—ON THE PICKET LINE—

Maggie Trowe, Editor

 

Union recycling workers in Calif. support Washington farmworkers

OAKLAND, Calif. — Some 35 recycling workers, members of the International Longshore and Warehouse Union Local 6, heard leaders of the Familias Unidas por la Justicia (Families United for Justice) farmworkers union from Washington state at a meeting at the local’s hall here March 29.

Local 6 Secretary-Treasurer Fred Pecker welcomed them. Ramon Torres, president of Familias Unidas por la Justicia, explained the union’s boycott of products sold by berry distributing giant Driscoll’s and appealed to the local to organize monthly pickets at Costco and Whole Foods stores that sell them.

“We in Local 6 fought for a good contract from 2012 to 2014, and finally we got it,” said Josefa Solano, who works at the BLT Enterprises recycling plant in Fremont, at the event. “It was because we got the support of many organizations and a lot of other unions. The fight of these farmworkers needs the support of all unions.”

About $250 was collected to assist the farmworkers’ fight.

— Carole Lesnick

Junior doctors in England strike against understaffing, pay cuts

MANCHESTER, England — Junior doctors picketed Wythenshawe Hospital here April 6 at the beginning of a 48-hour strike in hospitals across England. This was the fourth stoppage to protest a new contract the government will impose in August that will reduce overtime pay and eliminate it altogether on Saturdays before 5 p.m. The government wants a seven-days-a-week National Health Service without increasing staff. Hundreds of junior doctors and their supporters from across northwest England later held a protest march in the center of Manchester.

“Nurses have a heavy workload too,” junior doctor Miriam Bennett told the Militant. “We will get the same pay whether we are working at 3 a.m. or 3 p.m. We already work 24/7. But if we are going to have more staff working weekends, where will they come from?” Bennett said most shifts are understaffed already.

“The teachers are upset about their workload,” added Rebecca Hyde, a radiology registrar. “Every public service sector is being hit. It seems like we are all just coming together against this!”

Another strike is planned April 26-27.

— Tony Hunt and Catharina Tirsén