January 3, 2008

588 AT&T Customer Care Reps Vote CWA in New Hampshire

Concerned over the lack of job security, poor wages, and exorbitant health care costs, a unit of 588 customer care workers at an AT&T Government Solutions center in Dover, New Hampshire, gained representation with CWA Local 1298 through majority card check.  According to the state AFL-CIO it was the largest private sector organizing win in New Hampshire since 1966. The workers process passport applications under an AT&T contract with the U.S. Department of State.

"The leaders of the employees' inside committee did a tremendous job of educating the workforce, which is very young, about the value of having a union and bargaining rights in being able to address their concerns over the affordability of health care and other issues," said District One Vice President Chris Shelton. "We hope to make the workers proud by securing a fair first contract that raises wages, improves job security, and makes their health care more affordable," he said. A full time employee earns just under $22,000 a year, but the yearly deductible for family health care is $5,000.

The card check was certified by the American Arbitration Association on November 5, but CWA withheld making an announcement about the victory until now because of the onerous requirements that a Sept. 29 NLRB decision has put on workers who gain a union through card check.

The ruling by the Board's Republican majority gives anti-union workers, or a competing union, a 45-day period following a card check to petition the NLRB for a decertification election. In effect, this ruling means that just 30 percent of the workforce can force an NLRB election, even if the majority of the workforce signed up to join the union in a card check election. 

NLRB Slams Workers Again in Guild E-mail Ruling

The National Labor Relations Board has dealt yet another blow to workers' rights, ruling in a case involving CWA journalists that employers can ban union-related messages from being sent through a company's e-mail system.

The case has been pending since 2000 and stems from three e-mails sent by the then-president of the Eugene Newspaper Guild in Oregon. The e-mails discussed a union rally and urged members of TNG-CWA Local 37194 to wear union colors to support contract talks.

The 3-2 NLRB ruling was split along party lines, with outgoing Chairman Robert Battista voting with fellow Republicans to declare that e-mail is company "property" and employers can restrict its use with virtually no limitations.

Dissenting Democratic members Wilma Liebman and Dennis Walsh said the anti-worker majority on the NLRB has made the board "the Rip Van Winkle of administrative agencies" by failing to recognize how e-mail has forever changed communication at work and beyond.

 "The majority erroneously treats the employer's asserted 'property interest' in e-mail – a questionable interest here, in any event – as paramount, and fails to give due consideration to employee rights and the appropriate balancing of the parties' legitimate interests," they wrote in dissenting arguments.

TNG-CWA President Linda Foley called the decision "a continuation of the Bush NLRB crusade to shut down the rights of workers." Especially appalling, she said, is that the case involves a newspaper that is otherwise a champion of free speech.

The ruling has drawn fire from labor leaders around the country. AFL-CIO General Counsel Jonathan Hiatt told the New York Times that, "Anyone with e-mail knows that this is how employees communicate with each other in today's workplace. Outrageously, in allowing employers to ban such communications for union purposes, the Bush labor board has again struck at the heart of what the nation's labor laws were intended to protect — the right of employees to discuss working conditions and other matters of mutual concern."

Guild leaders say the board's  finding that the newspaper's e-mail policy doesn't discriminate against the union can be disproved by the words of the paper's own lawyer.

"During bargaining on a communications policy it proposed in August of
2001, the company's attorney, Michael Zinser, said that under the company's proposal, the Guild could not use e-mail to communicate with its members, but that it could be used by employees who wanted to decertify the union," said Eugene local co-president Randi Bjornstand. "Six years later, I still think that smacks of illegal discrimination."

CWA Calls for Independent Telecom Spinoff for No. New England

As regulators in Vermont, New Hampshire and Maine express concern over Verizon's proposed sale of its phone business to a small North Carolina company, FairPoint Communications, CWA has proposed that governors and lawmakers in the three states consider forming an independent company to buy and operate the telecommunications network.

CWA leaders applauded the Vermont Public Service Board for its recent rejection of the deal in a ruling that concluded the sale "has the potential to lead to a reduction in service quality, in less investment in the Vermont infrastructure and to slower deployment of broadband services than is acceptable."

The Vermont regulators "got it exactly right," said CWA President Larry Cohen.   He noted that a proposal by the two companies to restructure the deal to lesson FairPoint's debt load, which is being considered by regulators in Maine this week, is inadequate and would still leave residents with a financially shaky company and limited – if any – access to high speed Internet services.

CWA, together with the AFL-CIO and IBEW, is urging leaders in the three states to establish an independent company to create a stronger, more viable network, which would:

--  Be operated by local management dedicated to the region.

--  Not be burdened with $2.3 billion in debt, as FairPoint would be.

--  Improve on Verizon's record of investment in the region, versus FairPoint's plan to cut that investment.

--  Continue shareholder dividends at current or lower levels, unlike FairPoint, which plans to pay twice as much in dividends as it earns in income.

--  Be committed to rolling out true high-speed Internet service to every home and business.

IUE-CWA Blasts Delphi Executive Bonus Plan

IUE-CWA reacted angrily to the revelation in a Jan. 2 court filing of Delphi’s intention to reward Chairman Robert S. Miller with an $8.3 million bonus – previously undisclosed in the company's executive compensation plan -- for leading the auto parts maker through bankruptcy.
 
“This is just another pathetic example of the U.S. system feeding ever increasing corporate greed," said IUE-CWA President Jim Clark. “Many working families have been forced into personal bankruptcy while corporate executives reap great personal windfalls on the backs of their employees."
 
IUE-CWA Automotive Conference Board Chairman Willie Thorpe said, “It’s totally ridiculous, anybody getting that kind of money after what they did to our people.”

In addition, the company’s Chief Executive Officer Rodney O’Neal stands to gain a $5.3 million cash bonus and up to $10 million in stock options when the company leaves bankruptcy, expected in the first quarter of this year. He is also set to receive $1.5 million in salary and will be eligible for bonuses of atleast 125 percent of his salary, or $1.9 million annually. Long-term incentives for O’Neal included up to $6.7 million in restricted stock and stock options.

Miller came to Delphi in June 2005 for a salary of $1.5 million and a $3 million bonus. In 2006, the company’s first full year in Chapter 11, he gave up his annual salary and said he would work for $1 per year until the company leaves bankruptcy. He handed off the CEO title to O’Neal in 2007 and plans to leave Delphi when the reorganization is approved.

IUE-CWA agreed to hourly pay cuts from about $27 to $16.50 an hour and to allow the company to hire new workers for about $10 an hour. About 3,130 Delphi workers took retirement or buyout payments to leave the company, and Delphi closed several plants.

The company has continued to lose money throughout the bankruptcy -- $2.8 billion in 2007 alone.

The bonus was proposed by Delphi’s compensation committee and approved by its board of directors as part of the company’s reorganization plan. The company’s creditors are scheduled to vote on the plan on Jan. 11. Delphi is due in court Jan. 17 in New York to seek approval of the plan.

IUE-CWA will join the Auto Workers, whose members also suffered major wage, benefit and job cutbacks,  in formally objecting to the executive compensation portion of the reorganization plan, Clark said.

2,700 Piedmont Agents Gear up for Union Election

Ramp and gate agents at Piedmont Airlines are gearing up for a CWA representation election that begins on January 22.

A majority of the 2,700 agents petitioned the National Mediation Board for a union election in November. They are the only major workgroup at Piedmont and parent company US Airways without representation and consequently they receive only a fraction of the pay of mainline and mainline express agents doing the same jobs.  Piedmont operates as an express carrier for US Airways.

CWA and AFA-CWA-represented agents and flight attendants at Piedmont and US Airways are assisting in the campaign. The election, to be conducted over the telephone and on the Internet, runs until February 19 when the ballots are tallied.

TNG-CWA Local: Writers Guild Management Unfair to Staff

The Newspaper Guild of New York, CWA Local 31003, has filed several unfair labor practice charges with the National Labor Relations Board over the anti-union actions of Writers Guild of America East management.

President Bill O’Meara said the WGAE management reneged on a ratified contract with 19 staff members represented by the TNG-CWA local. 

WGAE management now wants to change the terms of a signed and ratified contract, terms that management negotiators agreed to, said O’Meara. He made clear that the Guild is fully supportive of striking Writers Guild members, and the dispute is solely with a management that contends it didn’t mean to propose the wage increases that were included in the contract that was ratified by union members. 

O'Meara said the dispute arose after the Writers Guild rewrote the previously ratified contract and insisted that the TNG local sign the revised version. “It’s like a car salesman demanding that you sign a contract after he’s changed all the numbers that you had agreed upon,” he said.

“It's unbelievable that that WGAE management doesn’t seem to understand that it can’t pick and choose the language it wants to live up to in a contract,” O'Meara said. “The contract language clearly supports our position regarding money owed our members that management is now refusing to pay.”

The NLRB charges cite WGAE Executive Director Mona Mangan for threatening to discipline the staff's union representative for insubordination when she took issue with Mangan over her handling of the dispute.

Another charge spotlights WGAE’s threat to withdraw previously approved holiday bonuses unless the union dropped its grievance over the wage increase owed and signed the revised contract. WGAE eventually paid the bonuses, but later than originally
scheduled.

TNG-CWA members continue to fully support the striking writers in their dispute with television and movie producers, the local said. “Out of respect for our striking fellow union members we tried to work this out quietly, and we even offered to submit the dispute to arbitration,” O'Meara said. “But the anti-union stance of WGAE leadership against its own workers, as well as the filing of a baseless charge against the local two weeks ago, forced us to reluctantly take this public step to defend our members.”

IN BREIF:

  • In a close race – one you'd hope no company would want to win –  Smithfield pork slaughterhouse CEO Joseph Luter III beat out American Airlines and Verizon Business to be named "Grinch of the Year" in the annual Jobs with Justice contest for the worst of the country's union-busting, workers-rights-stomping employers. 

    Of nearly 10,000 votes cast on the JwJ website in December, 28 percent went to Smithfield, which has run a fear campaign for more than 10 years while its Tar Heel, N.C., employees have fought relentlessly for a voice at work.

    American Airlines CEO Gerard Arpey was an extremely close second, getting 27 percent of the vote. Airline managers are reaping millions in bonuses while workers who gave concessions to keep the company out of bankruptcy in 2003 are getting nothing.

    Coming in third was Verizon Business' Bob Toohey, vice president for human resources. Despite widespread community and political pressure, he and the company have engaged in a full slate of anti-union tactics while refusing to recognize the majority of VZB technicians in New England who have signed cards seeking representation through CWA and the IBEW.


  • Just in time for election jokes, late-night TV is back – but only David Letterman has made a deal with the otherwise-striking television writers, allowing them to return to his and fellow CBS host Craig Ferguson's shows.

    Letterman invited 10 out-of-work writers from daytime, prime-time and other late-night shows to deliver his Top 10 list Wednesday night, detailing their contract "demands."

    No. 10: "Complimentary tote bag with next insulting contract offer." No. 6:  "No disciplinary action taken against any writer caught having inappropriate relationship with a copier." No. 2, delivered by a writer for Conan O'Brien's show, "I don't have a joke -- I just want to remind everyone that we're on strike, so none of us are responsible for this lame list."

    The two-month old strike involves fair compensation for writers whose material makes millions for media companies that rebroadcast it on the internet and other digital media.

    Writers Guild of America members picketed outside the NBC homes of hosts Jay Leno and O'Brien, who returned to air without writers. Though strikers said they are targeting the network and not the hosts, who publicly support the writers, many would-be celebrity guests are expected to refuse to cross the picket lines. That wasn't an issue for Republican presidential candidate Mike Huckabee, who flew in from campaigning in Iowa to appear with Leno on Wednesday.