Open World Conference of Workers
In Defense of Trade Union Independence & Democratic Rights
WHC Report Section 9
NOTE:
The Following is part of the ongoing report on the Western Hemisphere
Workers Conference Against NAFTA and Privatizations, which took place in
San Francisco on November 14-16, 1997.
Section
9 includes the following:
-
Presentation by Robin Alexander, director of international affairs of the United Electrical, Radio and Machine Workers of America (UE) to the Saturday, November 15, plenary session of the conference.
-
Presentation by Mike Dolan, field director for Public Citizen's Global Trade Watch, to the Saturday, November 15, plenary session of the conference, and
-
Five letters of greetings to the conference from
Presentation
by Robin Alexander, director of international affairs of the United
Electrical, Radio and Machine Workers of America (UE):
It's
really a pleasure to be here today, and it's wonderful to be with a group
of people who are both committed to international solidarity and who are
activists. I also bring
greetings from the FAT. They
are sorry they couldn't be with us, and I'd like to give the organizers
this poster which is a graphic illustration of international labor
solidarity. [applause]
How many of you were out there working against Fast Track?
Let's see the hands. All
right, let's give ourselves a hand. [applause]
Victory is really sweet. It
was really good to see that Clinton couldn't buy the votes this time that
he needed to get Fast Track to pass.
But we have serious challenges ahead.
As previous speakers have said, NAFTA expansion isn't over, and
we're facing MAI. And I
believe were facing an even greater challenge, which is that we need to
develop an alternative vision, and we need to make that vision a reality.
[applause]
On the labor front, an essential part of that is to form effective
alliances with workers and trade unions around the world in order that we
may take on the transnationals together.
And we know the future that we face if we fail to do that.
It's a mighty challenge. We
share problems with workers around the world who are suffering under the
same neoliberal policies we see here: privatization, downsizing, pressure
to increase productivity while cutting wages and benefits, deregulation,
the substitution of temporary workers and part time workers, attacks on
labor rights, and cuts in social programs.
I want to talk today about our relationship with the FAT because I
think it provides one small example of what may be part of the answer to
this challenge. And I say its
only part because we're both very small organizations.
Our relationship basically is focused on organizing, and we call it
the Strategic Organizing Alliance. There
have been a number of organizing campaigns that I obviously don't have
time to tell you about. We
also do a lot of education and we do worker-to-worker exchanges which we
believe are critical in cutting down some of the stereotypes that exist on
both sides of the border. We
also have a web page, and you should look at that [igc.apc.org/unitedelect].
We have literature in the back.
I want to close by asking your support for two campaigns.
One is a campaign that you heard about last night, that of the Han
Young workers in Tijuana, and I also want to recognize Enriqe Fernandez
Felix who is coordinator of the Union
de Defensa Laboral Communitaria who provided substantial support for
that strike, for that effort.
In the last few minutes what I want to do is tell you about a
campaign which I think is really important, and it's an effort
to expand our work with the FAT in a new way to make it a
tri-national effort. Last march in Chicago there was a meeting of representatives
from [workers at plants of] Echlin, which is an auto parts manufacturer.
People who attended were from the FAT in Mexico, the Canadian Steelworkers
and a number of US unions including the Teamsters, the Paper Workers,
UNITE!, my union and some others. And
what these representatives did was they pledged to support each other, in
both contract negotiations and in new organizing efforts.
The FAT was the first union to run a campaign since that meeting,
and what happened during that campaign was really outrageous, and I'd like
to share a little of that with you.
They faced a terrible trilogy, the government, the bosses, and the
CTM. Initially they faced the
problem of delay: as they filed the demand to represent the workers, the
case was postponed for several months while the labor board considered the
question of whether [the FAT union was] legally entitled to represent the
workers since they were auto parts workers and STIMAHCS is a metal
workers' union. It's totally
outrageous, and fortunately that challenge was eventually defeated and
they went on to an actual election.
The day of the election, two hours before the election, the labor
board again postponed it, and
failed to notify the union. Therefore
when all of the most active workers came out to be the first ones to vote,
they exposed themselves to the company and twenty of them were fired.
Nevertheless the workers hung in there.
They went on.
An election was held, and the night before the election, two
busloads of goons showed up at the plant.
Some had machine guns; some had sticks; some had chains; and
basically throughout the next day they just hung out at the plant.
The message was really clear.
Because elections take place by voice vote rather than secret
ballot in Mexico, and because it was on the company property (only three
representatives from STIMAHCS were allowed in the plant), workers who
voted had to do that in front of representatives of the company, the
company union, and of course there were all these goons.
In spite of that there were workers who were brave enough to say,
"No, we want a democratic, independent union,"
and to vote for STIMAHCS, for the FAT.
Nevertheless it's understandable that many of those workers were
intimidated, and the union lost.
They've come back to the Echlin alliance of unions and asked for
support, and I'm also asking you. The
company's shareholders' meeting is going to be on December 17th, and we're
going to be sending the company a message.
We're also going to be having rallies and demonstrations in other
parts the country, and we're going to be filing a complaint at that time
with the NAO in the United States and Canada, challenging the way that
elections are conducted in Mexico
Next week we'll have petitions and other literature.
If you're interested in helping, please see me, and I'd be happy to
get that material to you. We
need to send a strong, clear message to the company that they need to
reinstate those workers with full compensation and they have to stop union
busting and respect workers' rights.
[applause] I
can't think of a clearer example of how our lives and our futures are tied
together.
Obviously I haven't been able to say all that I wanted to during
this brief time, but I think that international solidarity is imperative. I think that the reason that our relationship with the FAT
works is because its based on mutual respect.
It's based on the fact that we talk, that we discuss things with
each other, and it's based on the fact that we share a common vision of
what unions should be like. We
call it rank-and-file unionism. They
call it autogestión, but it's
the same thing. We need to
fight for an international movement that really represents workers
throughout the world. Thank
you very much. [applause]
Presentation
by Mike Dolan, field director for Public Citizen's Global Trade Watch:
But you know, I think we've congratulated ourselves enough. It's
time to move on. I want to
pat myself on the back as much as the next organizer, but that was a fight
that we won and we dwell in the past for too long at our peril. You know what I want to do?
I want to tell you about a little trip I took. Three weeks ago, in the middle of the Fast Track fight, I had
occasion to go to Paris, France. For
work! I mean I went to Paris
for work! What could be
better, right? This was right
in the middle of the Fast Track fight.
I got away because I went to Paris, because Paris is right where
the Organization for Cooperation and Economic Development, the OCED is
located at. And I went to the
OCED because that's where the Multilateral Agreement on Investment is
being negotiated at. And I
went there to be part of a NGO, a Non-govermental Organization,
Consultation with the OCED, and on my first day in Paris, I took two very
important meetings before the actual beginning of the consultation.
The first meeting was at the Trade Union Advisory Council, the TUAC.
These are the trade union representatives to the Organization for
Economic Cooperation and Development.
And I talked with a man named Roy Jones there, and Roy described to
me the reformist approach of the affiliates of TUAC, which include the
AFL-CIO, and the Canadian Labor Congress, and others.
And they described how they wanted a very strong treatment of labor
issues in the Multilateral Agreement on Investment.
In other words, to make the MAI the best MAI it could possibly be:
strong language in the preamble; annexing some guidelines; and a binding
labor clause that was referred to earlier today, based on NAFTA section
11-14, whereby the signatory states are not merely encouraged, but are in
fact required not to lower labor standards in order to attract investment.
And these were some of the reformist recommendations of the Trade
Union Advisory Council to the OCED that I learned in Paris.
The second meeting I took was with the CGT.
We just heard from a representative a few minutes ago from them.
I met with Jean-Pierre Page at the Confederaçion
General du Travail
there, and he took a completely different trade union approach to the MAI.
He rejected the model. He
said the MAI is bad. He said
we must kill it. [applause]
I said, "Yeah, Jean-Pierre, vous
êtes raison. We're going to kill this thing."
But I was fascinated by the difference between two trade unionists:
one who wants to fix the MAI and the other who wants to kill the MAI.
A few days later, I had the strategy session with the NGO
community, most of whom were environmental, and I found this same division
between those who take a reformist approach to the Multilateral Agreement
on Investments -- and, dare I say, to these multilateral free trade
agreements in general -- and those NGOs, my own Public Citizen among them,
which want to bash the model. We
want to smash this horrible neoliberal free trade model, and I was in
Paris to add a militant voice to the NGO consultations at the OECD, and so
finally there we did.
Well, I should tell you that we were -- all the NGOs, forty odd
NGOs, mostly environmental groups -- together in a room to create a
statement. That's right, the
NGO statement, and if you come to the workshop later on, on the MAI, I'll
share it with you. We
eventually did prepare one, and fortunately I am here to report back to
you that the NGO statement reflected a militant perspective.
That is to say we brought into the consultation, and gave to the
OECD and to our national negotiators, a list of demands -- not questions
that wed like to discuss with you, but demands.
Suspend the negotiations. Eliminate
the investor-to-state dispute resolution mechanism: that's where the
corporations get to sue the governments -- bad stuff.
Eliminate that, we said among our demands.
All our demands, of course, were rejected.
But the reason that I bring these points up is that there were
these two positions within the NGO community and within the labor
movement, within the trade union movement, and it occurred to me as I got
back to the United States and began to resume organizing again on Fast
Track, that we must take a militant perspective in order to kill these
things. When I went into the
consultation with the OECD, and it was my turn to speak up -- in this big
French building with high ceilings and tapestries and bullet-proof glass
windows -- I had the opportunity to say to them, "On behalf of the
Citizens' Trade Campaign, the national coalition in my country
which is about to beat Fast Track negotiating authority for the
president, I am here to inform you that this agreement, this Multilateral
Agreement on Investment, will never pass in the United States
Congress." [applause]
Ever since NAFTA passed three and a half years ago, we have been
organizing out of fear -- fear of lowered wages, fear of lost jobs in this
country, fear of environmental degradation.
And it seems to me that with the Fast Track victory, with the
momentum created against this MAI, this new ugly multilateral agreement,
and with this conference today, we can now organize not from fear, but
from hope. And that is my
intention from this day forward, that we share this hope, that we organize
around these things, and we take a militant stance.
And it was that militant stance: that's how we beat Fast Track.
That's how we're going to beat the MAI.
That's how we will achieve global unionism.
That is why we are here, to organize.
Thank you, and I look forward to organizing with all of you.
[applause]
Five letters of greetings received by the Organizing Committee for the Western Hemisphere Workers Conference Against NAFTA and Privatizations:
• Letter
1: World Federation of Trade Unions
Branická
112, Prague 4
Czech
Republic
Organizing
Committee
Western
Hemisphere Workers Conference
San Francisco, CA
The World Federation of Trade Unions (WFTU/FSM), which represents more
than 100 million affiliated workers on the five continents, wishes to send
you our fraternal greetings for your brilliant initiative in convening the
Western Hemisphere Workers' Conference Against NAFTA and Privatizations.
The repercussions of these policies have caused great damage to workers'
interests across the Americas. Our affiliate organizations in Latin
America highly value this call because of its unifying character. Our
affiliated unions have sought to actively participate in all your regional
and national planning events and at the conference itself. Many were
unable to attend your conference only because of economic constraints.
We will be awaiting the resolutions and agreements adopted by the
Conference, which we are sure will greatly contribute to the strengthening
of the unity of all workers.
Only with workers' global actions will we be able to win. For that
reason, we salute you for your initiative.
Wishing you great success, we fraternally subscribe to our common ideals
and goals.
On behalf of the International Secretariat
of the WFTU
signed/
Valentin Pacho,
General
Secretary
•
Letter 2: Human Rights Commission of the National Congress of Mexico
Federal
Deputy Benito Miron Lince
President,
Human Rights Commission
Legislative Palace
Republic of Mexico
Mr. Art
Pulaski,
Secretary-Treasurer,
California
Labor Federation (AFL-CIO)
San
Francisco, California
Dear Brother Pulaski,
We received your invitation to participate in the Western Hemisphere
with great interest, and we would have liked to participate directly in
this event. Unfortunately, for reasons of a legislative nature in our
country, we are unable to be present with you.
For us, it is very inspiring and gives us great hope to know that the
workers of the world are meeting in many places, such as in San Francisco
on November 14-16, and that they are trying to build a common front
against the injustices resulting from economic globalization and its
policies of privatizations -- policies resulting in crises provoked by the
large banks, Wall Street, and the financial centers. The world of human
rights is not witnessing its best era, especially when we realize that
those who are promoting these destructive economic schemes on many
occasions value the almighty dollar more than a human life.
We wish you the best success possible at your conference, and we will be
looking forward to receiving a report on the results you have achieved.
Please send us all your conference documents and resolutions so that we
can pursue this necessary and important dialogue.
Sincerely,
signed/
Benito Miron Lince,
President
•
Letter 3: Canadian Labour Congress
San
Francisco District Labour Council
1188
Franklin St. #203,
San
Francisco, CA 94109
U.S.A.
Dear
Brother Rosario:
We wish
you every success in carrying out this conference on a subject which,
indeed, is one of the very important issues of our times.
We are enclosing some materials that the CLC has published over the
past year on related issues following a similar conference organized by
the CLC in March 1996 which we hope can be of use to you.
In
solidarity,
singed/
Robert
White,
President
•
Letter 4: Workers' Central Union of Cuba/CTC
WORKERS'
CENTRAL UNION OF CUBA
SAN
CARLOS Y PEÑALVER
HAVANA,
CUBA
Walter
Johnson
Secretary
Treasurer
San
Francisco Labor Council AFL-CIO
We
really appreciate all your efforts for our participation in the Western
Hemispheric Worker's Conference Against NAFTA and Privatizations but it is
impossible for us to attend the meeting due to just one reason:
- the
U.S.A. office in Cuba (SINA) has required us the information about flight
itinerary and airports for our trip in the formulation to ask for the
visas with no less than 21 days before the departure, it means that we had
to present the formulation before October 23 and at that time we didn't
have the flight itinerary so we couldn't ask for our visas.
As all
of you know we were very interested to attend the Conference and also to
meet with SFLC-AFL-CIO because we know about what you are doing to improve
AFL-CIO relations with Cuban trade unions.
We want
to thank you for the resolution you presented at the last AFL-CIO
convention and at the same time we want to confirm you our desire to con-tinue
working to strenght the relations between our organizations.
We will
be very pleased if in the next future we have the opportunity to meet you
here in Cuba or there if we are invited to go and we get the vi-sas from
US State Department.
Give
our thanks to all the organizations and friends that have supported our
participation, specially to the officers of SFLC-AFL-CIO.
With my
best regards,
In
solidarity
Signed/
Leonel
Gonzalez Gonzalez
International
Relations Secretary,
C.T.C.
Letter
5: Ontario Secondary School Teachers' Federation
Secretary-Treasurer
California
Labour Federation
AFL/CIO
Dear
Art Pulaski:
Greetings
and our apologies for being unable to attend the conference this weekend.
As
you are aware, the troubles in Ontario continue with a government bent on
destroying public education and public services in general. The agenda for public education became clear during our
province wide political protest from October 27 to November 7. By taking complete control of education, both financially and
philosophically, the final step is the weakening of the unions.
Bill 160 allows this process and that was the focus of the teacher
political protest in Ontario.
In
early December, the government will announce the funding model for
education - this will be the last step in their agenda to bring charter
schools and voucher education to Ontario.
The
support we received during the protest was massive and that support is
on-going. Parents and the
public in general realize now the lack of democratic principle of this
government and numerous groups are active in fighting Bill 160.
Although
we have returned to work, the struggle continues.
We face the scheduled passing of the Bill in the Legislature this
week. We are making every
attempt to stop or at least delay the passing.
OSSTF
has appreciated the support received from unions across the world and in
particular, many of the unions represented at your conference this
weekend.
We
wish you well in your discussions and will remain involved in the
struggle.
In
solidarity
Your
truly
signed/
Malcolm
Buchanan
General
Secretary