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<img alt="" src="/sites/default/files/migration/icem/image_aids_ribbon.gif" width="40" height="40"/>
In this issue of the ICEM HIV/AIDS newsletter, we inform about the union action for universal access in the run-up to the G8/G20 summits in Canada and give an overview of the activities planned in sub-Saharan Africa in 2010. 
 
The ICEM Calls on its Affiliates to Contribute to this e-bulletin 
 
ICEM affiliates are engaged in a wide range of HIV/AIDS activities. To spread the information on new agreements, awareness, and prevention campaigns, and educational activities, affiliates and project coordinators are invited to send news and information to <a href="mailto:hiv.aids@icem.org">hiv.aids@icem.org</a>. Any feedback on the format and contents of the e-bulletin is also welcome. 
<img alt="" src="/sites/default/files/migration/icem/image_aids_ribbon.gif" width="40" height="40"/>
G8/G20: Union Action for Universal Access to HIV/AIDS Services 
 
Trade unions in Africa and all over the world have joined forces to lobby the G8 and G20 for the provision of universal access to HIV and AIDS prevention, treatment, care and support. The lobbying is spearheaded by the Canadian Labour Congress (CLC) and the Africa Regional Organisation of the International Trade Union Confederation (ITUC). 
 
National trade union centres in Africa and elsewhere have delivered messages to the Canadian embassies in their country calling on Canadian Prime Minister Stephen Harper to play a leading role in convincing his fellow leaders to take quick and decisive action on HIV and AIDS. As the host country, Canada will preside over the G8 Summit in June and will co-host with South Korea the G20 Summit. 
 
The Global Union AIDS Programme has called on its membership to participate in this global campaign. The ICEM has delivered a letter to the Canadian mission in Geneva strongly urging that the G8 put forward an action plan to achieve its promises regarding universal access and calling on the Summits to support the ILO Decent Work Agenda and its Global Jobs Pact. 
 
It may be recalled that 2010 is the target year for the G8 commitment to achieve universal access to HIV prevention, treatment, care and support made at the 2005 Summit in Gleneagles. The failure to achieve this is evident; not even half of the ten million people who need treatment are actually on it. 

<img alt="" src="/sites/default/files/migration/icem/image_aids_ribbon.gif" width="40" height="40"/>
ICEM HIV/AIDS Project in Sub-Saharan Africa 
 
Planning was completed last month for the HIV/AIDS project in Sub-Saharan Africa with the sponsorship of SASK Finland and FNV Mondiaal of the Netherlands. 
 
Activities in 2010 will include two sub-regional workshops to strengthen the workplace response to HIV and AIDS in Anglophone and Francophone West Africa and in Southern Africa in September and October. A further workshop in May will be exclusively for women from the Southern African sub-region. 
 
At the national level, countries have submitted programmes which put emphasis on campaigns for voluntary counseling and testing (VCT) and include further training of peer educators and counselors. In Guinea (Conakry) and Côte d’Ivoire, training will be completed in new target companies and HIV/AIDS workplace policies are expected to be concluded. VCT campaigns will be initiated in Guinea and continue in Côte d’Ivoire. 
 
Ghana has drawn lessons from the regional workshop in November 2009 and included a VCT campaign and a workshop on collective bargaining in its programme. As a new project country, Mauritius will concentrate its efforts on widespread awareness campaigns at the workplace and address the issue of migrant workers and local and foreign sex workers. 
 
The well-established programme in Nigeria will expand its scope to training women as peer educators. Sierra Leone will draw on trained workers and its collaboration with the National AIDS Secretariat to run VCT campaigns in mining areas. 
 
A well-designed programme in Zambia will deal with peer education, VCT campaigns and collective bargaining issues. Uganda will undertake, among others, a revision of existing collective bargaining agreements to include HIV/AIDS clauses. In Tanzania, workshops will prepare a VCT campaign sponsored by the Women’s Department of the German IGBCE. 

<img alt="" src="/sites/default/files/migration/icem/image_aids_ribbon.gif" width="40" height="40"/>
AIDS a Key Cause of Female Death 
 
HIV and AIDS have become the leading causes of disease and death among women of reproductive age worldwide, UNAIDS said at the launch of a five-year action plan addressing the gender issues which put women at risk. 
 
Nearly 30 years from the beginning of the epidemic, HIV services still do not respond to the specific needs of women and girls. Up to 70% of women worldwide encounter violence. Experiencing violence hampers their ability to negotiate safe sex. 
 
UNAIDS Executive Director Michel Sidibé pointed out that “by robbing women of their dignity we are losing the opportunity to tap half the potential of mankind to achieve the Millennium Development Goals. Women and girls are not victims; they are the driving force that brings about social transformation.” 
 
Of the 33.4 million people living with HIV worldwide, 15.7 million – or almost half – are women. The proportion of women infected with HIV has risen in many regions; in Sub-Saharan Africa, it has reached 60%. In Southern Africa, HIV prevalence among young women aged 15 to 24 years is almost three times higher than among men of the same age group. 
 
(Source: UNAIDS website and BBC News, 3 March) 

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South Africa: Launches Massive HIV Testing Campaign 
 
From 15 April, everyone attending a clinic or hospital in South Africa will be offered an HIV test, regardless of whether they have symptoms of the disease or not. Patients have the option to refuse the test. 
 
Dubbed the HIV Counselling and Testing Campaign, or HCT, this is the most ambitious HIV testing campaign in the world, according to the SA National AIDS Council (SANAC). The target is to have 15 million South Africans tested for HIV by June 2011. 
 
The campaign has four objectives: to increase health-seeking behaviour; to encourage people to know their status; to equip those who test HIV-negative with ways to ensuring that they do not get infected; and to create an entry point to accessing wellness and treatment services for those who test HIV-positive. 
 
(Source: <a href="http://www.health-e.org.za">www.health-e.org.za</a>, 18 March) 
<img alt="" src="/sites/default/files/migration/icem/image_aids_ribbon.gif" width="40" height="40"/>
Malawi: Ambitious Plan to Prolong Life 
 
Malawi’s government announced plans to more than double the number of people receiving antiretroviral (ARV) drugs to half a million by the end of 2010. 
 
The country recently adopted new World Health Organisation guidelines that raise the threshold for starting ARV therapy from a CD4 count (a measure of the immune system strength) of less than 200 to a CD4 count of 350, regardless of whether the patient is displaying symptoms. 
 
Although implementing the changes will be expensive, some experts argue that starting patients on ARVs earlier could actually save money in the long term by reducing the need to treat them for opportunistic infections such as tuberculosis. 
 
Malawi successfully utilised its Global Fund Round 1 grant and was awarded a grant under the rolling continuation channel, which extends funding for six years and which can be used for the expansion of treatment. 
 
(Source: IRIN plusnews, 19 March) 

<img alt="" src="/sites/default/files/migration/icem/image_aids_ribbon.gif" width="40" height="40"/>
Global Funds Seeks $17-20 Billion from Donors for 2011-2013 
 
Mother-to-child HIV transmission may be eliminated by 2015; malaria may be eliminated as a public health problem within a decade; TB prevalence could be halved by 2015. However, these health targets can only be achieved if current rates of scaling up expenditure on the three diseases are maintained and, ideally, further accelerated. And that, in turn, requires donors to give the Global Fund between $17 billion and $20 billion during 2011-2013. 
 
This is what the Global Fund announced in a news release and in several documents released in preparation for upcoming "replenishment" meetings with donors. The Global Fund says that demand for donor support has more than doubled since the last replenishment in 2007 (which raised $10 billion for the period 2008-2010). 
 
An initial replenishment meeting was held on 24-25 March at The Hague, Netherlands. This meeting provided an opportunity for donors to discuss the Fund's financial needs for 2011-2013 and the results achieved by the Global Fund to date. The meeting laid the foundation for the pledging conference that will take place at the UN Headquarters in New York on 4-5 October 2010. 
 
(Source: Global Fund Observer, Issue 117 of 18 March. GFO is a free service of Aidspan, <a href="http://www.aidspan.org">www.aidspan.org</a>; to receive GFO send an email to 
<a href="mailto:receive-gfo-newsletter@aidspan.org">receive-gfo-newsletter@aidspan.org</a>) 
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News from Global Union AIDS Programme 
 
At the meeting of the Steering Committee of the Global Union AIDS Programme (GUAP) in Brussels on 17 March, Jan Eastman was appointed Chair of the Programme. Jan is the Deputy General Secretary of Education International (EI), a Global Union Federation. She took over from Alan Leather who had been the Chair since the inception of the Programme. 
 
The Steering Committee reviewed its activities, received reports from Global Unions, and charted its input for major campaigns and events in 2010, such as ILO’s International Labour Conference in June, with the second discussion of a new instrument on HIV/AIDS and the world of work, and the International AIDS Conference in Vienna in July. 
<img alt="" src="/sites/default/files/migration/icem/image_aids_ribbon.gif" width="40" height="40"/>
This ICEM HIV-AIDS Newsletter – How to Subscribe 
 
To subscribe to the e-bulletin, send an email to <a href="mailto:press@icem.org">press@icem.org</a>. Please put “subscribe ICEM HIV/AIDS e-bulletin” in the subject line.

ICEM HIV/AIDS e-bulletin - No. 55, April 2010

Tonight at 18h00 European time, the Swedish Paperworkers Union (Svenska Pappers) begins job actions at 62 pulp and paper mills over a national collective agreement in Sweden still not in place. 
 
The union needs your support and messages of solidarity and they need it now. Please send, in your own words, a note of encouragement, in your own language, to Mikke Sterbeck at <a href="mailto:mikke.sterbeck.fk@pappers.se">mikke.sterbeck.fk@pappers.se</a>. 
 
The union has told the ICEM that all messages will get to the local branch unions. Not only that, but Pappers tells the ICEM that such messages already received to date have greatly buoyed the rank-and-file, 18,000 union members at some ten pulp and paper companies. 
 
The industrial actions that begin tonight, 12 April, include a ban on all overtime and a plant blockade on contract and agency workers from coming into any mill to perform work. If no resolution comes by this Friday, 16 April, the union will begin selective strikes at six mills: Billerud Skarblacka (a kraft sulphate pulp mill that makes packaging and kraft papers, including flute papers); Holmen Braviken (a mechanical pulp mill that makes newsprint, and printing and writing papers); the Holmen Iggesund mill in Korsnas (a kraft sulphate pulp mill that produces boxbard/cartonboard); Stora Enso’s Skoghall Mill (a kraft, sulphate pulp mill making containerboard, boxboard, and white-top, mottled paperboard; SCA Packaging in Munksund (a kraft sulphate pulp mill making containerboard and kraft linerboard; and Sodra Cell Varo (a pulp mill). 
 
The bargaining situation is this: the union and Employers’ Industry Association (SFIF) met until 20h on Saturday night, 10 April. A three-panel paper industry mediation board submitted a proposal, but Pappers rejected it, while employers approved it. The proposal fell short of the union’s wage demands. It was for 22 months, with a 0.9% increase proposed for 1 June 2010, and 2.1% effective June 1, 2011. The contract expiration was 31 March 2010, and Pappers is insistent that a wage increase above Swedish cost-of-living take effect on 1 April 2010. The cost-of-living in Sweden for first quarter 2010 exceeds 1%, and Swedish paperworkers should not have to accept anything less. Other issues unresolved are aspects to retiree pension scheme, and the fact that employers are not willing to adjust upward the salaries of the lowest paid workers. Employers are also unwilling to give Pappers the same language regarding use of short-term contract workers and workers coming through labour agencies that other employers in other Swedish work sectors have given unions. 
 
Representatives of the employers’ association were to meet today amongst themselves, with the strategy to impose lockouts on Pappers members at certain mills. That meeting was postponed, perhaps because public opinion in Sweden is clearly on the side of the union. The union will now go ahead with the overtime ban and the blockade on contract and agency workers. They have also written to the employers’ today and requested that bargaining resume on Tuesday, 13 April, in the offices of Pappers, an unprecedented venue. 
 
It is very clear that the momentum in this contract dispute is with the union. But please write a short message to Svenska Pappers c/o <a href="mailto:mikke.sterbeck.fk@pappers.se">mikke.sterbeck.fk@pappers.se</a> and express that notion, and that your union is with them in this critical week. Again, these messages will get to local branches and make them even stronger than they are today!

Urgent Action Needed: Swedish Paperworkers/Appel à l'aide d'urgence: Travailleurs du secteur pâte et

<img alt="" src="/sites/default/files/migration/icem/InBrief100.jpg" width="100" height="39"/>
ICEM energy and mining affiliates in West Africa set ambitious priorities and work commitments in Dakar, Senegal, on 7-8 April. In workshops sponsored by the Friedrich-Ebert Foundation (FES) of Germany, unions of the region focused on specific growth strategies, the increasing threat of use of casual labour by multinational enterprises, and the necessity of West African nations to ratify ILO Convention 176, the Health and Safety in Mines Convention. 
 
Representatives from 13 trade unions in 11 countries participated in the two-day forum. The workshops were unique in that individual unions stepped forward and pledged to lead cross-union efforts in specific areas. 
 
"The entire resolve coming from the workshops underpins the commitment by ICEM West African affiliates to build strong and democratic unions in which to challenge multinational companies," said ICEM Sub-Saharan Representative Fabian Nkomo. "We have committed to challenge the exploitation of workers that leaves both communities and countries very poor. 

<img alt="" src="/sites/default/files/migration/icem/Fabian.Nkomo.jpg" width="110" height="153"/>
Fabian Nkomo
"It is a commitment to help democratic countries improve the lives of ordinary people, but also a challenge to non-democratic governments to democratise," added Nkomo. "In short, it is a call for better lives for all citizens in West African countries." 
 
All ICEM trade union affiliates of the region will consolidate their three- and four-year plans on growth strategies with each other. Those plans will center on leadership accountability to trade union members, and ownership of trade union structures by rank-and-file members. 
 
With West Africa fast becoming a hub of upstream oil and gas production, the Nigerian trade unions, NUPENG and PENGASSAN, took on responsibility to lead a campaign against casualisation, or the growing use of Contract and Agency Labour (CAL). The two unions will lead a mobilisation to build formidable trade unions in oil- and gas-producing nations of West Africa. 

<img alt="" src="/sites/default/files/migration/icem/CAL_en.jpg" width="146" height="66"/>
The Ghana Mine Workers' Union (GMWU) will lead the push for adoption of ILO Convention 176 in West African nations, as well as to develop and mobilise a cross-region campaign toward that end. 
 
A further commitment was made by participating trade unions to propose a Social Charter to the Economic Community of West African States (ECOWAS). That charter will specifically include adherence to all core ILO labour standards. ICEM Sub-Saharan African CAL Coordinator Joseph Toe and Ayikoue Teve of CSTT in Togo will head that effort. 
 
Finally, West African trade unions promised to spread training and education activities throughout their unions, and not to limit such opportunities only to individual leaders. 
 
The ICEM is grateful to FES for sponsoring the workshops; a forum that ICEM believes can be a turning point in trade union development in West Africa.

West African ICEM Unions Formulate Specific Goals in FES Workshops

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The ICEM-affiliated Italian Chemical, Energy and Manufacturing Workers’ Union, FILCEM-CGIL, has merged with the Italian Textile Workers’ Union, FILTEA-CGIL, to establish the new union FILCTEM-CGIL (Chemical, Textile, Energy and Manufacturing Workers’ Union). The official creation of the new union occurred at its Founding Congress, held on 7-9 April 2010, in the city of Pesaro. 
 
Representing over 250,000 members, the newly-created FILCTEM has 28 national collective agreements, covering more than 1,300,000 employees, in Italy, in chemicals and pharmaceuticals, textiles and clothing and footwear, rubber, plastics, glass, leather tanning, ceramics and tiles, energy (oil, gas transport, mining) and utilities (electricity, water, gas). 
 
FILCTEM-CGIL is affiliated to the ICEM, PSI and ITGLWF at the global level, as well as to EMCEF, EPSU and ETUF:TCL at the European level. 
 
The Founding Congress, held under the slogan “Founded in the Workplace”, was attended by around 800 delegates and guests. International participants were ICEM’s Kemal Özkan, Chemical and Rubber Industries Officer, ITGLWF and ETUF:TCL’s Patrick Itschert, General Secretary, EMCEF’s Reinhard Reibsch, General Secretary, and EPSU’s Jan Willem Goudriaan, Deputy General Secretary. 

<img src="/sites/default/files/migration/icem/1004.Filctem.Morselli.png" width="199" height="153" alt=""/>
Alberto Morselli
Alberto Morselli, General Secretary of the new organisation, opened the Congress, and outlined priorities for the upcoming period as increasing employee participation, workers’ rights beyond the crisis, constitutional transparency and legality, government’s policies on production and employment, energy efficiency, and renewable resources for the future. General Secretary Morselli emphasised the importance of unity and strength in light of a continued attack on workers’ rights. He declared that the new FILCTEM will struggle for change. 
 
Other Italian unions, FEMCA-CISL, FLAI-CISL, UILCEM-UIL, and UILTA-UIL participated in the Congress, and will work together with FILCTEM. 
 
The second day of the Congress was marked by a round table discussion entitled “Industrial Innovation for Developing Employment and Overcoming the Crisis”. Chaired by Alberto Morselli, the round-table was attended by Guglielmo Epifani, General Secretary of CGIL, Giorgio Squinzi, President of Federchimica (chemical employers’ organisation), Michele Tronconi, President of Sistema Moda Italia (textile employers’ organisation) and Giuliano Zuccoli, President of Assoelettrica (electricity employers’ organisation). There were also a number of high level representatives of large companies such ENI and ENEL. 
 
The Congress appointed Valeria Fedeli as Vice-General Secretary. She had been General Secretary of FILTEA-CGIL and continues as President of ETUF:TCL.

Italian Merger Congress Creates New Union FILCTEM-CGIL

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The latest meeting of the Asia-Pacific Electric Power Industry Network took place in Seoul, South Korea, 5-6 April, 2010. Hosted by President Kim, Joo-young, of the ICEM-affiliated Korean National Energy Workers Union (KNEWU) the meeting brought together over 20 delegates from ICEM affiliated trade unions representing workers in the Electric Power Industry from, Japan, Korea, Malaysia, Mongolia, Taiwan (Chinese Taipei) and Thailand as well as observer delegations from both the People's Republic of China and Vietnam. The Network meeting, which has now become an annual event, was supported by FES. 
 
After an opening session which included welcome speeches from the Director of the local FES office, Dr. Kamppeter and President Kim, the meeting unanimously elected, Seiichi Taneoka, the new President of the Japan Electric Power Confederation (Denryoku-Soren) as Chairperson of the Network. Denryoku-Soren has been an essential supporter of the Network since its foundation. 

<img src="/sites/default/files/migration/icem/1004.korea.electric.jpg" width="323" height="211" alt=""/>
ICEM Energy Officer, Jim Catterson, gave a detailed overview of the industry globally and recent ICEM work, and following presentations on the Korean Labour situation from a representative of the Ministry of Labour, together with an introduction on Electric power in Korea by a representative of the national electric power company, Kepco, delegates shared information on their own national situations with the discussions on the first day focussed on the industry and sustainable development. All delegations made detailed reports which supplemented written reports and the results of a questionnaire which had been circulated in advance of the meeting. 
 
Delegates were particularly interested to hear the reports from Ms. Zhang Mengmeng, the head of the delegation, from the Peoples Republic of China and Vice-Chairperson of the National Committee of the Chinese Energy and Chemical Workers' Union (ACFTU) and that of Brother. Tran Van Ngoc, President of the National Electricity Union, (VGCL) Vietnam. Both presentations emphasised their organisations wishes to work more closely with ICEM in the future in this globalised industry. 
 
Delegates left the conference room for proceedings on the second day to see the industry and trade union organisation at first hand in Seoul. The day's activities began with a meeting with the President of the KNEWU Seoul branch, Brother Kap-Soo Kang, who after a presentation on the history of the union branch and its present activities showed delegates the control room from which all electric power provision to Central and Southern Seoul was coordinated. After a question and answer session, delegates then visited a nearby centre of the Distribution Automation System (DAS) of KEPCO. DAS utilises recent advances in Information Technology and is an integrated control system operating the entire electric distribution system. It allows the distribution control center to remotely monitor and operate the automated switch on the distribution lines, that detect fault locations, and automatically collect operation data. A training simulator was shown to the delegation and a simulated major fault demonstrated. 
 
A detailed report on the meetings, together with an overview of the conclusions will be prepared and, together with the various national reports, loaded to the ICEM website. Delegates resolved that the 2011 meeting will take place in Thailand, hosted by our affiliate there EGAT-LU. ICEM staff attending the meeting were Jim Catterson, Energy Officer, Phee, Jungsun, Asia Pacific Regional Contact Person and locally based project coordinator, Yoon, Hyowon.

ICEM Asia-Pacific Electric Power Industry Network Meeting

<img alt="" src="/sites/default/files/migration/icem/USAUWUA.gif" width="100" height="100"/>
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 last week. 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; 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. 
 
And on top of that, comes the three-year pay, bonus, and other union protection items took effect 14 April 2010. 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 handling hazardous materials, and limits on sub-contracting.
<img alt="" src="/sites/default/files/migration/icem/0810Mike LangfordPrezUWUA.jpg" width="200" height="133"/>
UWUA President D. Michael Langford 
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.”

US Affiliate UWUA Achieves Exceptional First Contract with Covanta

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Turkish public sector employees have legally had the right to organise and form their own unions since 2001, as stipulated by the Public Employees' Trade Unions Act No. 4688. Although the law recognizes the right to organise, there are numerous groups of employees who are excluded, lawyers, civil servants at the Ministry of Defence and Turkish Armed Forces, employees at penal institutions, special security personnel, public employees "in positions of trust", presidents of universities, and directors of high schools. 
 
In terms of negotiating and taking strike action, these workers have no rights at all. Act 4688 allows for “collective consultative talks” for the negotiating of working conditions with government, it is then the government that makes the final decision on salaries, allowances, compensation, and bonuses. Likewise, there is still no formally recognised right to strike for public employees. This clearly is not in line with core ILO Convention 98. The International Labour Organisation repeatedly criticises this and urges the Turkish Government to make necessary modifications to the Act. 

<img alt="" src="/sites/default/files/migration/icem/0911.KESK.strike.2.png" width="205" height="133"/>
Centre Sami Evren, President of KESK, right Bircan Akyıldız, President of Türkiye Kamu-Sen
The collective consultative talks have proved inadequate in achieving the deserved working conditions for public sector employees, two major Turkish trade union confederations, Türkiye Kamu-Sen and KESK, have decided to take joint strike action on 25 November to urge the government to change the law and recognise the right to bargain and strike. On that day, both confederations report, aircrafts, trains and ships will not work, education will not be done, taxes will not be collected, “all the public services will be stopped”. 
 
The President of Türkiye Kamu-Sen Bircan Akyıldız stated that eight years of commitment to collective consultative talks have produced nothing for workers. “The strike on 25 November will not just be done on behalf of Kamu-Sen and KESK, but also for defending the rights of all public emloyees”, he added. The President of KESK, Sami Evren, stated that the parties have never bargained from equal positions during the collective consultative talks, leading to the Government ignoring the demands of public employees. “We have exhausted all internal judicial possibilities, and then applied to the European Human Rights Court, which ruled that Turkish public employees should have the right to bargain collectively”, he added. 

<img alt="" src="/sites/default/files/migration/icem/0911.KESK.strike.3.png" width="350" height="74"/>
The ICEM has affiliates from both confederations and fully supports the strike on 25 November, in line with the decision of the ICEM Turkish Coordinating Committee, which met on 2 November in Izmir. In his letter to the Presidents of Türkiye Kamu-Sen and KESK, ICEM General Secretary Manfred Warda has conveyed the solidarity of the whole ICEM family to the Turkish public employees in their struggle for bargaining and striking rights. “We cordially convey to you our deepest sympathy and solidarity for your rights which are guaranteed by international conventions that have been ratified by Turkey. It is our firm belief that your struggle, fought since the 1990s, for empowered unions with all rights, will be successful. The joint strike on 25 November is a clear signal for this. The ICEM has been and will always stand shoulder-to-shoulder with you in this honourable and rightful fight”.

Turkish Public Employees to Stop Work on 25 November Calling for Right to Bargain, Strike

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The Third Congress of Sindicato Nacional dos Papeleiros (SINAP), the ICEM pulp and paper union affiliate that is part of CNQ/CUT in Brazil, made great strides on gender equity over the weekend, including passage of a host of resolutions that clearly marks this union as the trend-setter in Latin America regarding involvement of women in all aspects of national and local branch work. 
 
Some 132 delegates from 20 local branches attended the benchmarking Congress, held in São Sebastião, São Paulo state, from 26-29 November. The Congress also saw a changing of the guard, with SINAP founder and President Iduigues Martins stepping down due to term limits and bring replaced by Carlos Monteiro, SINAP’s international officer who has led a union branch in Bahia state. 

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New SINAP President Carlos Monteiro speaks to Congress. At right, Outgoing President Iduigues Martins 
Martins has provided the union with steady and reliable leadership for the better part of ten years, growing the union with assistance from pulp and paper unions in Canada, Sweden, and Finland. He will remain on the Executive Committee of the union. 
 
The Congress elected “Caco” Claudecir Lopes Vargas to serve as Vice President. He is from the local branch of SINAP workers at Otacilio Costa in Santa Catalina state. 
 
But the story of the Congress was the progressive corner turned mandating enhanced and immediate gender equity inside the union. The Congress passed no fewer than seven resolutions mandating such, including one motion that called for SINAP to strive for at least 30% women involvement in all structures, both national and local branches. 

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Women's rights Won the Day 
The Congress created a national gender committee, to be composed of one woman from each of the SINAP’s 20 branches. A resolution was enacted mandating that women would serve on local branch bargaining committees. 
 
Another called for a fight for more community maternity centres and day-care facilities for children. And yet another called on the publication of a gender primer for use inside SINAP, as well changes in all union print and statutory materials to make then gender neutral. 
 
Of further significance, and again a milestone for any Latin-based trade union, the committee’s name that brought forward these motions was called the “Gender and LGBT Committee,” or lesbian, gay, bi-sexual and trans-sexual. 

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Finnish Paperiliitto President Jouko Ahonen 
Perhaps the most emotionally debated resolution came on the Congress’s final day, yesterday, 29 November. That was a motion for SINAP not to endorse racial quotas in Brazilian society. The motion was narrowly defeated, thus putting the union firmly on record in support of racial equality in Brazil. 
 
The SINAP Congress also moved to create a minimum national wage for paperworkers in the country. 
 
SINAP’s Third Congress was attended by several international guests, who pledged their continued support and solidarity, including Jouko Ahonen, President of Paperiliitto of Finland and chairman of ICEM’s Pulp and Paper Sector; Dave Coles, President of the Canadian Communications, Energy, and Paperworkers (CEP) Union, and Joe Gargiso, Administrative Vice President of CEP from Quebec; Walter Silva, President of the CUOPyC Pulp and Paper Federation of Uruguay; Patrick Bauret of French CGT-FILPAC; and Mikke Sterbeck of Pappers Union in Sweden.

SINAP Congress in Brazil Charts New Path with Gender Initiatives

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Through a series of meetings in Sao Paulo, Brazil, from 21 to 24 November, ICEM affiliated unions in Brazil explored the possibilities of engaging in (much) more social dialogue in their country. The meetings came at the end of a sequence of activities, organised this year as part of the ICEM Brazilian social dialogue project, which is funded by SASK Finland and LO-TCO Sweden, and supported, including through active participation in the meetings last week, by ICEM affiliates in these countries (IFMetall and Pappers from Sweden, and Kemianliitto and Toimihenkilöunioni from Finland). 

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As a way of dealing with labour relations, social dialogue is not very well developed at all in the ICEM sectors in Brazil, and even that may be an understatement. That said, going over the potential advantages of having a regular union-company dialogue outside of the bargaining period, all participants, including from the employers’ side (with employer representatives present from Petrobras, Braskem and Akzo Nobel), voiced support for the initiative to be explored further. Currently, in the often rather confrontational Brazilian union-employer relations, unions and companies tend to only schedule discussions at the time of the yearly collective bargaining negotiation sessions. 
 
During the one-day joint employers-unions conference on 23 November, where “sustainable development” was the leading theme, there was general agreement that it would be to the advantage of both parties to sit down around the table on a regular basis and discuss specific issues. These “social dialogue topics” would, certainly in the earlier phases of the dialogue processes, mainly include the lesser antagonistic priorities, i.e. those where both employers and unions would have a similar interest, ranging from such issues as health and safety or sustainability over the problems of young or women workers to the issue of social dialogue itself. At the same time, all parties also agreed that it may take a bit of time before there is enough trust for this dialogue to deliver spectacular results. 
 
One particular suggestion that is going to be followed up on by the unions in Brazil is to see if more companies - many of whom did show an interest, but were not present at the meeting for various reasons - can be brought into a regular dialogue via existing Brazilian employers’ organisations. 

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Elias Pintado and Sergio Novais
Sergio Novais, ICEM Vice-President for Latin America, ran the meeting, together with Elias Pintado, Coordinator of the Brazil Social Dialogue project.

Promising Potential for Social Dialogue in Brazil

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ICEM led a workshop for women from ICEM affiliates in Erbil, Iraq, from 17 to 19 November. The workshop was supported entirely by the US Solidarity Center. Hashmeya Muhssin from the Basra Electricity Workers’ Union and ICEM Executive Member was instrumental in organizing the meeting. The women who participated in the meeting were all highly educated. 

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The meeting focused on violence issues, since that was felt to be the most crucial issue facing women today in Iraq. Self-esteem is one critical area in building women’s confidence to participate in trade unions. Women need to build their self-esteem and confidence in order to become better leaders. Violence in all its forms was condemned – violence against women is not cultural. It is criminal. The women acted out role plays on violence in the family, at work, and in society. Women in armed conflict is another issue that has to be looked at, as women bear arms and are victims of those bearing arms. The women brought examples of Iraqi women role models that they admire. These included Dr Naziha Al-Dulaimy who was the first government minister in the Middle East in the 50’s. When it is said that Iraqi women are not participating recently as much as they used to, the explanation can be found in the Iraq-Iran war and the sanctions imposed on the country until 2003, followed by war since then. The problem is that without security, women cannot prosper. It was agreed that women need to go out to work in order to be financially independent and to take their own decisions. 
 
Examples were given of women’s organizations, in particular Kurdish women’s associations, who fight for legal reforms, provide shelter for the homeless and threatened, train the jobless and help the poor and ill. 
 
Hashmeya has been standing up for women as well as for men in Basra and is working to launch a campaign for social security. A lot of work still needs to be done to clean up the remains from the Iran-Iraq war, as well as provide environmental and community sanitation. This work will continue in connection with the elections scheduled in Iraq for 2010. 
 
The women left the meeting feeling empowered. “A bird cannot fly with one wing.”

ICEM Iraqi Women's Workshop Meets in Erbil

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