[Dryerase] Bush ends lockout, ILWU ordered back to work

[Asheville Global Report]

Bush ends lockout, ILWU ordered back to work

By Sean Marquis

Oct. 9 (AGR)--  In a highly controversial move, president George W. Bush 
has invoked the 1947 Taft-Hartley Act to end the West Coast lockout of 
longshore union workers.
Workers with the International Longshore and Warehouse Union (ILWU) had 
been locked out of their jobs since Sept. 27 when their employers, the 
Pacific Maritime Association (PMA) shutdown the ports because of a contract 
dispute.
At a White Hose press conference Bush said that the lockout  “threatens our 
national defense.”
“These ports load the ships that carry supplies to our men and women in 
uniform. These ports also receive parts and materials used by our defense 
contractors to complete projects and maintain military equipment.
“Because the operation of western ports is vital to our economy and to our 
military, I have determined that the current situation imperils our 
national health and safety,” Bush said.
Bush also intimated that he was keeping an eye out for worker slowdowns on 
the docks when he said that  in invoking the Taft-Hartley Act, he was 
“ending the lockout and requiring work at the ports to resume at a normal 
pace.”
Bush sought and won a federal court order Tuesday to end the lockout. The 
Taft-Hartley Act allows federal authorities to end a strike or lockout for 
80 days, if it poses a "threat to national security."
According to a report by the San Francisco Independent Media Center, Judge 
William Alsup has imposed a temporary restraining order until Wednesday, 
Oct. 16, when the court will most likely extend the restraining order for 
the full 80 days. Currently the order prevents the ILWU from engaging in 
slow downs and strikes.
Prior to the injunction, the latest talks had ended with both sides blaming 
the other for failure to accept proposals and creating an untenable situation.
The ILWU accused the PMA of making a contract proposal that was full of 
takeaways and represented a move backwards in bargaining and said the PMA 
also rejected a mediator request to extend the old contract for seven days 
that the ILWU accepted.
  “It is clear from PMA’s latest proposal that they never had any intention 
of making an agreement,” said ILWU International President James Spinosa. 
“Their strategy has been all along to use the lockout to push this 
situation to crisis and get the government to bail them out with the 
Taft-Hartley injunction.”
The ILWU also said that rather than deal with the union’s main concernthat 
the jobs left over after the implementation of technology and the new jobs 
created by the technology be ILWU jobsthe PMA proposal will allow the 
companies to outsource those jobs.
Joseph Miniace, President and CEO of the PMA, said that “the Union rejected 
a comprehensive proposal that would make their members the absolute envy of 
the blue collar workforce in America.”
“As it relates to a Taft-Hartley injunction,” Miniace said “the PMA gave 
the union every opportunity to get our ports up and running without 
government intervention.  We gave them the premier contract offer in 
America, and we offered to re-open the ports by extending the old contract 
for 90 days.”
The 80-day injunction Bush is seeking would give the PMA what it wanted by 
forcing the union back to work to get goods to retailers for the holiday 
spending season and give Bush what he needs to keep military supplies 
moving for his war on Iraq.
The union however, after already working the month of September under and 
expired contract, will be ordered to work the rest of October, all of 
November and most of December under an expired contract.
The Taft-Hartley enjoins both the employers and the union to return to the 
conditions of the old contract for 80 days. But the ILWU says that the 
Act’s provisions for fines, contempt of court citations and prison 
sentences for those violating the terms of the contract are aimed at workers.
“We fully expect PMA to use all the anti-union provisions of the 
Taft-Hartley injunction. These 80 days will not be a ‘cooling off period,’” 
said Spinosa. “PMA will start alleging ‘slowdowns’ by Thursday and will 
continue that. Taft-Hartley gives them 80 days of free shots at the union 
and we expect the employers will be dragging us to court daily, trying to 
bankrupt the union and throw our leaders in jail.”
According to the ILWU on Tuesday, Oct 8, minutes before Bush went on 
national TV, PMA rejected a deal the White House was trying to brokera 
30-day contract extension which the ILWU had already agreed to.
According to Washington State Jobs with Justice (JwJ), the PMA was fearful 
of a strike when the ILWU contract was to expire this summer and pushed for 
work speed-ups to get as much commerce, and profits, through the ports as 
possible before a strike would happen.
JwJ and the ILWU say that the work speed-ups led to dangerous conditions on 
the docks, prompting the ILWU to issue and order to workers to obey all 
safety regulations.
The PMA said this was a work slowdown tactic and then locked out the 
workers and closed the ports.
Between Mar. 14 and Sept. 3 this year, five ILWU workers were killed on the 
job in work-related accidents.

Red and Green?
  In a statement given to CNN, AFL-CIO Secretary-Treasurer Richard Trumka 
called Bush’s use of Taft-Hartley “a tragedy with historic ramifications.”
“Early in the process, the Bush Administration
threatened to invoke 
Taft-Hartleythus strengthening the employers' hand in bargaining and giving 
the [PMA] little incentive to bargain in good faith,” Trumka said.
A coalition of environmental groups has also shown support for the ILWU 
workers.
Members of the Alliance for Sustainable Jobs and the Environment, Earth 
First!, Rainforest Action Network, Bay Area Coalition for Headwaters, 
Global Exchange and the Sea Turtle Restoration Project joined locked-out 
dock workers for a solidarity rally at the picket line on Monday, Oct. 7.
“We have recently seen the Bush administration exploit the nation's fear of 
terrorism to suspend civil rights, particularly those of political 
activists,” said the Alliance for Sustainable Jobs and the Environment. “By 
the same token, the Bush administration, through the Dept. of Homeland 
Security, has made statements about possible militarization of the ports, 
threatening the use of troops as scab labor, effectively stripping the ILWU 
of its collective bargaining rights.
“As progressive advocates of environmental values, we see the links between 
our agendas and the struggles of labor. We stand in solidarity with our 
brothers and sisters in the ILWU and fully support their rights to 
collectively bargain, without government intervention,” the alliance said.