[Dryerase] The Alarm!--Labor briefs 10-4-02

[The Alarm!Newswire]

Security Screeners protest racist hiring practices
Security screeners at San Jose and Oakland international airports 
staged protests Monday, September 30, as new security screeners hired 
by the federal government take over those positions.  The screeners are 
decrying what they consider to be racism in the hiring practices of the 
Transportation Security Administration (TSA), noting that more than 80% 
of the present screeners in Bay Area airports are ethnic minority 
workers in low-wage positions.  The new federal positions are better 
paid and are being filled primarily by whites.

The TSA was formed through the Aviation and Transportation Security Act 
after September 11, 2001 in response to outcries over security lapses 
among low-paid security personnel in airports.

Davis signs agricultural labor mediation bills
After months of broad-based organizing, a well-attended march through 
the Central Valley to Sacramento and a weeks-long vigil by farmworkers 
and their supporters at the Capitol, Governor Gray Davis signed bills 
into law that would mandate mediation between management and 
farmworkers in the event of an impasse in labor negotiations.  The 
bills were a scaled-down version of those initially passed in the State 
Legislature that included provisions for binding arbitration in the 
event of a failure in mediation.  Farmworkers and their supporters 
rejoiced while agribusiness groups expressed extreme dismay.

At the same time, the Governor signed and vetoed a number of bills.  
One that he vetoed was a bill that would have allowed the issuance of 
drivers’ licenses to undocumented immigrants.

Mexican Government settles with Pemex union
The government of Mexico agreed on a wage settlement Monday with the 
country’s oil-workers union, which represents some 108,000 workers at 
the state-owned Petroleos Mexico (Pemex).  The politically fraught 
battle pitted Mexico’s President Vicente Fox against corrupt leaders of 
the union, who he charges helped funnel $170 million into the 
Institutional Revolutionary Party’s (PRI) 2000 presidential campaign.  
He had attempted to bring criminal corruption charges against the union 
leaders, but was stymied due to the immunity they held as legislators 
in the national government and the threat of economically devastating 
strikes.  The union’s base of support was eroded due to popular 
recognition of corruption in its leadership and the wage settlement was 
widely viewed as a victory for Mr. Fox.

Canadian Auto Workers gain assurances from Ford
The Canadian Auto Workers (CAW) and Ford Motor Company reached an 
agreement on a three-year contract Monday, a day before the previous 
contract was set to expire.  The contract came after negotiations over 
the fate of 1,400 workers employed at the company’s pickup-truck plant 
in Oakville, Ontario—a plant that Ford intends to close.  Ford agreed 
to find new work for 900 of the 1,400 workers, which the CAW considered 
to be an acceptable compromise of its original position that all 1,400 
jobs needed to be saved.  Management claimed that it was unlikely that 
any workers would be laid off in the end due to the C$60,000 incentives 
offered to long-time employees of the company to take an early 
retirement with full pensions.

The negotiations were closely watched by management and labor in the 
United States, as similar issues relating to plant closures are likely 
to come up in negotiations next year between the United Auto Workers, 
CAW’s American counterparts, and Ford.  The escalating costs of health 
benefits are likely to be more central to the negotiations, however.

Lay-offs continue global telecommunications industry
As the global telecommunications industry continues to falter severely, 
workers in that industry are taking the brunt of the loss.  SBC 
Communications, one of the “Baby Bells” (local telephone providers 
split off from the AT&T monopoly in the 80s) which serves 13 states 
from the Midwest to California, announced that it will cut an 
additional 11,000 jobs, bringing the yearly total of layoffs to 20,000.

Verizon Communications announced plans to cut another 1,000 union jobs 
in New Jersey, on top of the 512 cut earlier this year.  Rather than 
laying workers off, Verizon has asked union members to accept voluntary 
buyouts.  Only 332 of the original 512 have taken the offers.  The 
company, another of the Baby Bells, announced that it would lay off 
8,000 workers this summer.

Qwest Communications and BellSouth, two other Baby Bells, have lain off 
6,000 and 5,000 workers, respectively.

The trouble isn’t limited to the United States, either.  European firms 
such as Colt Telecom in Britain and Germany’s MobilCom have recently 
lain off thousands of their staff members
 
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