| June
9, 2006
After eight months at the bargaining table, NABET-CWA
members at NBC Universal have voted overwhelmingly to
authorize a strike if a fair contract can't be reached.
Key sticking points are job security, wages and NBC's
attempt to inject language that would allow anyone —
management and other non-union workers or people who aren't
NBC employees at all — to operate digital video cameras,
NABET-CWA President John Clark said.
During relatively smooth negotiations in 1998 and 2002,
both the union and network agreed to limit the number of
bargaining issues on the table and reached early agreements.
Clark said issues are limited this year, too, but the contract
expired March 31 and bargaining has gone on since
November.
"This time they took us for granted," he said. "They
thought we were anxious to get another early deal and they
could foist whatever they wanted on us."
No new talks are scheduled and the last bargaining session
was early May. The union is keeping the lines of communication
open and is hopeful the network will respond, Clark said.
With the company refusing to budge, the 2,500 technicians,
camera operators and employees represented in New York,
Washington, Chicago and Los Angeles are mobilizing. Recently,
a sea of green balloons with the NABET-CWA logo became the
backdrop for the "Today" show. And Clark said members are
reaching out to advertisers, especially in local markets, to
persuade them to stop doing business with the network until
there's a fair contract.
CWA urged the Federal Communications Commission to keep an
eye on job levels and service standards as it looks at the
pending merger of AT&T and BellSouth.
While noting, in comments filed this week with the FCC,
that the merger "holds the promise of accelerating the
deployment of high-speed Internet networks to more Americans,"
CWA told commissioners that BellSouth and AT&T have not
provided commitments to the union regarding employment
security.
CWA's filing pointed out that when SBC bought the "old"
AT&T and then became the "new" AT&T, six months later
the company announced a force reduction including the closure
of consumer call centers in Pennsylvania, Arizona and
Massachusetts while it continued to contract with overseas
call centers.
CWA "is hopeful that we will be able to reach agreement
with AT&T and BellSouth to protect the employment security
of our members while promoting growth and quality service,"
the filing stated. However: "Absent progress, we
will look to the commission to meet its obligation to protect
the public interest, including protection of service-impacting
employment, by ensuring that the merged entity does not
sacrifice quality customer service by reducing employment and
closing facilities to meet synergy targets."
Jammed with information about the country's health care
crisis and possible solutions, a new CWA website makes it
easier than ever for members to have a voice in the national
health care debate.
CWA set up the site,
http://www.healthcarevoices.org as
a way for union members to express their opinions about the
health care system in the U.S., share their own stories of
health care nightmares, ask questions of experts through
online discussions, and learn more about the trends that are
affecting union-negotiated health benefits.
The stories and ideas members share can be searched by
Congressional district, making an easy packet of constituent
information to send to or bring to meetings with members of
Congress and their staffs.
A 42-year-old single mother from California wrote that,
"I've never collected an unemployment check, I've always had a
decent job and my credit score is 745. Yet how can it be that
I'm nearly in bankruptcy due to the costs of health care? My
daughter and I both have health concerns and we can't live any
longer on my wage. We will be selling my home of 15 years and
moving to a cheap apartment so I can pay my health care
debts."
A contributor from Georgia says, "I received a new liver in
1992. The cost of a transplant without insurance: tens of
thousands. The cost of meds: hundreds monthly. It is wonderful
that science has allowed us to live longer but we will
probably die worrying how we will foot the bill."
The site will also link members to information from the
Citizens' Health Care Working Group, a Congressional project
to involve all Americans in finding solutions. An interim
report — based in part on an online poll that drew 15,000
responses, including 500 from CWA members — recommends some
form of universal health care. Through resolutions, CWA
convention delegates also have overwhelmingly supported health
care for all. The Citizens Health Care report can be
downloaded at CWA's Health Care Voices site.
Bringing ordinary people into the gridlocked debate was the
bipartisan effort of Sen. Ron Wyden (D-Ore.) and Sen. Orrin
Hatch (R-Utah). "We decided, let's try something else," Wyden
told the Associated Press. "Let's go to the public and let
them provide a kind of roadmap where the country ought to
head."
The site will offer online question-and-answer sessions
every month, possibly more often, with experts in the field.
Transcripts from a series of discussions that took place in
April and May are available at the site.
Henry Reichard, IUE-CWA Automotive Conference Board
chairman, died suddenly at home on June 5 of an apparent heart
condition.
Reichard was heading negotiations for a new contract with
Delphi Corp. as the company restructures under Chapter 11
bankruptcy, and had been under intense pressure in bargaining
the week prior to his death. Delphi asked the court for a
postponement of a hearing set for June 9 on its request to
void union contracts.
IUE-CWA President Jim Clark, hundreds of IUE-CWA members
and officials from Delphi and General Motors attended a
memorial service for Reichard in Centerville, Ohio. Bargaining
was recessed until at least next week.
Reichard first went to work for Delphi Energy and Chassis
Systems in 1969 and held several leadership positions in Local
755 including vice president.
He joined the IUE-CWA District 7 staff in November 2000 as
an organizer. In March 2001, he was appointed to the
Conference Board staff as director of safety. He was elected
chairman of the Conference Board in May 2005.
The IUE-CWA Automotive Conference Board negotiates and
enforces contracts for 17,000 members at five companies:
Delphi, General Motors, DMAX, Visteon and Valeo.
"Over the last eight months, Henry has spent countless
hours protecting our members and retirees as we face the
challenges of the Delphi bankruptcy," Clark said. "At the same
time, he oversaw negotiations at DMAX and General Motors.
There are thousands of IUE-CWA members, retirees and their
families who have Henry Reichard to thank for their wages,
pensions and benefits."
Reichard is survived by his wife, Kathy, four children and
five grandchildren.
- Flight attendants aren't just tired — they're
tired of waiting for the results of a flight attendant
fatigue study that the Federal Aviation Administration is
over a year past due in releasing.
AFA-CWA
flight attendants gathered on the grounds of the FAA
Wednesday afternoon and through the night for a sleep-in to
put pressure on the agency. "Enough is enough," AFA-CWA
President Pat Friend said. "The study was due back to
Congress on June 1, 2005, and the FAA continues to make
excuses for its delay."
The union has been urging the
government and airlines to address flight attendant fatigue
for years. They were joined Wednesday by Rep. Mike Honda
(D-Calif.), who is also pushing the FAA to release the
report.
"In a post 9-11 environment, flight
attendants are expected to remain extra vigilant in the
cabin, yet despite the increase in security
responsibilities, they are experiencing longer work days
with shorter rest periods," Friend said. "Results from this
independent study will help show the detrimental effects of
fatigue in the day-to-day role of flight
attendants."
- Since the Bush administration's Social Security
debacle last year, Republicans have been mum on the subject.
That is, until Rep. Jim McCrery (R-La.) spilled the beans
this week.
McCrery, who wants to be the next
chair of the powerful House Ways and Means Committee, told a
U.S. Chamber of Commerce audience that privatizing Social
Security will be back on the agenda as a top priority if the
GOP maintains control on Congress in November's midterm
elections.
Fellow Republicans have remained silent.
Which is no surprise, AFL-CIO President John Sweeney and
Democratic leaders in Congress said: Knowing that Americans
overwhelmingly rejected the Bush administration's scheme to
line Wall Street's pockets at the expense of workers'
retirement security, most Republicans are afraid to show
their true colors before the ballots are
counted.
- In 2005, 115 union leaders around the world were
killed for defending workers' rights, more than 1,600 were
subjected to violent assaults, 9,000 were arrested and
another 10,000 were fired, the International Confederation
of Free Trade Unions reported this
week.
"This year's report reveals deeply
disturbing trends, especially for women, migrant workers and
those who work in the public sector," ICFTU General
Secretary Guy Ryder said. "The death toll was slightly lower
in 2005 than the previous year, but we are nevertheless
witnessing increasingly severe violence and hostility
against working people who stand up for their
rights."
Latin America continues to be the most
perilous region for trade union activity, with Colombia
again topping the list for killings, intimidation and death
threats. Of the 115 union activists killed globally, 70 were
Colombian. Other countries noted for violence and repression
against unions include Iraq, Iran, El Salvador, Djibouti,
China, Cambodia, Guatemala, Zimbabwe and Myanmar. Even in
Australia, the government has pushed a new wave of
anti-union laws through Parliament.
The ICFTU also
took aim at the Bush administration, saying it "continued
its efforts to undermine freedom of association and
collective bargaining in the United States, helping to
ensure that union-busting remained rife."
A detailed
press release and the full report are available online at
http://www.icftu.org/.
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