in China, and the week prior, a mine explosion killed 19. On 7 July at a licensed mine in Chishan township, Jiangxi province, a flood trapped 15 miners. A day earlier, three miners were killed due to a gas combustion explosion. That accident was at the Wangzifen coal mine in Chifeng city, North China&rsquo;s Inner Mongolia autonomous region. On 2 July, 19 of 24 miners working at the illegal Jiajiabao coal mine in Ningwu county, Shanxi province, died after a gas explosion rocked the mine.

Gas Blast in China Kills 81

Global union-employer agreements are &quot;the best way forward&quot; for the Global Compact advocated by UN Secretary-General Kofi Annan. 
 
That was the message from world union leader Fred Higgs when multinational CEOs, unions and non-governmental organisations met under Annan's chairmanship yesterday at UN headquarters in New York. 

<img height="302" alt="" src="" width="380" />
BOOSTING LABOUR RIGHTS: 
UN Secretary-General Kofi Annan and ICEM General Secretary Fred Higgs. 
First launched by Kofi Annan in Davos last year, the Global Compact aims to ensure respect for labour rights, other human rights and the environment within a globalised economy. 
 
&quot;Organised labour and organised business can best 'embrace and enact' the Global Compact by negotiating global agreements,&quot; Higgs told yesterday's meeting. He is General Secretary of the 20-million-strong International Federation of Chemical, Energy, Mine and General Workers' Unions (ICEM). 
 
Most of the multinationals represented at the New York meeting are in ICEM-organised sectors. Higgs challenged them to reach verifiable global agreements with the ICEM as soon as possible. 
 
&quot;Collective bargaining is one of the rights enshrined in the Compact,&quot; he said, expressing strong support for Annan's initiative. &quot;Collective bargaining could also be the means of securing compliance with all of the Nine Principles upon which the Compact is based.&quot; 
 
Not coincidentally, Higgs pointed out, the focus of the ICEM's current agreements with multinationals is &quot;precisely those labour standards, human rights and environmental responsibilities that are enshrined in the Compact's Nine Principles.&quot; 
 
The ICEM already has such agreements with multinationals Statoil and Freudenberg, Higgs stated, and &quot;we expect to reach similar agreements with a number of other global corporations in the near future.&quot; 
 
Meanwhile, current negotiations with the International Council of Chemical Associations could soon produce &quot;the first-ever global sectoral agreement,&quot; Higgs said. This would ensure ICEM involvement in the monitoring and implementation of the chemical companies' Responsible Care programme, thus helping to achieve &quot;the highest standards of occupational health and safety and of environmental protection&quot; at chemical plants worldwide. 
 
Global corporate or sectoral agreements signed with the ICEM give it &quot;the right to monitor compliance and to raise with the global corporate managements or the sectoral federations any breaches of the agreements,&quot; he emphasised. &quot;This is the crucial difference between global agreements and companies' own internal codes of conduct.&quot; 
 
Global agreements also benefit the companies, Higgs argued, as they &quot;give substance and credibility to corporate ethics.&quot; 

Go to: <a href="http://www.unglobalcompact.org/Portal/Default.asp?">Global Compact Web-site</a>

Bargaining For The Global Compact

Mining giant Rio Tinto has made an offer to settle a long-running dispute at its Mt. Thorley mine in Australia. 
 
The news was announced this morning to a mass rally of striking mineworkers at the three Rio Tinto mines in Australia's Hunter Valley. 
 
The company concession came on the eve of an international trade union action week on Rio Tinto. The action is planned from today onwards in countries ranging from Australia to the USA, South Africa, Chile and Brazil. 
 
Rio Tinto has faced serious industrial disputes across all of its Australian coal mines since it sought to cease bargaining with unions and to push workers on to individual contracts - a process begun in 1993. 
 
The company's offer at Mt. Thorley was made on Friday night, and now has to be put to the union membership. The mining union CFMEU is understood to have recommended acceptance. At the global level, the CFMEU is affiliated to the 20-million-strong International Federation of Chemical, Energy, Mine and General Workers' Unions (ICEM), with which it has been campaigning globally on the Rio Tinto issue. The campaign and the action week will be maintained while the union members take their decision on the Mt. Thorley offer.

Rio Tinto Settlement Bid At Australian Mine

An American union has won a hard-fought election to represent Imerys workers at the company's Sylacauga site in Alabama. Imerys is a leading materials and minerals multinational, and a global trade union campaign played an important part in the election victory. 
 
&quot;We won against all odds by showing our union had real power against this giant global corporation,&quot; said Charles Stevens, an Imerys worker and one of the leaders of the organising committee for the Paper, Allied-Industrial, Chemical and Energy Workers International Union (PACE). The union secured a 205 to 181 victory on 22 June in a secret ballot election to represent 400 workers at the Imerys plant. 
 
Imerys withdrew recognition of the union in June, 1999, after the company acquired English China Clays (ECC) and combined a much larger non-union ECC plant with its unionised Georgia Marble facility just next to it. Imerys claimed the union no longer represented a majority of workers at the combined operation. PACE immediately formed an organising committee, made up initially of union members from Georgia Marble, after the withdrawal of recognition, and started contacting non-union ECC workers. 
 
The victory, according to PACE Organiser Joe Wilson, who led the drive in Sylacauga, was the culmination of a year-long campaign. &quot;Most ECC workers had little knowledge of a union, and the company used brutal scare tactics to keep the workers from talking to union supporters from Georgia Marble,&quot; said Wilson. &quot;Eventually, we broke the spiral of fear by fighting back with a combination of hard work, proven organising methods and a sophisticated 21st century global campaign that overwhelmed the company.&quot; 
 
Key to the organising drive was support received from unions representing Imerys employees in Britain, Belgium and Australia and in France, where the company is headquartered. 
 
PACE produced a video and other publicity material on Imerys' &quot;union-busting&quot; at Sylacauga. A special PACE/ICEM website highlighted the campaign and enabled workers worldwide to communicate with their colleagues in the US. 
 
The union also sent two delegations to meet European trade unionists. One of the delegations included Imerys worker Keith Fulbright from the ECC side of the Sylacauga facility. Fulbright's accounts of Imerys' behaviour prompted European trade union protests to the company. British workers represented by the ICEM-affiliated Transport and General Workers' Union wore 
stickers at some of Imerys' largest plants stating: &quot;Stop Imerys Union Busting in the US.&quot; 
 
The ICEM lobbied Imerys headquarters management directly in Paris, and ICEM General Secretary Fred Higgs travelled from the international's headquarters in Brussels to a union rally in Sylacauga to show international support for the workers there. Higgs also led a march on the plant. 
 
The global campaign against Imerys peaked on 9 May at the Imerys shareholders' meeting in Paris. PACE, the ICEM and Walden Asset Management, a major social investment company, drew the shareholders' attention to Imerys' anti-union practices. 
 
&quot;I believe that PACE and the ICEM have made a little history with this campaign and our victory,&quot; commented PACE President Boyd Young today. 
 
PACE anticipates the start of bargaining soon for a first contract (collective agreement) at Sylacauga. &quot;We hope the company will finally put aside its anti-union attitude and realise that the union and company must work together to make the Sylacauga operation a success,&quot; said PACE Region 5 Vice-President Don Langham. 
 
&quot;This is a great victory for international solidarity,&quot; said ICEM General Secretary Fred Higgs today. &quot;Above all, it is a victory for the courage and perseverance of the Sylacauga workers and their trade union, PACE. We call upon Imerys to honour the workers' decision without delay. In Sylacauga as everywhere else, it is in the company's own best interests to work with the union and to conduct collective bargaining in good faith.&quot;

US Union Wins Imerys Recognition Vote

Materials giant Imerys is using a self-proclaimed &quot;goon squad&quot; to oppose union recognition at one of its US plants. 
 
This is shown by a photo taken yesterday morning at the multinational's Sylacauga site in Alabama. 
 
An election is to be held at Sylacauga on 22 June to decide whether workers there should be represented by the Paper, Allied-Industrial, Chemical &amp; Energy Workers' Union (PACE). 
 
But the US management's tactics are bringing French-based Imerys into serious disrepute. 
 
The new photo features a man carrying the company's anti-union leaflets. He is wearing a teeshirt with &quot;Goon Squad&quot; printed on the back. &quot;Goon&quot; is a slang word for &quot;thug&quot;. 
 
So the teeshirt is an implied threat of physical attack. Goon squads often played a violently anti-union role in past US labour disputes. 
 
PACE reports that some of the company's other leafleters were wearing the same shirts. The union believes that they were provided by Imerys. 
 
This latest union-busting attempt at Sylacauga has been roundly condemned by the 20-million-strong International Federation of Chemical, Energy, Mine and General Workers' Unions (ICEM). PACE is one of the ICEM's American affiliates. 
 
The goon squad photo coincides with the ICEM's receipt of a letter from Imerys CEO Patrick Kron, in which he admits that the company is allowing its Sylacauga management to pursue an anti-union line. 
 
Dated 9 June, Kron's letter is in response to a recent protest from ICEM General Secretary Fred Higgs. 
 
&quot;Local management,&quot; Kron replied, &quot;has said from the beginning that a third party representation is not an advantage for the plant or our employees in Sylacauga and that a direct relationship between management and employees works well at Sylacauga. There is obviously no reason to prohibit the local management to express and explain this view to our employees and no commitment to refrain from doing so has been taken by anyone.&quot; 
 
Kron's words will shock Imerys employees in Europe, where the company has emphasised &quot;social partnership&quot; with unions. But unions in Europe, too, are now questioning the company's two-faced approach to industrial relations. Can it really cuddle up to unions on one side of the Atlantic and use goons on the other? 
 
Higgs had told Kron of three current anti-union activities by the Sylacauga local management: 
 
(a) Supervisors at Sylacauga are wearing &quot;Vote NO&quot; stickers on their hardhats and posting the same stickers around the plant. 
 
(b) The supervisors, sometimes two together, are also taking workers one at a time into offices, telling them that unionisation would mean a loss of wages and benefits, and urging them to vote against the union. 
 
(c) The company is still using the union-busting lawyer Frank Parker to train its local managers. 
 
In response, Kron wrote that the ICEM had been &quot;misinformed&quot; about points (b) and (c). He made no comment on point (a). 
 
Higgs had also urged Kron to &quot;confirm in writing to all workers in Sylacauga what you told your shareholders about the free choice of the workers.&quot; This was a reference to the commitment given by Kron, at last month's annual shareholder meeting in Paris, that the company would not campaign against the union. Both PACE and the ICEM asked questions during the Paris assembly, and discussed Sylacauga with Kron and his colleagues afterwards. 
 
In his reply to Higgs' letter, Kron made no comment on the suggestion that he should write to the Sylacauga workers. 
 
Today, Higgs again wrote to Kron. 
 
Kron had argued that Imerys is &quot;committed to respect the laws in all the countries where we operate and to conduct our industrial relations and business in an ethical manner.&quot; 
 
Higgs' reply: &quot;My experience tells me that a blind reliance on domestic legislation in many countries would certainly not deliver acceptable ethical business behaviour.&quot; 
 
Imerys employees in Europe should view the company's anti-union preference in Sylacauga with concern, Higgs stated - &quot;as I am sure they will when it is brought to their attention.&quot; 
 
And he signed off with the hope that &quot;even at this late stage, you will reflect on the inconsistency in the application of Imerys' declared corporate ethics, by ensuring your US management respect trade unions as legitimate social partners who, as in the European Union, should be welcomed rather than resisted.&quot;

Imerys: &#039;Goon Squad&#039; Photographed At US Site

Materials giant Imerys was today accused of acting in bad faith over an upcoming union recognition vote at one of its US sites. 
 
&quot;Imerys headquarters management in France had assured us that the company would not campaign against the union in the US,&quot; said Fred Higgs in Brussels today. &quot;They have broken their word.&quot; 
<img height="263" src="" width="350" alt="" />
UNDER PRESSURE 
Imerys supervisors are pushing US workers to vote against the union. 
(photo: PACE)&nbsp;
Higgs is General Secretary of the 20-million-strong International Federation of Chemical, Energy, Mine and General Workers' Unions (ICEM). 
 
An election is scheduled for 22 June at Imerys' Sylacauga site in the US, to decide whether workers there should be represented by ICEM American affiliate the Paper, Allied-Industrial, Chemical &amp; Energy Workers' Unions (PACE). 
 
The vote follows a campaign by PACE, the ICEM and unions at other Imerys sites worldwide to secure the Sylacauga workers' right to opt for a union. 
 
Imerys corporate headquarters had promised the ICEM and PACE that the company would not campaign against the union in the run-up to the poll. 
 
On 17 May, local US manager Randy Sandrik sent all Sylacauga employees a note proclaiming the company's &quot;commitment to a fair and prompt election.&quot; 
 
But a little further into the memo, he unveiled his real agenda: &quot;In consideration of the relationship between the company and unions throughout Imerys, we will not campaign against unions in general. The focus of our communications process will only be union representation at Sylacauga.&quot; Sandrik also gave everybody the benefit of his own views: &quot;I don't think the Sylacauga employees need a third party representative to manage our relationship.&quot; 
 
The results of this duplicity are already plain. 
 
Supervisors at Sylacauga are wearing &quot;Vote NO&quot; stickers on their hardhats and posting the same stickers around the plant. 
 
The supervisors, sometimes two together, are also taking workers one at a time into offices, telling them that unionisation would mean a loss of wages and benefits, and urging them to vote against the union. 
 
And the company is still using the union-busting lawyer Frank Parker to train its local managers. 
 
&quot;One thing is clear,&quot; Higgs said today. &quot;Either the Imerys corporate management in Paris is acting in bad faith - or else it is simply being fooled by its US local managers.&quot; 
 
He urged Imerys CEO Patrick Kron to write immediately to all the Sylacauga workers, assuring them of the company's full neutrality on the issue of union representation at its US site. 
 
PACE has now brought a case against Imerys at the OECD, which has a code of conduct for multinational companies.

Imerys in &#039;Bad Faith&#039; Over US Union Vote

Archive

ICEM’s Regional BASF Network Meets in Singapore

Binda Pandey Among Women Nominated for Nobel Peace Prize

Amicus Seeks to Keep UK Paper Mill Open

Paperworkers in Canada Ratify Bowater Contract

Gas Blast in China Kills 81

Bargaining For The Global Compact

Rio Tinto Settlement Bid At Australian Mine

US Union Wins Imerys Recognition Vote

Imerys: 'Goon Squad' Photographed At US Site

Imerys in 'Bad Faith' Over US Union Vote

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