Vol. 76/No. 7      February 20, 2012

Vale, based in Brazil, is the second-biggest mining company in the world.

Last June two miners were buried under a run of muck at its Stobie mine near Sudbury. In October, a miner was killed while operating a scoop tram at the Thompson, Manitoba, operation.

The Coleman, Stobie and Thompson mines are organized by the United Steelworkers.

Vale officials temporarily closed all five of the company’s Sudbury-area mines following Perry’s death. The miners will receive their basic pay during the shutdown. As of Feb. 6 some miners had begun returning to work, although production remained suspended.

Miners who spoke to the Militant pointed to Vale’s drive to increase production and profits as the underlying cause of high death and injury rates.

“We are being pushed to do more production,” said smelter worker Paul Theriault. “There used to be eight guys per level and now there are only six and we are doing the same amount of production and more. So we have fewer guys working harder. Since the strike they have been pushing us.”

Steelworkers Local 6500 fought an almost year-long strike in 2009-2010 against concession demands, a number of which were imposed on the workers at the end of the walkout. At the time of the strike there were 3,300 production and maintenance workers. Now there are 2,600.

“We are angry at the company,” said miner Tim Levesque, who has been working at the Coleman mine for eight years and knew Perry. “When we came back from the strike the company eliminated some safety regulations. Before, we could directly file our ‘079 reports’ on safety concerns. Now we have to do it through the foreman, and it is up to his discretion whether to have the complaint dealt with.”

Levesque also reported that a company change to its “bonus” system, a form of piece work, rewards miners for working faster at the expense of safety.

Vale’s media department in Sudbury has not responded to Militant calls.

“Four fatalities in seven months is unacceptable … this has got to stop,” Local 6500 President Rick Bertrand told the Sudbury Star. “We’re not even finished one investigation and we’re into another.”

In the case of the two deaths at the Stobie mine, Local 6500 and Vale organized separate investigations, a departure from past practice, because union officials refused to accept Vale’s terms for the inquiry.

On Feb. 2 union officials and Vale agreed to a joint investigation of Perry’s death. The two sides have also started a joint plant-gate collection to raise money for Stephen Perry’s daughter.

At the time of his death Perry, an experienced miner with 16 years at Vale, was working alone.

“Years ago we had a buddy system and nobody worked underground alone,” said Seppo Vataja, who works at the North Mine. “Now you can work alone. We are supposed to call in every two hours. But what if you call in and five minutes later you have a serious accident. You won’t be reported missing until two hours later and that could be too late.”
 
 
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