This column is devoted to reporting the resistance by working people to the employers' assault on their living standards, working conditions, and unions.

We invite you to contribute short items to this column as a way for other fighting workers around the world to read about and learn from these important struggles. Jot down a few lines about what is happening in your union, at your workplace, or other workplaces in your area, including interesting political discussions.

Hospital Workers Rally For A Decent Contract
Chanting, "No contract, no work!" 1,000 members of District 1199C of the hospital employees union demonstrated May 10 outside Children's Hospital of Pennsylvania in Philadelphia. After three sessions at the bargaining table the hospital is still stalling negotiations on a new contract. The hospital administration is threatening to cut workers' pensions and refusing to adopt a retraining program that the union has won at other city hospitals.

"The hospital has been using sick children to gain the public's sympathy against the workers," a hospital employee told the Militant.

"They have all kinds of machines to operate on little babies; now it's the workers out here getting operated on," a union spokesperson told the crowd.

The rally showed that the unionists are ready to fight and that they are not alone. Gerald McEntee of the international union urged workers at other hospitals to be prepared to adopt a striker if no agreement is reached by July 1, when the current contract expires. Harry Lombardo, president of Transport Workers Union Local 234, returned solidarity given during his union's recent strike. Joe Rausch, president of the Philadelphia AFL-CIO Labor Council, also offered support.

Mushroom workers fight for union recognition
Workers in Kennett Square, Pennsylvania, are continuing the struggle to win recognition for their union at Kaolin Mushroom Farms. With more than $30 million in annual sales, Kaolin Mushroom Farms is the country's fifth-largest mushroom producer.

On April 11, the Pennsylvania Labor Relations Board (PLRB) finally issued its ruling on a disputed union recognition election won by the Kaolin Workers Union by a vote of 124-102 on May 27, 1993. That vote took place after a 30-day strike during which the mainly Mexican workers won support from area unions and the Philadelphia Central Labor Council. With the help of churches and organizations in the Asian community, the farm workers also parried an attempt to continue production with Cambodian and Vietnamese replacement workers.

The PLRB ruling was contradictory. On the one hand it ordered a new election. The board said the union victory was tainted by improper supervision and inadequate Spanish translation at the polls. On the other hand, the board found that Kaolin Mushroom Farms violated fair labor practices by firing 11 workers during the strike. The board ordered that the 11 be reinstated with back pay.

"The decision was half and half, but more of a triumph for us," Luis Tlaseca, one of the fired workers and a leader of the union organizing effort, said. The union announced it is challenging the order for a new election at an April 20 news conference attended by some 35 workers.

"It was a clean election and the decision of the workers should be respected," Tlaseca insists. Union attorney Arthur Read believes the board's order for a new election has a good chance of being reversed on appeal.

State labor law does not require verbal translation during a union election, only that the ballots be presented in the appropriate languages. In this case they were. The charge of improper supervision applies to one incident in the first five minutes of voting. The incident could not have affected the union's margin of victory, especially if the votes of the 11 reinstated workers were to be taken into account.

Tlaseca says a new election at this point would stack things in favor of the boss. "He has put considerable pressure on the many new workers he has hired since the strike, implying that known union supporters could not be assured they would still have jobs after returning from visits with their families in Mexico.

"Kaolin has also increased pay by 5 cents per basket [of 16 pounds] each year since the strike. Meanwhile, he's gotten an injunction prohibiting leaders of the Kaolin Workers Union from going near the plant and appealed the PLRB order that myself and other union supporters be reinstated with back pay."

Tlaseca is eager for a chance to return to his job, but said, "We plan to continue our struggle to organize our union for the workers any way we can."

Contributors to this week's column include: Erin Forbes, a Temple University student and member of the Young Socialists, and Pete Seidman in Philadelphia.  
 
 
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