Workers Challenge IKEA’s American Labor Relations Record by Calling for Union Recognition
BOSTON – Today, workers at the IKEA furniture store in Stoughton, Mass. filed with the company for union recognition. While IKEA USA has union manufacturing plants in Danville, Va., and IKEA Group prides itself on positive relationships with unionized workers in stores around the world, this is the first time that IKEA retail workers in the United States have formed a union.
The bargaining unit consists of workers in the Goods Flow In department. The workers are joining the United Food and Commercial Workers (UFCW), the nation’s largest private sector union with 1.3 million members.
“I love working at IKEA, and I want to make a career here,” said eight year IKEA co-worker Chris DeAngelo. “A union is the best way to work together to live our values and build an even better IKEA. We’ve gone through a lot at our store, but this is a chance to turn over a new leaf and reset the relationship between IKEA’s hard-working men and women and management. If IKEA does what is right and chooses to recognize our union today, it will show that IKEA respects our right to join a union without fear of retaliation or harassment.”
Workers are seeking union recognition in an NLRB process that allows an employer to voluntarily recognize a union when workers demonstrate majority support. An overwhelming majority of Goods Flow In workers have signed a public petition to join the union. A copy of the petition can be obtained by contacting mbulloch@ufcw.org.
The Boston-area IKEA store has been the subject of a recent National Labor Relations Board (NLRB) complaint filed in Boston, alleging that the company violated federal law by unlawfully infringing on the right of workers to engage in protected union activity. The company has since settled the complaint with the NLRB.
The effort to improve the lives of IKEA workers has garnered domestic and international support. Philip Jennings, General Secretary of UNI Global Union, stated, “here at the meeting of our World Executive Board, the affiliates of UNI, representing 20 million workers, including those working at IKEA stores the world over, have stated their unequivocal support for the brave actions of workers in IKEA Stoughton”. Jennings continued, “we call on IKEA to listen to the workers at Stoughton and recognize their union rights; and we have today committed to stand with these workers until they have a union contract.”
UNI Global Union is an international federation of unions, representing the unions of IKEA retail workers around the world.
UNI Global Union, based in Nyon, Switzerland, represents more than 20 million workers from over 900 trade. UNI and our affiliates in all regions are driven by the responsibility to ensure these jobs are decent and workers’ rights are protected, including the right to join a union and collective bargaining.
Washington, D.C. — Today, Marc Perrone, International President of the United Food and Commercial Workers (UFCW), the largest private sector union in the nation, released the following statement in response to the Trans-Pacific Partnership (TPP) trade deal text becoming public.
“Donald Trump and Hillary Clinton don’t agree on much, but both believe that the Trans-Pacific Partnership (TPP) is a terrible trade deal for America.
“In a nation so divided politically, a trade deal must be truly devastating to hard-working families when leading Presidential candidates from both parties find common ground in opposing it.
“Of course, the American people should not take anyone’s word for it. Finally, everyone will now have the opportunity, after months of backroom deals and secret negotiations, to read for themselves the truth about how this trade deal will destroy jobs and lead to lower wages in America.
“Our message to Members of Congress is a simple one – listen to the concerns of UFCW members, everyday Americans and even the leading voices in the current Presidential race – and defeat the TPP once and for all.
“We may not be able to change every mind, but we will remember and hold accountable those elected leaders, Democrat or Republican, who choose to stand with corporate special interests, instead of doing what is right for hard-working men and women and their families.”
A new report from UFCW Canada and the Agriculture Workers Alliance reveals how many of Canada’s more than 45,000 migrant and temporary agriculture workers regularly face workplace and human rights abuse. The Status of Migrant Farm Workers in Canada 2015 details how this mostly invisible workforce, hidden away in agriculture centers across Canada, is left vulnerable to exploitation because of legislative and regulatory discrimination that denies migrant agriculture workers basic workplace, labor, and health and safety rights.
Currently, in Ontario – the province with the largest agriculture workforce – workers in the sector are excluded from unionizing under the Labour Relations Act. In most jurisdictions across the country, migrant agriculture workers are also restricted from the fullest protection of provincial employment standards and health and safety regulations. As the new report details, the result is that Canada’s migrant agriculture workers are faced with conditions where exploitation and abuse are all too common. Migrant and temporary agriculture worker programs in Canada are regulated by the federal government, and typically tie a worker to one employer with no option to seek another if there is a workplace problem.
Providing transferable work permits is just one of the report’s 19 recommended legal reforms to provide fair treatment for migrant agriculture workers. Other recommendations include an impartial worker appeal process when faced with arbitrary repatriation, national standards to monitor and discipline offshore recruiters, mandatory dormitory health and safety inspections, as well as revising discriminatory legislation where it exists, to provide agriculture workers the same rights as other workers to join a union and bargain collectively.
The full report on the status of Migrant Agriculture Workers in Canada 2015 is available for download in PDF format at www.ufcw.ca/statusreport2015.
LabCorp workers at labs across San Diego and Los Angeles County voted union Yes this week to join UFCW Local 135 and UFCW Local 770. The workers join a growing movement of phlebotamists and lab technicians who have come together from the Northwest to the Southwest to raise standards in the health-care industry.
LabCorp is one of the largest laboratory networks in the world, employing workers throughout the United States and Canada. Given the company’s prominence, workers hope that through the growing power of their combined voice, LabCorp workers will be able to influence and improve standards for workers throughout the industry.
“I voted yes for all the young workers at LabCorp,” said Leon Guttierez, who joined the UFCW in May along with his coworkers at the Chino LabCorp location. “I want them to have a better future than I did while working in this industry for so long. ”
California LabCorp workers began their organizing campaign after a chance encounter with their unionized counterparts in Washington state. With the encouragement and support of their northwestern coworkers, LabCorp workers in California are coming together and finding their voice.
Already, their organizing efforts are paying off as many LabCorp workers have seen significant raises since the campaign began.
Frank Meehan spent two decades spearheading the United Food & Commercial Workers’ (UFCW) effort to raise money to defeat blood cancers. As president of the Long Island, NY Local, he was one of the first leaders to act upon the union’s national relationship withThe Leukemia & Lymphoma Society (LLS).
Then last spring, in a twist of fate, he ended up losing his life to one of the aggressive leukemias he’d been hoping to see cured.
“It’s so ironic. He worked so hard for this cause,” said his wife Pam. “He kicked off UFCW’s involvement for years. For him to pass from acute myeloid leukemia (AML) just blew us all away.”
Meehan, who was 75, looked and felt fine when he went for his annual physical in December. He had a low level of vitamin B12 that he couldn’t seem to kick but that was it. When a doctor did a bone marrow biopsy in March just to be safe, he was diagnosed with AML. The initial treatment knocked out his white blood cells and when he developed a complication, it couldn’t be treated and he got pneumonia. He died on Easter Sunday, only three weeks after being diagnosed.
At first his family was angry. He did so much to fight leukemia. Why would this happen to him?
“But then you ask why it would happen to a small child,” said Pam Meehan. “There’s no answer. It’s just a devastating loss.”
This year’s Light The Night Walk is a special one for Local 1500 as members are participating in the Oct. 17 event in East Meadow in honor of Meehan. The “Cancer Kicker” group has traditionally raised more than $50,000 a year for LLS by hosting walks at Shea Stadium, bowling tournaments, comedy shows, raffles and bus trips to Atlantic City, When Meehan retired in 2005, the local raised more than $100,000 in his honor and donated it to LLS.
“Frank lived a life of openhearted generosity and cared for all who met him,” said Tony Speelman, secretary-treasurer for Local 1500. “He touched the lives of thousands of working men and women through his kindred spirit, generosity and loving demeanor. He was a friend, a father, a husband, a grandfather, but no title could ever sum up the essence of Frank Meehan. He was simply one of a kind.”
The labor leader was at the forefront of battles to improve the working conditions of thousands of union members. A part-time grocery store worker who rose to become a store manager, he became an organizer and union representative, and was elected president of Local 1500 in 1984.
David Timko, LLS’s senior vice president for volunteer engagement, said that once Meehan understood the LLS mission and the tragedy of blood cancers, he took up the cause. The union held him in high regard and he was an inspiration to others, Timko said. While sick in the hospital, he signed a release to donate blood and other samples for research.
“He lived such a rich life and did so much for others,” Timko added. “He spent so many years fundraising for LLS and he passed away just as we were beginning to make progress.”
Pam Meehan said she continues to have great hope for upcoming research. For her husband, doctors said that getting AML was like flipping a switch. One minute you’re fine, the next you’re sick.
“I hope somewhere out there someone will find a way to turn that switch off and save other people from going through this,” she said.
The United Food and Commercial Workers Union (UFCW) has been a powerful voice for LLS for an amazing 32 years – raising close to $77 million! In 2015 alone, the UFCW raised $1.9 million in the U.S. and more than $2.5 million in Canada. Fundraising activities included charity golf tournaments, auctions, dinners, bottle drives, bowling events and sporting clay shooting events along with participation in LLS campaigns such as Light The Night, Team In Training and other activities.
The UFCW is now focusing on getting more of its locals to participate in the Light The Night Walk and it looks like that number will triple this fall.
Here are just a few examples of how the UFCW has been involved. Local 328, representing workers in Rhode Island, southern Massachusetts. and eastern Connecticut, reached the $1 million milestone recently through its annual golf tournament. In addition, UFCW Local 75 in the Cincinnati/Dayton area raised $110,000 with a charity golf tournament, Shoot for a Cure event and participation in Light The Night. UFCW members affiliated with The Beer Store supported a bottle drive for LLSC throughout Canada that raised more than $1.7 million.
The UFCW, the largest private sector union in the country, represents workers in the grocery industry as well as nursing homes; retail clothing stores; poultry, meatpacking and food processing plants; and in numerous other retail and food manufacturing areas.
Seventy-two percent of underpaid workers approve of labor unions, and 75 percent support a $15 minimum wage and a union according to the first-ever poll of workers paid less than $15 an hour.
The poll, released last Monday by the National Employment Law Project (NELP), follows on an April 2015 NELP study that found 42 percent of workers in the nation are paid less than $15 an hour. With the presidential campaign season heating up and Democrats convening next week for their first candidate debate, the poll looks at the voting preferences of this critical demographic of underpaid workers:
69 percent of unregistered respondents say they would register to vote if there were a presidential candidate who supports raising the minimum wage to $15 an hour and making it easier for workers to join a union;
65 percent of registered voters say they are more likely to vote if a candidate supports $15 and a union for all workers; and
69 percent of respondents favor raising the minimum wage to $15 an hour.
72 percent of underpaid workers approve of unions;
69 percent say it should be easier for workers like themselves to join together and form a union;
72 percent believe unions can make a real difference in whether or not workers like themselves get raises;
66 percent say they would have a better chance of making $15 an hour and being able to support their families if they could join a union; and
Support for $15 and a union is particularly strong in the South: 77 percent of Southern respondents expressed support.
“We’ve long known that unions help create good jobs and boost the economy, and now we know that underpaid workers share that view as well,” said NELP Executive Director Christine Owens. “An overwhelming majority want $15 and a union—and a president who will stand behind them in support of these basic rights. Underpaid workers in our country are a powerful force to be reckoned with in the workplace and the voting booth.”
For Immediate Release October 9, 2015 Contact:press@ufcw.org
#AnswerMyQuestion Initiative Will Pose Questions to all 2016 Candidates, beginning with Upcoming Democratic Debate, and Aims to Hold Them Accountable to Hardworking Men and Women
Washington, D.C. — Today, the United Food and Commercial Workers (UFCW), the largest private sector union in the nation, launched an online grassroots social media campaign asking UFCW members and other hardworking men and women to submit their questions and concerns to 2016 presidential candidates.
The goal of the #AnswerMyQuestions2016 campaign is to pressure 2016 presidential candidates, Democrat and Republican, to answer the tough questions that truly matter to our members and all hard-working families – whether they are union members or not.
The first phase of the #answermyquestion2016 initiative will focus on Democratic candidates participating in their first debate in Las Vegas, which will air October 13th at 8:30pm EST on CNN.
Using the hashtags #AnswerMyQuestion2016 and #DemDebate, UFCW members, supporters, and everyday Americans will be encouraged to submit any questions they have for Hilary Clinton, Bernie Sanders, Martin O’Malley, Jim Webb, and Lincoln Chafee. Questions asked through tweets, photos, videos, and all other forms of social media creativity will be accepted – if it is hash tagged, we will find it.
As part of an effort to focus the debate on the issues that matter to hard-working families, questions will also be submitted to CNN and posted on UFCW’s Tumblr page (ufcw.tumblr.com).
The goal of this effort is to ensure that candidates are answering real questions from real people and are held accountable for how they will better the lives of everyday Americans if they become President of the United States.
As we continue to celebrate Hispanic Heritage Month, we’re highlighting the story of Fermin Rodriguez, who has bravely stood up for his coworkers and their collective union rights.
Fermin is a member of UFCW Local 770, and works at El Super–a California-based, Mexican owned supermarket chain. Fermin had worked for El Super for 9 years, until the company illegally terminated him, simply for standing up for workers’ rights. The company tried to silence him due to his union activity, and the union’s charges lead the National Labor Relations Board (NLRB) to obtain a court injunction that ordered the grocer to return Fermin to work
Since September, 2013, Fermin and his fellow workers had been working without a contract because El Super refused to bargain with them even after the workers fought off the company’s decertification attempt to take away their Local 770 union representation. In response, the workers launched a boycott to protest the company’s unfair labor practices at their store. Since then, workers like Fermin have continued to speak up about what the company is doing, and have gained support from other workers and community members from far and wide.
In late July, Federal Distict Court Judge George King granted the National Labor Relations Board’s (NLRB) request for a rare “10j” injunction to stop El Super’s unfair labor practices and immediately remedy their unlawful treatment of workers. In the face of El Super’s coercive and threatening conduct designed to silence workers, Chief Judge George H. King issued the significant “10j” injunction, ordering not only the immediate reinstatement of Fermín, but the restoration of workers vacation accrua which El Super had taken away. The Company also conceded in the face of these actions that it would return to the bargaining table.
Fermin is proud of this victory but is clear that this fight isn’t just about him–“it’s about respect for all workers and basic protections on the job. The ability to take sick leave when we or a family member is ill; a fair wage that reflects our contribution to the company’s giant profits; and guaranteed full-time hours for those willing to work.”
To speak out about how he and his coworkers are engaged in a campaign to stand up for worker rights, Fermin came to Washinton, D.C. this week to #StartTheConvo at the White House Summit on worker voice.
His message? “Don’t let yourself be exploited. Fight for your rights. Join a union. Unions are there to protect all workers from exploitation and ensure that employers respect workers’ rights.”
Fermin also used the opportunity to discuss how unions are at the forefront of fighting for immigrant workers’ rights: “It is imperative for workers to realize that they shouldn’t be afraid and know that they have rights. Regardless of whether workers are documented or undocumented, the union is here to help all workers. It is important to know that we, Latino workers, come to this country to work hard, contribute to the economy of this country, and fight to better the lives of our families. It is important for this to be taken into account and finally pass immigration reform.”
In his remarks, Fermin also touched on the significance of Hispanic Heritage Month, and what it means to him: “It is an honor and gives me a sense of pride in my work and my contribution. Latinos come to the USA to improve our living standards and to help our families here and back home. Whether we are from Mexico or other countries in Central America, Hispanic Herititage Month is important to us because we come here to work hard, not only for ourselves but to help this country as well.”
This year, Hispanic Heritage Month coincides with the 50th anniversary of the beginning of the Delano Grape Strike, and provides us with an opportunity to pay tribute to two great labor leaders who co-founded the National Farm Workers Association (NFWA) and helped to organize one of the most successful strikes in labor history—Cesar Chavez and Dolores Huerta.
On September 8, 1965, Filipino farm workers in Delano, Calif., who were members of the Agricultural Workers Organizing Committee (AWOC), walked off the job at table grape farms in the area to protest the low pay and poor working conditions. The leaders of AWOC knew that a successful strike had to include the many Latino farm workers in Delano, and they reached out to Chavez, Huerta and the NFWA to join them in their fight for dignity and respect on the job. Chavez insisted that the Filipino and Latino strikers work together and take a vow to remain nonviolent, and expanded the goals of the strikers to include the right to unionize and engage in collective bargaining. Realizing their common goals, the NFWA and AWOC merged to form the United Farm Workers Organizing Committee in 1966.
In 1966, Chavez led a strike of California grape workers on a 300 mile march from Delano to Sacramento to raise awareness for their cause. Soon, the strike spread to thousands of workers and the movement gained national attention and support from around the country, including the support of Robert F. Kennedy. In 1967, Chavez shifted his focus and urged consumers and supermarket chains to boycott table grapes. In response to the plight of the farm workers, Americans throughout the country refrained from buying table grapes in a show of support. After five years of nonviolent strikes, boycotts, marches and fasts, the United Farm Workers Organizing Committee succeeded in reaching a collective bargaining agreement with table grape growers in California in 1970—resulting in better pay, benefits and workplace conditions for thousands of farm workers.
In 1972, the United Farm Workers Organizing Committee was accepted into the AFL-CIO and changed its name to the United Farmworkers Union. A year later in 1973, Chavez and Huerta led another successful consumer boycott against California grape growers that resulted in the California Agricultural Labor Relations Act of 1975, which allowed farm workers to form unions and bargain for better wages and working conditions.
On Oct. 7, the White House is holding a summit with leaders in the various movements to improve the lives of working people across the country, with a focus on how to make sure that economic growth is broad-based and that workers share in the benefits they help create with their labor. Until the summit begins, we’ll be highlighting the stories of workers and their struggles to make sure their voices are heard on the job.
Today, we take a look at Lydia Flores.
Flores is a 37-year-old single mother of three who works as a cashier at union El Super market in Arleta, Calif. She and her co-workers have been fighting for a new contract for more than two years in the face of a campaign by the company to undermine the workers’ desires for fair working conditions and a voice on the job.
Currently, she makes $12.88 per hour after 11 years at the company. The low wages and the lack of sufficient hours keep Flores in a constant struggle to pay her bills:
I pay the mortgage and my car and my utilities—and the rest of the bills have to wait. Sometimes I work 32, 36 hours. The 40 hours are not guaranteed.
When Flores speaks up about anything at work, she says that she is met with hostility and disdain. Other workers at El Super have made similar complaints.
Flores says the workers want more:
We want more respect and enough hours to support our families. If we had a contract, they would respect the 40 hours, and we would not have to be fearful about raising concerns about the company’s failure to follow the rules
Flores knows that coming together with her co-workers can make positive change. She is a member of the United Food and Commercial Workers (UFCW) Local 770, a shop steward and a member of the union’s bargaining committee.
El Super employs low‐wage and predominantly Latino workers. The workers at the union stores were covered under a contract with El Super that expired on Sept. 27, 2013. For more than a year, the unions and the worker bargaining team sought to bargain to improve their working conditions. In September 2013, El Super imposed what it called its “last, best and final” offer, which did not address the workers’ concerns and provided for less paid sick leave than is currently mandated by California state law. On Dec. 12, 2014, El Super workers voted resoundingly to recertify the union and demanded the company return to the bargaining table, a request which El Super rejected. El Super employees and the UFCW launched a boycott in December 2014 to protest the company’s actions. The union’s boycott lines have turned away more than 100,000 prospective El Super shoppers. In the face of the boycott and after the NLRB issued complaint and sought a 10(j) injunction in federal court regarding the company’s unlawful refusal to bargain, the company agreed to return to the table. El Super recently agreed to bargain for the first time in more than a year.
Flores and her fellow workers aren’t making outrageous demands, especially in light of the fact they are owned by a billion-dollar business:
“What we’re trying to do with our consumer boycott of El Super is trying to get something better for our families. We just want the company to hear us, we want them to come and negotiate and give us what is fair. We’re asking for better wages, regular schedules and hours to support our families and respect, that’s what we want.”
About El Super
El Super is managed by the Paramount, Calif.-based Bodega Latina Corp. There are 50 El Super locations in Southern California, Arizona and Nevada. Bodega Latina Corp. is 81.4% owned by Mexico-based Grupo Commercial Chedraui (Chedraui). Chedraui operates 211 markets in Mexico. It is Mexico’s third-largest retailer.
In January 2013, Forbes estimated the personal wealth of Chedraui’s chairman of the board, Alfredo Chedraui Obeso, at more than $1 billion. That year the company made $5.1 billion in revenue. The El Super stores make up more than 20% of Grupo Chedraui’s income.
