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News and Updates
Industry News
September 30, 2010
UFCW President Joe Hansen New Chair of Change to Win
WASHINGTON, DC — The Change to Win (CtW) Leadership Council elected Joe Hansen, United Food and Commercial Workers International Union (UFCW) President, as its new Chair. Hansen replaces Anna Burger who earlier had announced her retirement from CtW where she served as Chair. Teamsters General President Jim Hoffa was elected CtW Secretary-Treasurer.
Change to Win unions, the UFCW, SEIU, the Teamsters and Farm Workers represent millions of private-sector unionized workforces in the U.S. Change to Win members work in the fastest growing industries in the country in service-sector jobs, including transportation, health care, food production and retail, among others.
The following is a statement from Joe Hansen:
“Change to Win is focused on ensuring that workers in the various service sectors have jobs with wages and benefits that can support a family. If these jobs are vital to the American economy, then service sector jobs should come with middle class wages and benefits.
“We know that a stronger labor movement is essential to the rebuilding of America’s middle class and that will be the primary focus of our work at Change to Win.
“”We will continue our strategic work building strength for workers in our core industries.
“We will continue our advocacy on key public policy issues, including labor law, pension, and comprehensive immigration reform, food safety and health care. We are also committed to working with the Administration to ensure that the purchasing power of the federal government exercises wise stewardship of taxpayer money by promoting quality, family-supporting jobs.
“We will continue close coordination with our labor partners at the AFL-CIO on public policy issues. Both labor Federations share unity of purpose to address the crisis facing American workers.
Change to Win and the AFL-CIO will work together to make sure that candidates that support working families win in November.
The Change to Win unions are more inspired than ever to stand up for workers’ rights and make the economy grow again for working families through good jobs in every community.””
James P. Hoffa, General President of the Teamsters stated: “”The United States is the first country where a majority of its citizens joined the middle class. Labor unions created that middle class. No country in the world has ever had a strong middle class without a strong labor movement. And like all social movements, the labor movement was born fighting. Our work is far from over today, and Joe Hansen is the kind of leader we need in our fight to strengthen America’s working families.”
Said SEIU President Mary Kay Henry: “”Joe Hansen’s determination to make sure that 5,000 Smithfield workers had the chance to vote for the union after 16 years is exactly the leadership we need to rededicate Change to Win to lifting wages for millions of private sector workers.””
UFW President Arturo S. Rodriguez said: “”I want to congratulate Joe on his new position, there is no doubt in my mind that he is the right person to move the organization forward. I’m sure that he will continue to ensure that Change To Win leads the way in developing new strategies, new programs and new efforts to effectively organize workers in the private sector.””
September 23, 2010
Workers From “814 Americas” Plant Join Local 464A
Workers at the 814 Americas, Inc. meat processing plant in Elizabeth, N.J, overwhelmingly voted on September 9th, 2010 to join Local 464A. The unit of 27 joins more than a quarter million meatpacking and food processing workers across North America who already have a voice at work with the UFCW.
Patrick Cudahy, a subsidiary of U.S. meat processor Smithfield Foods, acquired 814 Americas, Inc. from Spanish food company Campofrio Alimentacion, in 2005. The UFCW continues to build strength and solidarity across the industry as an increasing number of Smithfield Foods workers across the country join with their brothers and sisters for better jobs and a voice at work.
September 16, 2010
WHITE HOUSE APPOINTS UFCW PRESIDENT JOE HANSEN TO ADVISORY COMMITTEE FOR TRADE POLICY
WASHINGTON, DC-Joe Hansen, President of the 1.3 million member United Food and Commercial Workers Union (UFCW) has been appointed to the United States Trade Representatives Advisory Committee for Trade Policy.
The UFCW represents workers in the meatpacking, food processing, poultry, food distribution and retail food sectors of our economy. As the economies of developing countries grow, demand for food products made in the US-particularly meat-is increasing. Hansen is committed to ensuring that American farmers, workers, and responsible businesses and manufacturers are not locked out of these emerging growth markets. Hansens experience in the global union movement, and his role negotiating contracts with multi-national meatpacking, food processing, and grocery companies gives him a unique perspective and the capability to ensure the voice of working people is heard in trade agreements that affect their livelihoods.
I am so honored to accept this appointment. Food and meat industry representatives have long served on this Advisory Committee; I want to express my appreciation to President Obama and Ambassador Ron Kirk for nominating me as representative of workers in these industries. I look forward to working with Ambassador Kirk on trade policies that create more jobs in the U.S. by increasing our food and meat exports; and on improving working, living, and environmental standards for workers and their families both here and abroad-standards that will also benefit consumers, businesses, farmers and manufacturers, Hansen said.
September 14, 2010
MOTT’S
Washington, DC—United Food and Commercial Workers Local Union (UFCW) 220* ratified a new contract, yesterday, ending a three-and-a-half-month strike at the Dr Pepper Snapple Group owned Mott’s Plant in Williamson, New York. The new agreement restores wage levels, maintains affordable health care, and continues the pension plan.
The strike became a national symbol for working people struggling to maintain middle class jobs and strong communities, after Dr Pepper Snapple Group imposed a $1.50 per hour wage decrease and other cuts on the workers. UFCW members, along with community and other allies, engaged in nearly 600 actions, including handbilling shoppers at grocery stores across the country in support of Local 220* members. Driven by blogs and social networks, tens of thousands of people joined the cause of the Mott’s strikers, advocating for good jobs with paychecks that pay the bills.
Local 220* members will be back on the job September 20, eager once again to make applesauce and other great products for American families.
July 9, 2010
Shaw’s
Metheun, Mass. – Associates at the Shaw’s Methuen (Mass.) distribution center have ratified a mediator-recommended settlement agreement, ending the strike that began March 7. The four-year contract continues Shaw’s long-standing history of providing good wages, comprehensive and affordable health care and a generous retirement plan. It also allows the company to operate more efficiently and address changing business conditions in a very competitive marketplace. Both sides are committed to working together to meet the needs of the business and its customers.
June 28, 2010
UFCW Members Celebrate New Contract with Giant Eagle
(Pittsburgh, Penn.) – Late last Friday, thousands of Giant Eagle supermarket workers from Western Pennsylvania and West Virginia ratified a new contract with Giant Eagle. Highlights of the agreements between the members of the United Food and Commercial Workers Local 23 and Giant Eagle include:
- Substantial hourly wage increases over the four-year contract;
- Higher pay rates and vacation benefits for newly hired workers;
- Increased quality and access to affordable health benefits; and
- Strengthening of retirement security for all workers.
Ratification of the contract stands to benefit Giant Eagle, the workers that have made the company a market-leading success, and communities around Pittsburgh and Western Pennsylvania.
“UFCW Local 23 members were facing a number of issues in these negotiations but our membership came together. The new contract is a testament to our solidarity and union spirit,” said Tony Helfer, UFCW Local 23 President.
UFCW Local 23 members mobilized like never before to inspire customers to support Giant Eagle, a local supermarket company, and to stand with its workers. With a number of Giant Eagle franchise stores in the area where workers are not afforded the same rights and benefits as the UFCW Local 23 members, workers plan to take the energy and momentum from this bargaining process to work toward raising standards across the company.
The contract covers approximately 5,800 employees at 36 Giant Eagle Stores in Western Pennsylvania and Northern West Virginia and will be in effect until June 28th 2014. UFCW Local 23 represents a total of over 13,000 members in West Virginia, Western Pennsylvania and Eastern Ohio.
June 9, 2010
One Year After Tragedy in Garner, Safety Regulations Can
WASHINGTON, D.C. – The following is a statement from Jackie Nowell, Director of Occupational Safety and Health at the United Food and Commercial Workers International Union:
A year ago today – June 9, 2009 – it was a warm afternoon in Garner, North Carolina when a powerful explosion leveled the ConAgra Foods plant. A tragic error in judgment while installing a new water heater led an outside contractor to repeatedly release natural gas from a pipe into an enclosed room near the center of the building and an unknown spark set it ablaze.
The resulting explosion and toxic ammonia release killed four people and injured 70 others. It was a preventable tragedy that destroyed lives, livelihoods and a community of friends and neighbors. The United Food and Commercial Workers represented the more than 300 ConAgra workers affected by the blast and saw first-hand the devastation caused by this explosion.
Conflagrations like this one killed and injured workers from Missouri to Michigan, and yet no regulations existed to prevent contractors from purging gas lines into closed spaces. Working with authorities and experts from across the country we set about to change this. Our fight became marked by even greater urgency after five workers were killed in yet another gas purging explosion in Connecticut that February.
Along with the U.S. Chemical Safety Board, who investigated this explosion, we urged the National Fire Protection Association (NFPA) – who provides safety codes for building contractors across the country – to adopt regulations that would prevent contractors from purging explosive gasses into enclosed spaces. But after heavy lobbying from the natural gas and propane industries, the NFPA wilted like old lettuce and failed to stand for the safety of America’s workers.
So here we are, one year later. The plant in Garner rather is scheduled to close, bringing a second round of devastation to the community. We know we can’t bring back these workers, these friends, these family members back to their community and their loved ones. The broken system at the NFPA has failed to learn from these tragedies and has bowed to industry pressure to let these deadly indoor gas purges continue unregulated.
This is frankly unacceptable. As Debra Petteway, a Food and Commercial Workers member who worked in the ConAgra plant and lost her son to the explosion said, “Louis Watson was my son, he was my only son, and now he’s gone. They didn’t have to die, and if someone doesn’t fix this, it’s going to happen again.”
Ms. Petteway is right. The NFPA, who is supposed to protect workers like her son, has shirked their duty.
So one year later, the “experts” charged with protecting America’s workers have failed to learn from this tragedy or from the legions before or after. How much longer will we wait with no regulatory or legislative action for the safety of American workers? The Occupational Safety and Health Administration (OSHA) and our legislators must not wait for these quasi-governmental regulatory bodies to demonstrate their craven kowtowing to industry demands any longer. We need comprehensive legislative or OSHA regulation so that the lessons of those who gave their lives in these explosions are not forgotten and all those that come later are protected from a similar fate.
June 3, 2010
Activists Call for End to Gender Discrimination During Walmart Shareholder Meeting
Washington, DC – The following statement is from the Wake Up Walmart campaign of the United Food and Commercial Workers International Union (UFCW):
“With the disclosure of a 1995 internal Walmart memo documenting company-wide discriminatory practices nearly six years before the landmark Dukes v. Walmart class-action lawsuit, the women of Walmart are taking another step forward in their march for justice.
“Walmart shareholders must hold Walmart CEO Mike Duke accountable for the company’s failure to follow federal anti-discrimination and workplace laws. The retail giant could face more than a billion dollars in back wages and other damages to women to settle the class-action suit. Today’s news is a smoking gun that Walmart leadership was aware of the financial risk facing the company for six years before women took legal action against its policies that systematically paid female workers less than their male counterparts and prevented women from winning promotions.
“The internal memo was first reported on by the New York Times on June 3, 2010. We call on Walmart to make this document public and give all 1.4 million Walmart associates access to the internal review.
“In statements to investors, Walmart claims that 15% of cash incentive payments for top executives are tied to meeting diversity goals. Walmart should disclose the diversity goals so that shareholders can hold them accountable toward meeting them. Shareholders will present a resolution at the company’s annual meeting tomorrow that will allow shareholders to hold executives accountable for issues like gender discrimination.
“Walmart executives must make public their diversity standards. Until they can prove that they have purged their old sexist culture, Walmart executives should have their bonuses withheld. As part of a national day of action involving Wake Up Walmart activists from across the country, we are asking Walmart shoppers to sign a letter to Walmart CEO Mike Duke calling for oversight in executive pay as long as allegations of discrimination remain outstanding.
May 24, 2010
MOTT
WILLIAMSON, NY, May 23, 2010 — Over 300 full time manufacturing workers at the Mott’s plant in Williamson, New York went out on strike this morning at 6:00 a.m because of painful wage cuts while the company enjoyed a record year of $555 million in profits. The work stoppage was caused as a direct result of the Mott’s executives (a subsidiary of Dr. Pepper Snapple Group) unfair labor practices as they tried to peel away good jobs and wages, including not bargaining in good faith. The company had publicly declared an impasse and plans to implement their last contract terms, which offered nothing but a reduction in hourly wages and drastic healthcare and pension concessions for the skilled, dedicated workforce at the Williamson manufacturing.
“The workers that were forced to strike today are the same workers who helped make Mott’s be the highly profitable company they are today, and they should not be treated like a bunch of rotten apples by overpaid executives,” said Stuart Appelbaum, national president of the Retail, Wholesale and Department Store Union, UFCW. “We understand that no one wins when there is a strike, but is very troubling and disturbing that such a profitable company as Mott’s would carve away a core relationship with their workforce all for corporate greed. Whittling down wage and benefit standards, while exponentially increasing CEO compensation is rotten business, and frankly unAmerican!”
The Retail, Wholesale and Department Store Union (RWDSU/UFCW) Local 220, which represents the workers, has been tirelessly negotiating to secure a fair and decent contract for months with Mott’s management. Despite the company’s profitability, Mott’s/Dr. Pepper Snapple have demanded givebacks, including a $1.50 per hour wage cut for all employees, a pension elimination for future employees and a pension freeze for current employees, a 20 percent decrease in employer contributions to the 401K and increased employee contributions toward health care premiums and co-pays.
Mott’s workers overwhelmingly rejected this offer and voted in favor of authorizing their negotiating committee at RWDSU/UFCW Local 220 to call an unfair labor practice strike. The union has continued to demand that the company bargain in good faith in order to quickly reach a fair contract.
By contrast, Dr. Pepper Snapple Group President & CEO Larry D. Young (located in Plano, Texas headquarters) has enjoyed a 113% salary increase over the last 3 years (or 28 percent each year). Mr. Young’s total compensation for 2009 was $6,519,378
Additional, last year, Dr. Pepper Snapple Group made $555 million in profit.
Michael Leberth, president of RWDSU/UFCW Local 220 said “the company has not budged from our reasonable and dignified offer and there will be no late night negotiations. We are tired of being juiced by such a profitable company.”
May is the highest busiest season for Mott’s apple juice and applesauce manufacturing as the demand for these parent and children favorites is highest during the summer season.
The Williamson plant is the only plant that produces Mott’s applesauce, including high margin single serve packs, with 70% of the workforce in skilled labor categories. A labor dispute could damage the value of Mott’s family-friendly brand by associating it with corporate greed and union busting. Additionally, the product may suffer quality issues, as the skilled workforce is not easily replaceable. The Mott’s brand is responsible for more than $550 million worth of Dr. Pepper Snapple’s retail sales each year.
“Why would DPS, with millions in profit, risk interrupting production at a high volume plant?” asked Ira Bristol, who has worked at the plant for almost five years. “Destroying goodwill and creating this antagonistic atmosphere will badly hurt the production system and bottom line, not to mention negatively affecting employee morale and tarnishing the Mott’s good brand around the country.”
May 21, 2010
FOOD WORKERS UNION ASKS DOJ/USDA PANEL TO INVESTIGATE WALMART
Union says examining Walmart’s pricing pressure and buying power is critical to understanding the negative effects of concentration on food workers, farmers, poultry growers, consumers, communities and local economies
Normal, Ala. – The United Food and Commercial Workers International Union (UFCW), which represents more than 250,000 men and women in the meatpacking and food processing industry, released the following statement today regarding the Department of Justice/USDA workshop on agriculture and antitrust enforcement issues in the poultry sector:
“We believe that these historic hearings represent an enormous opportunity to rebuild and revitalize rural America by ensuring justice and fairness for working men and women across the food industry.
“At the first DOJ/USDA hearing held in March, Secretary of Agriculture Tom Vilsack cut to the heart of this issue when he said the central focus of these workshops was to determine if the marketplace was ‘providing a fair deal for all.’
“To answer that, it is critical that the voices of individuals across the food supply chain—from workers, to growers, to farmers—be heard and for the entire industry to be closely examined. That means analyzing the industry from the farm to the shelves of our grocery stores. It means examining how big retailers, such as Walmart, are driving concentration through their enormous buying power and the pressure they impose on suppliers.
“Make no mistake about it, Walmart’s actions affect every level of our nation’s food supply chain—and they have no intention of loosening their tight chokehold on our food production and distribution systems.
“To secure its rural stranglehold, Walmart uses its enormous footprint, coupled with its pricing power, to literally dictate how whole industries must operate. They reach deep inside a company, effectively influencing every aspect of a supplier’s business operations. This inevitably leads to lower wages for workers, less money for farmers, growers and ranchers and fewer choices for consumers.
“As one industry publication recently wrote, ‘The costs of running processing businesses, from transportation to utility costs and insurance premiums, continue to increase along with pressures from retail customers to not raise prices. Leading the charge for resisting price increases is Walmart, which has informed its suppliers it will not allow price increases in the coming months.’
“Walmart’s pricing strategy leads to incredible pressure on producers, customers, competitors, farmers and workers. It squeezes workers’ wages and means less money in the pockets of hardworking poultry growers. It often drives industry concentration and leads to the elimination of healthy competition in the marketplace—on products ranging from poultry to pet food.
“If we truly want to address anti-competitive practices in agriculture, we must treat more than just the symptoms, we must treat the disease—and Walmart is the disease.
“If Walmart’s actions are not addressed, if the downward pressure they put on workers, businesses, growers and farmers is not vigorously challenged, we will continue to see a destructive race to the bottom that will destroy strong communities and wipe out good rural jobs that are the backbone of our nation.
“If we really want to rebuild our nation’s food system, if we really want to ensure that our agriculture sector is providing a fair deal for all, it is critical that the Obama Administration addresses Walmart’s unprecedented ability to hold farmers and packers captive to their pricing schemes and supply chain management practices.
“The ugly truth is that Walmart has created a system that pits workers and farmers against each other, fighting for the scraps that are left over after company executives try to wring every cent out of our nation’s food supply chain to bolster their profits. This system is devastating to rural innovation, it devalues farming economies and it destroys what were once solid, middle-class packing and processing jobs.
“We applaud the efforts of Attorney General Holder, Secretary Vilsack and Assistant Attorney General Varney and look forward to rigorous enforcement against business practices that hamper competition, hurt workers, harm communities and hinder our nation’s ability to provide good, quality food to America’s kitchen tables.”