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.

LINWOOD, Pennsylvania-"Business got us again," said one member of Oil, Chemical and Atomic Workers (OCAW) Local 8-234 summing up his view of the concession proposal demanded by Tosco in exchange for rehiring 216 of 320 laid-off union refinery workers here.

Tosco Corp. bought the refinery from British Petroleum Oil Co. in November of last year. OCAW members voted January 4 by a four-to-one margin to reject a contract proposal by Tosco that included ignoring seniority in deciding which union members to rehire. BP agreed to turn the refinery over to Tosco in an idled state, and Tosco has left it "moth-balled" since February 1. After months of refusing to talk, Tosco proposed the recent concession contract just as union members' unemployment benefits ran out.

"It's been bad for everybody. Jobs are very hard to get around here," said Ed Creely, a 52-year-old maintenance worker with 18 years at the refinery.

On August 30 the workers, who had already been notified by Tosco if they were going to be offered jobs or not, came to the union hall to cast their ballots on the contract. It was approved by 93 percent of those voting.

"They stripped our contract apart," said Diane Heller, Recording Secretary of Local 8-234 and a lab worker with 22 years seniority in the refinery. Concessions in the new 5-1/2 year contract include cuts in overtime pay, job combinations, and other language giving the company more flexibility in work rules.

Those who are offered jobs will be paid $500 a month until they are actually called back to work to get the refinery ready for an expected start-up next July. "Those not called back to work will be given $500 a month for 10 months but they must sign a `disclaimer' relieving Tosco of any responsibility," said Heller.

"No one knows how they did the evaluation to call people back," she said. "Some people got called back with 3 years seniority and some didn't with 22 years. Out of 34 women, 12 are being called back."

Beginning in February, OCAW Local 8-234 maintained activities to protest the lockout by Tosco. Union member kept up picket lines until August 23 and sent regular mailings to unions and other organizations. The workers won support and financial assistance from other OCAW locals and many other unions.

Robert McGurk, a worker at the Sun refinery in Marcus Hook, Pennsylvania, said his sister, Kathy Brady, was one of the BP workers not called back by Tosco. He added, "I got some people in my shop to go to the rallies," at the Tosco gate.

"Some people thought they did the wrong thing," voting down Tosco's contract proposal in January, said McGurk. "I think they did the right thing, 100 percent. Íd rather fight a battle and lose it than not fight and lose it - and they fought."

Meat workers fight concessions
PAEROA, New Zealand - "This thing has been a real wake-up call," a worker on the picket line at Lowe Walker's Paeroa plant told the Militant. (The workers can't be named because of a "secrecy" clause in their existing contract which forbids them to talk publicly about "company business.") "We were in the union, but never considered ourselves a staunch shed [plant]. We just concentrated on getting the job done. Then they hit us with this."

The workers, members of Aotearoa Meatworkers Union, have a contract to process beef that runs to the year 2000. But this year, during the off-season for beef, the company wanted them to kill bobby calves under a new contract that did away with seniority rights and other conditions. The workers were given five days to sign or be locked-out. Forty of the 102 at the plant did sign, nearly all recent hires who were told by the company they were still "on trial," the pickets explain.

In addition the company has hired up to 80 new workers, mostly from outside the district where the plant is located. The company has been able to nearly complete the bobby calf season, but early every morning for the past seven weeks the scab workers have had to cross a spirited picket line maintained by the locked-out unionists. "We won't give this company the satisfaction of going back," said one picket.

A number of the workers at the plant are or have been farmers. Lowe Walker, which owns the Paeroa plant, and 11 other North Island meat companies have been accused by the Commerce Commission of fixing prices offered to farmers for stock.

Supporters of the Militant who visited the picket line included Eugen Lepou, who works at the Auckland Abattoirs, also organized by the Aotearoa Meatworkers Union. He is the Communist League's candidate for Auckland Central in the forthcoming general election in New Zealand.

Deborah Liatos, member of Oil, Chemical and Atomic Workers Local 8-1 in Philadelphia, and Terry Coggan, member of the Meat Workers Union in Auckland, contributed to this week's column.  
 
 
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