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News and Updates
July 28, 2008
UFCW Calls on OSHA to Issue a Combustile Dust Standard
Washington, D.C. – OSHA’s proposed fines of $8.7 million for violations at the Imperial Sugar plant near Savannah, Georgia, where an explosion killed 13 workers in February, and at another plant in Gramercy, Louisiana, magnify the gaps in current OSHA enforcement standards with regard to combustible dust, including a reliance on “general duty” citations and a patchwork of other standards which are limited in scope and do not address such critical considerations as design, maintenance, hazard review and explosion protection. This action also underscores OSHA’s reluctance to follow the recommendations of the U.S. Chemical Safety Board (CSB) that may have prevented the tragedy in Georgia and other combustible dust explosions.
The fines also expose OSHA’s inability to monitor the actions of big businesses such as Imperial Sugar. The explosion in Georgia took place on February 7; however, OSHA inspectors found that the company had not taken immediate steps to mitigate another potential disaster when they inspected the plant in Louisiana a month later.
Earlier this year, the UFCW and the Teamsters called on OSHA to issue an emergency standard on combustible dust, and filed a petition with the U.S. Department of Labor demanding that OSHA follow the 2006 recommendations of the CSB, an independent federal agency charged with investigating industrial chemical accidents.
In 2006, the CSB recommended that OSHA issue a rule that would have reduced the possibility of combustible dust explosions. That year, the CSB conducted a major study of combustible dust hazards, and noted that a quarter of the explosions that occureed between 1980 and 2005 that were identified, occurred at food industry facilities, including sugar refineries. In only one or two investigations were these incidents caused by mechanical mysteries that were either unforeseen or unpredicted.
Standards and codes have existed for years for OSHA to build upon and eliminate this type of explosion. In 1987, OSHA issued the Grain Handling Facilities Standard as the result of grain dust explosions in the late 1970s and early 1980s. This standard has effectively reduced the number and severity of combustible grain dust explosions in the grain handling industry, but stopped short of regulating combustible dust in industries outside of the grain industry.
The UFCW applauds the U.S. House of Representatives for passing legislation to force OSHA to set a combustible dust standard, and urges President Bush to reconsider his veto threat. OSHA must act now and follow the recommendations of the CSB before more workers are killed or horribly injured.
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The United Food and Commercial Workers International Union (UFCW) represents more than 1.3 million workers, primarily in the retail and meatpacking, food processing and poultry industries. The UFCW protects the rights of workers and strengthens America’s middle class by fighting for health care reform, immigration reform, living wages, retirement security, safe working conditions and the right to unionize so that working men and women and their families can realize the American Dream. For more information about the UFCW’s effort to protect workers’ rights and strengthen America’s middle class, visit www.ufcw.org.
July 21, 2008
UFCW President Announces Aggressive New Health Care Mobilization Project
Washington, D.C. – The United Food and Commercial Workers International Union (UFCW) today pledged to aggressively mobilize its 1.3 million members in support of the newly-formed Health Care for America Now, an unprecedented coalition of organizations across the political spectrum that have come together to call for affordable, quality health care for all Americans.
UFCW International President Joe Hansen announced at the official launch of the historic campaign in Washington, D.C., that the UFCW would join the coalition of allied labor unions, medical associations, small businesses and community groups that have united in response to America’s health care crisis.
“While there may be gridlock in Washington, there is consensus in America,” said Hansen. “The American people want solutions–not sound bites. We need health care for America now.”
The event was part of series of Health Care for American Now launch activities taking place in 52 Cities across the U.S. today, including in 37 state capitals.
UFCW members are at the forefront of the fight for better health care. It is an issue that they strongly advocate for every time they sit down at the bargaining table–and just like most Americans, they believe that working people shouldn’t have to shoulder the burden of health care reform alone.
From 2003 to 2006, President Hansen served as an active member of the congressionally mandated Citizens’ Health Care Working Group. For nearly two years, the group held an unprecedented nationwide dialogue with the American people on the health care system before reporting its findings to the President and Congress.
The report documents a remarkable consensus from the American people on health care reform. Americans want affordable, quality health care coverage for all—and they want it now.
The UFCW has heard America’s call for change and will continue the fight as a proud member of the Health Care for America Now coalition. United, the coalition members will make sure the voices of average Americans are not drowned out in Washington by that of the insurance industry and big business.
July 19, 2008
CASE FARMS POULTRY WORKERS FORCED TO WITHHOLD THEIR LABOR
June 27, 2008
United Food and Commercial Workers International Union President Joe Hansen Statement on Wal-Mart
Wal-Mart’s announcement yesterday that it would notify its employees about the EITC is another company effort to polish its image.
The United Food and Commercial Workers International Union (UFCW) believes the Earned Income Tax Credit is a valuable program for workers. And we applaud efforts that educate and encourage those eligible to apply for it.
But when the world’s largest corporation, when it has revenues in excess of $300 billion, when it has a lengthy and notorious history of shifting its employment costs onto American taxpayers, and when its employment rolls are rife with workers earning wages that put them below the poverty line, it is wrong to take the stage with that company and provide cover for its mistreatment of workers and irresponsible practices.
The facts on Wal-Mart are well documented. The company’s meager wages and benefits push workers onto government assistance programs at taxpayer expense to the tune of billions every year.
Wal-Mart is in the midst of an aggressive campaign to change its public persona. But what it needs to change are its corporate practices. Shouldn’t Wal-Mart begin by taking responsibility for its own workers?
It is more than unfortunate that there are those who would participate in this sham, and it is deeply troubling that elected officials would allow Wal-Mart to cloud their good legislative intentions.
June 26, 2008
Grocery Workers in Tennessee, Kentucky, and Alabama Achieve Fair Agreement with Kroger Company
Grocery workers represented by the United Food and Commercial Workers Union (UFCW) Local 1995 have reached a tentative agreement with their employer, the Kroger Company. The agreement covers 9000 members working at 92 Kroger stores (and one freestanding pharmacy) in middle and eastern Tennessee, southern Kentucky, and northern Alabama.
UFCW Local 1995 members stuck together in solidarity through months of negotiations to achieve a fair contract with Kroger—one with affordable, quality health care, wages that pay the bills, and a secure retirement. They reached that goal with an agreement that includes:
- Significant health care improvements for full-time and part-time workers;
- Pension security; and
- Significant improvements in wages in all areas of the agreement.
Workers will be meeting to vote on ratification of the agreement Saturday, June 28th through July 2nd.
Across the country in 2007-2008, UFCW members working at Kroger and other grocery stores nationwide have reached fair agreements making grocery jobs good, middle class jobs—the kind workers can raise a family on. For more on UFCW grocery negotiations across the country, please visit the Grocery Workers United website at www.groceryworkersunited.org.
June 26, 2008
UFCW Staff Testifies Before House Subcommittee on Steps to Improve Chemical Plant Safety and Security
Washington, D.C. – John S. Morawetz, Director of Health and Safety at the United Food and Commercial Workers International Union’s (UFCW) International Chemical Workers Union Council (ICWUC), testified before the House Subcommittee on Transportation Security and Infrastructure Protection today about steps that can be taken to improve chemical plant safety and security for workers and surrounding communities in light of the recent explosion of a Goodyear plant in Houston earlier this month. The ICWUC represents more than 20,000 chemical workers in 32 states.
Morawetz, who has investigated workplace hazards, injuries and deaths since the early 1980s, testified about the industrial hazards chemical plant workers face on a daily basis, including those who work with petroleum and coal products, fertilizers, pharmaceuticals, pesticides and other agricultural chemicals in smelters and refineries, as well as with natural gas distribution and in power plants. He called on Congress to increase funding for the Chemical Safety Board and enforce stronger OSHA standards so that incidents linked to chemical hazards can be fully investigated and standards are followed and enforced. He also underlined the importance of worker involvement in chemical plant security plans, as well as the need for effective training requirements, strong whistleblower protections and safer technology in this industry.
“Chemical workers know first hand how a plant works, what chemicals are used, and any particular facilities’ weaknesses,” Morawetz said. “All these responsibilities make chemical workers the first line of defense and explain why we strongly believe vast improvements can and must be made in this nation’s chemical security.”
Morawetz also spoke about the UFCW’s commitment to improving workplace safety for all workers by enforcing existing regulations and passing stronger legislation.
“Unions have a proud history of fighting for the right to a safe workplace and for the basic right for workers to return home after a day on the job as healthy as when they left,” he said. “From workers who are concerned about their safety and health, to union negotiators seeking health and safety contract language, to unions investigating health hazards or testifying in support of legislation, we are actively involved in making our workplaces safer.”
For a copy of Morawetz’s testimony, please contact press@ufcw.org.
June 4, 2008
Change and Hope for America
Washington, D.C. – Last night’s victory by Senator Barack Obama was not only a magnificent moment for our nation, but an historic opportunity for working men and women to reclaim the American Dream.
Senator Obama’s campaign shows us the power that we have to change the direction of our country, and reminds us of our responsibility to reclaim our government on behalf of the hopes, dreams and aspirations of workers and their families across this great nation.
As he stands on the threshold of becoming the Democratic nominee for President of the United States, Senator Obama’s candidacy reflects our nation’s progress, but more importantly it represents the promise of a better tomorrow. A tomorrow in which all workers have their rights protected and their hard work respected. A tomorrow that brings affordable health care, real retirement security, economic prosperity, national security and worker safety.
For the past five months, the UFCW has mobilized its 1.3 million members across the country to support Senator Obama’s candidacy, and his message of hope and change has struck a chord with UFCW members of all ages. The UFCW will continue to mobilize, organize and energize our members to support Senator Obama and fight to regain the rights and protections that America’s workers have lost under the Bush Administration.
The past seven years of the Bush Administration have been a hard road to travel for America’s workers as they struggle to cope with the high cost of housing, health care, food, fuel and education. The fragile state of the economy, coupled with a sense of national foreboding, has led many Americans to believe that they will never achieve the American Dream of owning a home, providing their families with health care coverage, or retiring comfortably.
While Senator John McCain now tries to distance himself from President Bush, his economic, health care and trade policies celebrate the Bush legacy of giving big tax breaks to corporations, increasing health care costs and reducing benefits, and supporting trade agreements that have devastated the economy and sent good, middle class jobs overseas.
America’s workers cannot afford another four years of a leader who values corporate interests over the well being of America’s workers and their families. The UFCW will continue its fight to restore the American Dream by ensuring that Senator Obama becomes the next president of the United States.
June 4, 2008
UFCW Launches Campaign in Britain Against
One of America’s biggest unions, the 1.3 million-strong United Food and Commercial Workers union, today launched a UK campaign to expose “The Two Faces of Tesco.””
At a Westminster press launch chaired by Jon Cruddas MP, the union said that it is stepping up a campaign already begun in the United States to shame Tesco to talks on union recognition and employee pay and benefits.
The UFCW seeks to represent some of the lowest-paid and least secure retail workers in the USA, more than half of whom are women, and has been seeking talks with Tesco for two years since the world’s third-largest retailer announced its entry into the US grocery market. All attempts have so far fallen on deaf ears, and Tesco launched its chain of Fresh & Easy supermarkets in 2007 as non-union stores.
UFCW says that it is seeking the chance for dialogue, to build the same constructive partnership that Tesco enjoys in the UK with the shop workers’ union Usdaw, but Tesco refuses to meet.
So UFCW has brought the campaign to Britain. It believes that its new report – The Two Faces of Tesco – is a damning indictment of how Tesco operates different principles at home and abroad. The report also highlights what UFCW believes are stark contrasts between what Tesco says and what it does.
Speaking at the launch Jon Cruddas MP said:
“British companies which operate in the global marketplace should apply the highest standards in dealing with their workforce, both at home and abroad. What this dossier exposes about Tesco’s practices in the United States, in my view not only undermines Tesco’s reputation, but will also affect how people think about the fairness of British companies in general. I urge Tesco to put its stated principles and policies into practice and to start talking to these important stakeholders.”
The launch was also attended by UFCW member Jackie Gitmed, a cashier from a rival, unionised supermarket, and by UFCW’s campaigns director, Emily Stewart, who said:
“We were genuinely excited at the prospect of building a partnership with Tesco, so we are doubly appalled at the way it is behaving towards us and the many community groups which have tried and failed to meet with it.
“Tesco has a great reputation for employment rights and corporate responsibility in the UK, but this is a reputation which, in our view, is sullied by its behaviour in the USA.
“Our dossier exposes Tesco’s two faces, and we intend to campaign in Britain to show Tesco’s other face to British people, British investors and British politicians, in the hope that they will influence Tesco to stop and think again about how they conduct their business in America. We are asking for nothing more than Tesco already does here.”
Jackie Gitmed, a cashier from Ralphs Supermarket in Encino, California, with 32 years’ experience in unionised stores, added:
“We’re never going to be rich working for a grocery store, but we all deserve a shot at earning a living wage and health insurance we can afford, as well as the peace of mind to know that we won’t be let go at a moment’s notice.
“In my 32 years working with the protection of a union agreement, I have enjoyed job security and union-negotiated healthcare and pensions benefits. Our colleagues at Tesco’s Fresh & Easy stores don’t have this. I have flown from LA to London because this campaign is important. I hope it will make Tesco pay attention, so that my fellow workers in Tesco’s US stores can enjoy the benefits and opportunities they deserve.”
April 30, 2008
NATIONAL COMMISSION INVESTIGATING MISCONDUCT BY IMMIGRATION ENFORCEMENT AGENTS HOLDS PUBLIC HEARING IN DES MOINES
DES MOINES – A recently formed national commission examining raids by Immigration and Customs Enforcement (ICE) agents held its third regional hearing today at Plymouth Church in Des Moines, Iowa.
“The goal of today’s hearing is to shine a spotlight on the government’s activities,” said commission member and former Iowa Governor Tom Vilsack. “Our Constitution is at stake, and if our government can’t following the Constitution, that is a serious problem that must be addressed.”
The hearing focused on the impact of workplace immigration raids in Marshalltown, Iowa, Grand Island, Neb., and Greeley, Colo., and examined how the execution of these raids is part of a wider pattern of ICE misconduct occurring across the country.
“”This is our third regional hearing and the fact that at each one we are hearing similar testimony of heavy handed tactics by immigration agents, as well as examples of clear violations of workers’ constitutional rights, is deeply troubling and points to the systemic and recurring nature of these injustices,” said Joseph T. Hansen, founding chairman of the National Commission and United Food and Commercial Workers (UFCW) International Union president.
The hearing in Des Moines was part of a series of regional public meetings that the commission is holding to explore the execution, implications and ramifications of workplace immigration enforcement. The commission will also look into claims that ICE has engaged in violations of the 4th amendment. After a thorough investigation, the commission will produce a public report that highlights its findings and makes recommendations about how the system should be reformed.
“Many of the misdeeds that we have heard from occurred to workers who are in this country legally; U.S. citizens who have lived in the United States their whole lives, people who were born here or who immigrated properly to this country,” added Vilsack. “That is what concerns me, and why it is critical that these activities are exposed and adequately addressed.”
To date, ICE has refused to address the concerns raised by the witnesses who have testified.
“This commission has heard from workers, from religious leaders, from elected officials at every level of government and from psychological and legal experts,” added Hansen. “For ICE to try to ignore the pain these workers have gone through, as well as the testimony of respected leaders and elected officials about the devastation and destruction these raids cause families and communities, is simply unacceptable. We will continue to draw public attention to their actions until the system is appropriately reformed.”
The national commission was created in response to a series of raids that took place at meatpacking plants in America’s heartland. On December 12, 2006, thousands of innocent workers were detained at meatpacking plants in six states during workplace raids carried out by federal ICE agents. The UFCW represents workers at five of the plants, including Worthington, Minn.; Greeley, Colo.; Cactus, Tex.; Marshalltown, Iowa; and Grand Island, Neb.
On September 12, 2007, the UFCW filed a lawsuit against the Department of Homeland Security and ICE to protect the 4th amendment rights of all Americans and enjoin the government from illegally arresting and detaining workers, including U.S. citizens and legal residents, while at their workplace.
In addition to Vilsack and Hansen, a broad group of leading policy experts serves on the commission. The commission held its first hearing in Washington, D.C., on February 25, 2008, and the second hearing in Boston on April 7, 2008. Future hearings are scheduled in Atlanta, Ga., for May 29, 2008.
Civilian-driven commissions have played an important role in U.S. history. When African-Americans were arrested, beaten and killed during the civil rights movement, the tragedies fueled the McCone Commission in 1965 and the National Advisory Commission in 1968.
When Japanese-Americans were sent to internment camps during World War II, the Commission on Wartime Relocation and Internment of Civilians was established to investigate these unacceptable civil rights violations.
Citizen review panels are often created to help renew a commitment to rights guaranteed by the U.S. Constitution, especially when those rights are violated by local police brutality.
April 23, 2008
IMPRESS USA, Inc. WORKERS IN BLOOMSBURG RATIFY NEW CONTRACT
Milton, PA—United Food and Commercial Workers (UFCW) Local #38 announces the successful ratification of a new three-year contract with Impress USA, Inc. at their plant located in Bloomsburg, PA. Approximately 145 workers at this location make metal food cans for Del Monte, Simmons, and Suter food companies, among others. The new contract delivers wage increases and vacation improvements, maintains affordable health care, and makes significant improvements in overtime pay. A majority voted to ratify the contract on Sunday, April 20.
Highlights of the new agreement:
–Wages for current employees will increase by 3 ½ % per year over the term of the agreement.
–Employees will now be able to use up to 2 weeks of vacation in single day increments. Employees can earn two days of vacation for perfect attendance. Workers will be allowed to carry up to three days over to the following year, or have the days paid out.
–Employees keep affordable health care coverage with only modest increases in their premiums and no plan changes.
–The contract provides the following overtime improvements and protections:
— Workers will be paid double time on the 6th and 7th day for any work over 60 hours.
— Workers will be paid double time on the 7th day for work over 48 hours.
— When workers volunteer to work or are forced to work overtime three times in one pay period, the company cannot force them to work any more overtime in that pay period.
— When workers volunteer to work six consecutive days of overtime, then the company cannot force them to work more overtime for six days.
UFCW Local 38 represents over 1500 workers in the Milton and Bloomsburg areas. Local President Russ Baker credits the strong work ethic of the membership at the Bloomsburg Plant as the main reason the contract passed. “”Both sides recognized that it takes a cooperative effort in today’s business climate to achieve fair and balanced labor agreements,”” Baker said. I know that both the UFCW and Impress USA, Inc. hope for continued success in Bloomsburg for many years to come.””