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.
PEKIN, Illinois - At shift change February 15, the strikebreakers at Tazewell Machine Works here were greeted by 75 -100 union members chanting "Union, union, union," and "We want Justice." This was the second rally to be organized in front of the plant within two weeks.
Members of United Auto Workers (UAW) Local 2283 have been on strike since October 5 at Tazewell, which makes parts for Caterpillar. Members and retirees from UAW Local 974, which organizes Caterpillar workers in East Peoria, have been among the strongest supporters of the strike. UAW Local 974 had organized a chili supper fund-raiser for the strike the previous week. More than 400 union members from 20 different unions in central Illinois attended.
Five strikers from Lenc-Smith in Cicero, Illinois, traveled almost three hours to be part of the February 15 picket line. Another big group of union members came from the Pekin power plant where they do contract work. They are in many different unions and have been supporting the Tazewell strike with collections on the job.
Earl Ferguson, a member of Pipefitters Local 178, said, "If they can do it to them, they can do it to us. I remember in the early '80s when I was working at Chrysler outside of St. Louis, they cut our wages. We were supposed to help get Chrysler back on their feet." Chrysler workers "still haven't got it back," he added.
Dozens of members of IBEW Local 34, electricians working at the Pekin power plant, also came. Brian Perry, 27, said, "We heard about it from our union steward that morning at a safety meeting and decided to come." He said his father is on strike against Inco Alloys in Huntington, West Virginia.
After the shift change, Henry Cakora, the owner of Tazewell Machine Works, came out to thank the Pekin cops who were out in force to escort the strikebreakers.
Chad Hartley, president of the striking local, thanked union supporters for coming, and told them to come back again March 1 from 4:00 p.m. to 6:00 p.m.
Auto workers in France confront `flex-timé plans
PARIS - "For a 35-hour, five-day work week, including the
coffee breaks" and "No to flexible work hours, No to
annualized work time," were the demands as 700-800 workers
walked off the morning shift January 28 at Peugeot's Sochaux
plant in eastern France.
At almost the same moment, workers at Peugeot's Poissy plant near Paris opened their monthly pay slips to discover that the normal reference to a wage "based on a 169-hour work month" had disappeared. Animated discussions led to spontaneous work stoppages blocking the motor assembly line for two hours.
Company representatives were unable to convince workers that the change in the pay slips was of no importance. In Poissy's press shop, Hamid Chliah said, "You don't have to have gone to school to know that they don't change the pay slips for no reason." Work stoppages continued in both factories the next day.
An agreement at Peugeot had been announced with great fanfare as the first major private company in France adopts the 35-hour work week and hires unemployed workers in the framework of a new government law. All unions at Peugeot except the CGT initially said they would sign the agreement. But Peugeot workers, by determined action including spontaneous work stoppages, forced union officials to renounce the agreement. In the end, even the company union at Peugeot, the CSL, refused to sign.
Since his election in 1997, Socialist Party premier Lionel Jospin has promised to reduce unemployment by lowering the working week from 39 to 35 hours. But the 35-hour work week law voted in June 1998 encouraged local negotiations that granted major concessions to the bosses, particularly allowing the 35-hour week to be considered as an annual average rather than as a fixed weekly schedule. In the proposed Peugeot agreement, the workweek could have been varied from three to six days at the bosses' discretion. Up to 23 Saturdays could have been imposed a year and not paid as overtime unless the annual average workweek was more than 35 hours.
In addition, Peugeot announced that the 22 minutes a day of coffee break would no longer be considered as "work time," although it would still be paid. This meant that Peugeot would only have to reduce "real work time" by one hour and 40 minutes to be in agreement with the 35-hour workweek law. Peugeot has promised to hire an additional 1,500 young people, but workers point out that increased auto sales would have forced some hiring anyway.
Negotiations on a similar plan are under way at Renault. In Renault's auto parts plant in the Paris suburb of Choisy-le- roi, workers have already defeated a company attempt to renew an annual plant agreement on flexible work time.
Opposition has been vociferously led by young workers on the motor assembly line. Many of them had previously worked as "temps," known as interimaires in France, working on temporary contracts for outside labor contractors like Manpower. At the Choisy plant, 13 percent of the workers last year were interimaires but only five young workers were hired on permanent Renault contracts during the year. Many of the younger Renault workers who had previously supported the flexible work hours agreement now argue that it gives Renault leverage to avoid to hiring the interimaires.
Boston transit workers: `No contracting out jobs'
BOSTON - About 200 members of the Transport Workers Union
(TWU) and several other railroad craft unions made their mark
on a ceremony of the centennial of Boston's South Station
January 19. Amid a bustling lunch-hour crowd the unionists
chanted above State Transportation Secretary Kevin Sullivan
and the Lieutenant Governor Jane Swift, "We want our jobs!"
and "What are you hiding? Tell us the truth!"
The "truth" the trade unionists want is about deals they suspect are being made behind the back of the TWU by the Massachusetts Bay Transportation Authority (MBTA) to award a new contract for mechanical services at the commuter rail that contains massive job cuts. The union is calling for public hearings on this issue. There have been rumored threats by MBTA management for years to "outsource" the work of the mechanical department when the current contract expires. Amtrak has been contracted to run the service as a whole since 1987, and the 700 mechanics, mechanical helpers, and car cleaners affected are members of TWU Local 2054 together with the Amtrak Northeast Corridor mechanical workers.
The daily Boston Herald and Boston Globe both gave prominent coverage to the protest with an antiunion bent, including an editorial in the January 21 Herald editorial saying that the mechanics' noontime protest indicated, "They are not a very good deal for taxpayers."
The possible outsourcing deal has led to a lot of discussion among rail workers here. Working people are told to expect fewer of the socially necessary services like public transportation, and to pay more for it because, as the big business government argument goes, transportation must increase its profitability, or in Amtrak's case become "self- financing" by 2002. One car mechanic on the MBTA, Richie Poteau, said what is posed is "...a big challenge - to fight the MBTA with all the workers so divided into separate unions."
If the MBTA plan goes into affect, one Amtrak worker who did not want his name used pointed out, layoffs would displace many women and Blacks who are now car cleaners and in the TWU, most of whom have been hired in the last five years.
Ontario hotel strikers protest cop harassment
CHATHAM, Ontario - The 250 strikers at Wheels Inn here
took their battle against police harassment to the local
government on January 25. The workers got hundreds of
signatures on a petition citing "numerous unnecessary police
calls and police intervention on the picket line," where
"several CAW [Canadian Auto Workers] members have been
arrested for merely walking on the picket line . . .and the
picket line has been overwhelmingly lawful and without major
disturbance."
They asked that the "mayor and elected councilors of the municipality of Chatham-Kent demand that police be instructed to allow lawful picketing without interference; and further ask that all assaults against CAW members, including vehicles striking persons on the picket line, be investigated promptly and appropriate charges laid."
Picket captain Andrew Binga reported that 70 workers showed up for the city council meeting, with the prior understanding that a vote would be taken on hearing their plea. Chatham city council regulations stipulate that labor disputes are not to be discussed. Two and a half hours into the meeting, the city council members still had not voted on their request. The strikers learned that a secret vote was taken before the meeting against putting them on the agenda. The strikers walked out in disgust.
"They think it's a big joke.... I thought the city council was there to take care of the city. I found out otherwise. This issue is tearing the city apart," Binga said. Workers intend to press their fight. At least 27 people have been arrested so far.
Alyson Kennedy in Pekin, Illinois; Jacques Salfati and Nat London, members of the CGT near Paris; Linda Marcus, a member of United Transportation Union Local 1462 in Boston; and Marty Ressler and Bill Schmitt in Detroit contributed to this column.