The Militant - August 6, 2012 -- On the Picket Line

Vol. 76/No. 29 August 6, 2012

On the Picket Line

Hundreds rally for Teamsters
on strike against Davis Wire

KENT, Wash.—Some 300 people rallied outside the Davis Wire Company here July 17 to show support for members of Teamsters Local 117, who have been on strike since May 21.

“These men have worked together in an oppressive environment,” Tracey Thompson, secretary-treasurer of Local 117, told the rally, thanking those from other unions and the surrounding community for providing support. “Now they stand together as coworkers, husbands, sons and fathers, demanding that their employer recognize and honor their dignity as men.”

“We work 12-hour shifts and have to stay at our machines on breaks and lunch. Many of us have suffered injuries because of the unsafe conditions,” said Robert Bruner, a Teamsters union shop steward in the plant. “Enough is enough, and we are not going back without a contract.”

Earlier in the day the union filed a lawsuit against the sweatshop-like conditions at the mill.

Those wishing to support the workers can find out about the ONE MORE DAY fund at www.teamsters117.org.

—Edwin Fruit

Atlanta school workers
protest denial of jobless pay

ATLANTA—On July 17, school bus drivers from Taylor Motors in Columbus and cafeteria workers from Spelman College, Emory University, Georgia Tech and Georgia State, along with supporters from several unions, other organizations and student groups protested at the South Metro Office of the Department of Labor.

Georgia Labor Commissioner Mark Butler recently issued a ruling denying unemployment payment to workers at private schools laid off over the summer break. Some 64,000 workers in the state are affected by the decision.

—Rachele Fruit

Steelworkers in Iowa ratify
Henniges’ new contract offer

KEOKUK, Iowa—After rejecting an earlier company offer, members of United Steelworkers Local 444 at Henniges Automotive Profiles voted to accept the company’s new offer July 20. The agreement includes $1.13 in wage increases over the next three years, an increase in second- and third-shift differential pay, and an extra week of vacation for workers with one to eight years’ experience. Unlike the first offer, the second contained no increases in medical or dental insurance premiums.

“It was pretty much unanimous,” Mike Bennett, president of Local 444, told the Burlington Hawk Eye.

“The fact that the company backed off increasing the medical insurance and kept it the same, while giving the $1.13 raise, made me decide to vote for it,” Tammy Allen said at the Labor Temple Lounge after the vote. She has worked at Henniges for 34 years.

Carol Picton, who has worked there for 33 years, said, “I would have liked to have a little more. But the fact that we got some money and the insurance was left alone is important.” Picton added, “I feel that if we had demanded more, the company would have hired replacement workers and we would have had to go through something like Local 48G went through,” referring to the 10-month lockout of the 237 members of Bakery, Confectionery, Tobacco Workers and Grain Millers union by the international corn-processing giant Roquette America here in 2010-2011.

“I voted no,” Dwayne Bunker said. “We have given up too much in the past, and I don’t feel the wage increase was enough.”

There are 472 hourly workers at the Henniges plant, which makes rubber seals for automobiles; 425 of them are members of the USW.

—Buddy Howard

Canada nuclear workers
fight concession demands

MONTREAL—Some 800 nuclear engineers, scientists, technologists and tradespeople in three Canadian provinces walked off the job July 9, rejecting far-reaching concession demands aimed at pensions, vacations, seniority and wages by Candu Energy Inc. bosses.

The workers design, build and service Candu nuclear reactors and are members of the Society of Professional Engineers and Associates. Candu, which had been operated by the federal government, was privatized and sold to Montreal-based engineering giant SNC-Lavalin last year. The 18 nuclear reactors the company services supply 16 percent of Canada’s electricity requirements.

“They are trying to get rid of the union,” Montreal striker Gilles Sabourin told the Militant in a phone interview. They had been working without a contract for 18 months, Sabourin added.

Since Candu was privatized, 25 percent of union jobs have been cut, while the number of contract laborers has more than tripled.

—John Steele

Australia grocery warehouse
workers end two-week strike

MELBOURNE, Australia—Some 600 grocery warehouse workers in Somerton, north Melbourne, ended a two-week strike July 23 after winning higher shift payments, more flexibility in the use of public holiday entitlements and a modest wage increase.

The workers—whose slogan is “equal rights for equal sites”—demanded the same rights and conditions as workers at other Coles warehouses across the country.

Coles outsourced workforce hiring and management at Somerton to Toll Holdings six years ago.

Toll secured a “greenfields” site agreement with the National Union of Workers—a contract that is reached before any workers are hired and requires no ratification—before it opened the new warehouse. Since then, the workers have been fighting to gain a better union contract.

“We’re trying to get what everyone considers standard,” Mark Hopkins, 35, a forklift driver, told the Militant July 15. This strike “is about showing the company we have some spine.”

Elizabeth McEwen, 47, who works in returns and damages, said that when she started five years ago “only 60 percent were union members but now it is 93 percent.”

—Ron Poulsen

New Zealand home care workers
conduct partial strikes over pay

AUCKLAND, New Zealand—More than 60 workers at the Aranui Home and Hospital began three days of partial strike actions at 3 a.m. on July 17. The workers, members of the New Zealand Nurses Organisation and Service and Food Workers Union, provide care for elderly residents.

At a lively picket line NZNO delegate Julie Faifai Loa, who has worked at the facility for 10 years, told the Militant many workers have been there a long time and are not going up the pay scale. “They don’t acknowledge the work we do and just want you to shut your mouth and do your work,” she said.

Most workers used to belong to an outfit named “Team Aranui,” set up by the facility’s bosses. Around three years ago, led by a few who had joined the Nurses Organisation, workers began to discuss the need to have their own union. Almost all now belong to the NZNO or the SFWU.

—Annalucia Vermunt
and Felicity Coggan