And so is the response of the CLC!

But, I wonder, what should CLC have done?

EDIT: Thread title - rd.

[ 23 November 2003: Message edited by: robbie_dee ]

Story

I recomend the below link for more information on the strike.

"I work for the Salvation Army and I was just fired. I knew we'd have to fight with the government. I knew we'd have to fight the employer. But I never thought I'd have to fight another union."

-Brenda Jordison, health care worker

Thousands of women health care workers like Sister Jordison have had their lives turned upside down by the government's brutal health care privitization agenda. Their collective agreements were shredded by the Liberal's contract breaking legislation. They've been swept out of their jobs, and replaced by multinational corporations that stand to make huge profits by paying low wages to workers.

But what's even more upsetting for health care workers is that they've been undermined by another union -- a local of the IWA.

This is not about jursidiction between CUPE/HEU and the IWA. It's about the actions of IWA Local 1-3567 which is actively collabarting with multinational companies and the Liberal government to privatize important health care support services across the provice, dramatically roll back pay and benifits for women workers, and impede CUPE/HEU's organizing efforts.

Last year the BC Federation of Labour helped expose how these multinational companies and the Cambell government were going to use Bill 29. On audio tape, a senior corporate executive brazenly outlined plans to blacklist CUPE/HEU members by shopping for a union willing to agree to cut wages in half and rollback benefits through so-called voluntary recognition deals.

And if CUPE/HEU or any other principled union managed to win certifications and push for decent wages and benifits, the multinational company would walk away from the privitization contract and terminate all its workers for joining the wrong union.

Unfortunatly, these multinational companies -- Compas from the from the UK, Sodexho from France, and Aramark from the US -- have found a willing partner in IWA Local 1-3567. From hospital wards to the Labour Relations Board, the IWA local has collaborated behind closed doors to sign sweethart deals - with no input from members -- that cut wages from $18 an hour to $9.50 and eliminate almost all benifits.

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Support grows for CUPE’s position on the IWA dispute [CUPE]

[November 27, 2003] Federations of Labour in BC, PEI, New Brunswick, Ontario and Alberta have now passed resolutions supporting CUPE’s position that voluntary recognition agreements with multinational contractors undermine health care workers, and promote privatization.

CUPE President Paul Moist has continued to work with the CLC to try to resolve the dispute, but has been very clear that redress for CUPE means that the IWA Local 1-3567 must withdraw from the “partnership agreements” they have signed with four multinationals.

Speaking at the BC Federation of Labour Convention, Brother Moist encouraged delegates to support BC Fed Executive Council resolution that calls for acceptance of the findings of the CLC Umpire and for the CLC Executive to “take immediate action to tackle the problem of voluntary agreements with privatizing multi-nationals”. Said Moist, “It is about the kind of labour movement we want at all levels. The CLC works in communities across Canada, and it must work at the leadership level as well.”

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Unions fight over privatized health care workers (Vancouver Sun)

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The HEU says employees now represented by the IWA have seen their wages and benefits drastically cut.

"This process is being facilitated by the IWA, which has four partnership agreement with multi-nationals. The irony is that contracting out is one of the issues striking IWA members are also having to deal with," said HEU official Chris Allnutt.

The HEU also claims the IWA has been taking fees from companies for each employee, to the tune of five to 10 cents an hour.

Sonny Ghag, president of the IWA Local 3567, dismissed the HEU's protests.

"There are loonies in the HEU who are still living in the [1930s]," said Ghag. "We've signed collective agreements. There is a part of one clause that deals with partnership, and there's nothing unique about that. All private-sector unions have it and it basically deals with the well-being of our members and the company.

"What's wrong with a company making a profit? If it doesn't, it won't exist and our members won't have jobs," said Ghag.

As for receiving payments from a company for each employee, Ghag said the money goes to the IWA's education and training fund and similar provisions were in contracts the IWA had with companies in the forest industry.

Ghag said HEU workers whose jobs were threatened by privatization should apply to join the IWA.

"Instead of waiting for a pink slip, they'd be better off leaving the HEU and coming to us. We'd sign them up and meet with the government to protect their jobs," said Ghag.

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[ 04 December 2003: Message edited by: robbie_dee ]

IWA tensions boil over as two locals brawl at mill (Vancouver Sun 12/18/2003)

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A Vancouver sawmill was forcibly shut down Tuesday night and workers were chased off their jobs by an angry mob of rival workers that witnesses say were wielding as weapons the handles of tools they normally use to roll logs.

At least five of the 30 workers on the evening shift at Terminal Forest Products' Mainland Sawmills reported they were struck in the melee and dragged off their equipment.

The workers, members of the Vancouver local of the Industrial, Wood & Allied Workers of Canada, say they were attacked by more than 100 members of the IWA's Fraser Valley local.

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At the height of the fracas, the president of the Fraser Valley local, Satnam Singh (Sonny) Ghag called his fellow union members scabs for returning to work. His comments were quoted on a late-evening TV news broadcast, spreading the internal union battle beyond the Mainland mill site.
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Besides showing the power struggle within the IWA, the incident also provided a glimpse into the murky world of IWA politics. Mainland Sawmills competes with a mill owned by Ghag's brother, Gurdial Ghag.
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Ghag said workers went to Mainland Sawmills -- one of several Lower Mainland sawmills that had resumed operations Tuesday -- because they were upset Vancouver workers were returning to work before the legislation was in force. The national office of the IWA told workers they could return to work if companies reinstated the terms of the union contract. Mainland had done that.

Anger over the legislation is only part of the story. The Mainland workers are not only members of another local of the IWA. They are also employed at a mill that competes with G&H Noble Custom Cut Ltd. the mill owned by Ghag's brother.

G&H Noble has a separate labour contract with Ghag's local that pays lower wages than the coast master agreement. Because of the separate contract, it remained operating during the strike, prompting Mainland Sawmills to seek an exemption from picketing similar to one the union granted Doman Industries Ltd. Mainland claimed it lost business to G&H Noble during the strike.

Ghag said he has no direct relationship with G&H Noble and that Tuesday's incident was purely a matter of angry workers upset over the back-to-work order.

It is the second time since IWA workers walked off the job in November that Mainland Sawmills has been targeted by Ghag's local.

"I have had enough of this kind of bullshit," [Vancouver IWA local president Darrell] Wong said. "This leads one to wonder what the hell is going on. The whole thing has a bit of a smell to it."

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[ 18 December 2003: Message edited by: robbie_dee ]