The Militant - January 19, 2015 -- On the Picket Line

Vol. 79/No. 1 January 19, 2015

On the Picket Line

Help make this column a voice of workers’ resistance!
As the new year begins, it is worth recalling what we said when we expanded the column last fall. On the Picket Line is dedicated to spreading the truth about the labor resistance that is unfolding today. To be a voice of fighting workers, it depends on input from readers. If you are involved in a labor struggle or have information on one, please contact me at 306 W. 37th St., 13th Floor, New York, NY 10018; or (212) 244-4899; or themilitant@mac.com. We’ll work together to ensure your story is told.

— Maggie Trowe

Washington rally: ‘Reinstate fired Walmart worker’
LYNNWOOD, Wash. — More than 25 people rallied to demand the reinstatement of Jared Surdam Dec. 20 at the Walmart store here where he was fired at the end of November.

In a letter to supporters, Surdam said he was fired for speaking up for safety on the job after taking part in the Black Friday protest, part of actions across the country organized by OUR Walmart, a union-backed nationwide campaign fighting for $15 per hour and full-time work. “I brought safety concerns to my store management,” Surdam wrote. “When they ignored my concerns, I would bring them up again.”

Walmart workers, representatives of Puget Sound Advocates for Retirement Action, All Pilgrim’s Church, the United Food and Commercial Workers, Socialist Workers Party and others gathered to present a letter to the store manager urging Surdam’s reinstatement. The letter was signed by Mike Sells, state representative in the 38th legislative district, and Mark McDermott, retired regional director for the U.S. Secretary of Labor, and endorsed by UFCW Local 21, the A. Philip Randolph Institute, Community Alliance for Global Justice, Church Council of Greater Seattle and the Coalition of Labor Union Women.

Surdam’s supporters also distributed informational flyers to customers and store workers on his case and recent National Labor Relations Board rulings against Walmart for harassment of OUR Walmart members at two California stores.

“The fight for respect and a living wage is not only a Walmart worker’s fight or a fast-food worker’s fight, it’s our community’s fight,” said Matt Edgerton, the lead organizer for OUR Walmart in Washington state, in a statement sent to the Militant.

— George Lawson

Kellogg cereal workers at four plants reject concession contract

ATLANTA — In early December union workers at four of Kellogg Company’s cereal plants voted 1,268 to 21 to reject a concessionary contract proposal reached in secret negotiations between the company, international officials of the Bakery, Confectionery, Tobacco Workers and Grain Millers International Union and federal mediators.

The proposal would have modified the current master agreement, which expires in October 2015, at the four plants in Battle Creek, Michigan; Lancaster, Pennsylvania; Memphis, Tennessee; and Omaha, Nebraska.

“This is worse than the proposal they made before they locked us out,” Memphis BCTGM Local 252G President Kevin Bradshaw, an operator in the plant there, told the Militant in a Dec. 22 phone interview.

Two hundred twenty-six members of Local 252G were locked out by Kellogg’s in October 2013 for nearly 10 months after local members refused to accept the company’s plan to hire a lower-paid tier of temporary, part-time workers.

Before the contract vote, BCTGM members received a letter from International President David Durkee urging a “yes” vote, pointing to Kellogg’s threats to close one or more plants if the contract failed to pass. International officials said a “confidentiality agreement” with Kellogg and the federal mediators prevented them from informing the locals of the negotiations.

The company’s rejected proposals included elimination of cost-of-living adjustments and a leave-of-absence benefit, cuts in health care and establishment of a lower tier of “transitional” employees in all the plants in an arrangement Kellogg calls the “New Workforce of the Future.”

— Susan LaMont

California grocery workers vote to keep union
LOS ANGELES — After organizing to defeat an employer-backed decertification effort, hundreds of grocery workers and their supporters picketed El Super grocery stores Dec. 20-23, urging shoppers to support their struggle and boycott the chain.

The workers, members of the United Food and Commercial Workers, have been without a contract since September 2013.

Only seven of the 46 El Super stores are unionized. After the company launched a decertification campaign, that effort “turned into a recertification campaign,” a union statement said. In a 402-131 vote Dec. 12 workers rejected decertification.

The El Super unionists are fighting for a 40-hour week, sick pay, wage increases and seniority rights.

“The company tried to intimidate us,” El Super worker Guadalupe Baleriano told the Militant while picketing the East Los Angeles store Dec. 20. “They took away hours from the people fighting for the union. But now we’re stronger and more confident. We know who is for the union, and we’re not afraid anymore.”

— Bill Arth

Canadian can workers on strike for 16 months win support
TORONTO — Can workers on strike for 16 months here against Crown Holdings’ two-tier proposal are winning support.

The 120 members of United Steelworkers Local 9176 have maintained 24-hour pickets since striking Sept. 6, 2013, when Crown, one of the world’s largest can producers, demanded cuts in wages, pensions and benefits for new hires.

“They want us gone, but we’re not going anywhere,” Gary Lytle told the Militant Dec. 29 on the picket line. The company is operating with management and strikebreakers.

The strike has received solidarity from unionists in Canada, the U.S., Europe and Turkey. Steve McHugh, a union solidarity organizer, spoke at the Steelworkers District 5 convention in Quebec in November. “Right after I spoke, one local after another started pledging money. We raised over $45,000,” said McHugh.

Crown announced a list of 36 union activists they don’t want back in the plant, and plans to retain 80 strikebreakers, leaving only 26 jobs for union members, Local 9176 Vice President Calvin Gillard told the Militant.

The USW has called for a boycott of beer in cans.

To express solidarity or contribute money to the strikers, go to the USW Local 9176 website: www.bottlesnotcans.ca

— Tony DiFelice and Annette Kouri

Chicken butchers in Israel strike for union, permanent jobs
Singing and dancing in a circle, 65 kosher butchers and helpers went on strike at the Milouoff slaughterhouse near Acre in the Galilee region of Israel Dec. 15. They are demanding representation by the Koach La Ovdim (Workers Power) trade union federation and to work directly for the company.

The contractor the butchers worked for was fired by Milouoff, Rafi Kimhi, coordinator of Koach La Ovdim in northern Israel, said in a phone interview Dec. 29. The new contractor said it would not guarantee everyone a job.

The Milouoff butchers work piece rate, receiving 4 to 6 cents per chicken.

The butchers are all haredim — ultra-orthodox Jews from North Africa. The other workers at the factory, who raise the chickens, carve the carcasses and ship the product, are Arab citizens of Israel.

“When we started unionizing the butchers, we tried to unionize the other 400 workers too,” Kimhi said. “But the company brought in the Histadrut [the largest Israeli union federation] and got them signed up without any contract, to block us from having one big union.”

After the slaughter operation shut down, the other workers were laid off, but are following the strike closely, Kimhi said.

— Seth Galinsky

N.Y. transit workers protest arrest of bus driver
BROOKLYN, N.Y. — Amidst the city’s “Vision Zero” road safety campaign that scapegoats bus and taxi drivers for any accidents, police arrested and handcuffed a Metropolitan Transit Authority bus operator here Dec. 23 at a hospital where he was being treated for trauma after the bus he was driving struck and killed a pedestrian.

Bus driver Reginald Prescott, 57, a member of Transport Workers Union Local 100, was charged by cops with failing to yield to a pedestrian and immediately suspended without pay by the MTA.

At the same time, transit bosses press drivers to keep on schedule or face penalties, and the city has cut the speed limit from 30 to 25 miles per hour.

Under “Vision Zero,” failure to yield to a pedestrian is now a misdemeanor punishable by up to 15 days in jail and/or a fine of up to $50.

To protest Prescott’s arrest and suspension, bus operators at several Brooklyn depots delayed the next morning’s “pullout” for more than an hour.

“WE ARE NOT CRIMINALS!” Local 100 President John Samuelsen said in a Dec. 26 statement. Samuelson cautioned drivers to observe all traffic regulations, including the new speed limit. “Should any member of Supervision threaten or harass you in any way to speed up service to make schedule,” Samuelson said, drivers should contact the union immediately.

— Jim Watson