Canadian UFCW members got first collective agreement in North America:
Is Wal-Mart now afraid that an Obama victory could help its workers join their union?

Wal-Mart now has its first collective agreement in North America. Eight workers at the retail giant's Tire and Lube Express garage in Gatineau in Quebec, next to the Canadian capital Ottawa, joined UFCW in 2005 and have ever since tried to gain a contract. Now finally, a government arbitrator put and end to Wal-Mart's efforts to evade this responsibility, and imposed a collective agreement on the site.

The Canadian collective agreement is not the only concern for the world's largest retailer. At home in the United States, the next president is very likely to be Barack Obama. He and the Democratic Party have signalled that they will give workers a fair chance to decide on trade union representation without employers being able to block it as they can do today.

Full story 17 August 2008

E.land workers' struggle and George W. Bush visit used by Korean government:
Union leaders are jailed and heavy handed police repression on the streets is encouraged

Korean police search for trade union leaders in cars leaving the KCTU confederation headquarters in Seoul. (Picture: KCTU)

In a show of weakness and nervousness in preparing for the arrival of U.S. President George W. Bush, South Korea's conservative government is sending its police out to quash freedom of speech. Once again, the target is the trade unions and particularly the country's militant union confederation KCTU. Arrest warrants are out against its top leadership, and its 1st Vice President - the top woman union leader Jin Yeong-ok - is already held at the Seoul Detention Centre.

But the police repression is not only about quieting down anti-Bush protests. It is also about trying to grab an opportunity to accomplish a long time goal of right wing politicians and many employers: Busting the country's militant trade union structures.

Full story 7 August 2008

UFCW for Fresh & Easy says Obama

UNI Global Union has welcomed Democratic presidential candidate Barack Obama's renewed call for UK-based supermarket group Tesco to let unions represent workers in their new Fresh & Easy stores in the USA.

In spite of having a partnership agreement with USDAW in the UK, Tesco has refused to even talk to the UFCW, which has 1.3 million members in supermarkets across the USA.

Full story 27 June 2008

Wal-Mart under pressure again:
Wal-Mart shareholders ask for decent work

The continued violation of core ILO Conventions and the active anti-union policies pursued by Wal-Mart has prompted some of the biggest shareholders to demand that Wal-Mart clean up its act and start behaving according to its own governance standards. According to the Observer the investors are concerned about reports that customers seem to choose to shop elsewhere because of the company’s notoriously poor record on labour issues and American cities are now adopting laws to prevent the establishment of Wal-Mart shops.

UNI Commerce Global Union has for many years together with its American affiliate UFCW been trying to establish a social dialogue and raise labour issues with the Wal-Mart management but talks where abruptly stopped in 2005 when the management walked out and since then Wal-Mart has remained largely silent.

Should the UK pension management company F&C choose to sell its shares in Wal-Mart it will not be the first time that a pension fund chooses to disassociate itself from Wal-Mart as the Swedish Second National Pensions Fund (Andra AP-Fonden) did it in 2006 when it found that Wal-Mart was systematically violating workers' rights and all attempts to bring about a change in this behaviour had failed.

It is not the first time that the UK pension management company F&C is voicing concern over Wal-Mart’s behaviour as in 2007 it filed a similar resolution before the AGM, because over the past several years, it had become increasingly concerned by signs of failure in internal controls that have led to government investigations and class action lawsuits by employees.  

Article partly based on The Oberserver 01.06.2008 and http://www.forbes.com/markets/feeds/afx/2007/05/31/afx3774569.html

German commerce employers want to get rid of collective agreements?
UNI-Europa Commerce is concerned about impact on future labour relations

Full story 29 May 2008

Again a victory for UFCW-RWDSU members:
New York flagship department store gets four year collective agreement

Workers at Bloomingdales, New York's upmarket department store, have achieved a four year collective agreement. The deal came after difficult and drawn out negotiations, where the Retail, Wholesale and Department Store Union finally was forced to announce a strike on behalf of the 2,000 Bloomingdales workers.

6 May 2008 Full story

Romanian UNI Commerce affiliate and Metro Cash & Carry conclude collective agreement and develop their labour relations

Vasile Gogescu and Cristina Ionescu, president and general secretary, are the two key people behind a successful change and development process of Romanian commerce trade union FSLC. In a few years, the union has made remarkable inroads into the fast growing retail industry of this large European Union Member State. A close project cooperation with UNI Commerce and affiliates HK - HK Handel in Denmark has helped in the launch of a modern and efficient social dialogue oriented trade union.

Romanian UNI Commerce affiliated trade union FSLC and German multinational Metro Cash & Carry signed their first collective agreement last week in Bucharest. The agreement provides for wage raises and increased compensation for work on Saturdays and Sundays, among other benefits. It also establishes a social dialogue within the fast growing company, which operates wholesale cash and carry markets in the country.

Serious labour conflict was avoided in Ukraine:
UNI Commerce and Metro Cash & Carry reached agreement on labour relations and social dialogue

UNI Commerce Global Union and Metro Cash & Carry have agreed on a normalisation of labour relations in the company's subsidiary in Ukraine. This follows a period of tense labour relations during the last months of 2007, due to the dismissal of Vladimir Demyan, president of the company level trade union. Mr Demyan will now be reinstated in his job. The local union and its federation will on their side refrain from all charges and allegations against the company, and a constructive social dialogue relationship will be built up with the active support of UNI Commerce and UNI's Moscow Office.

30 January 2008 Full story

Self-proclaimed true believer celebrated his Company Christmas:
Thirty Korean E.Land workers were thrown out on the streets as the holiday season started

The E.Land labour conflict has been about much more than disagreements on a collective agreement or grievances by a trade union. This was an outright attack by a greedy employer on some of the country's most vulnerable working people. The young women and girls who saw no alternative but cry out their desperation at the in-house pickets knew that if they lose their employment, then everything falls in pieces around them. But E.Land showed no mercy, and with Christmas at the door those who had reached out in support of their friends and colleagues were coldly showed the door. Over thirty union activists lost their jobs and the meagre outcome that they had as part of Korea's huge population of non-regular workers.

When the E.Land labour conflict was getting really sour and ten union representatives were behind bars, Park Sung-soo just disappeared from sight. Now this self-proclaimed true believer is back and has just celebrated his company's Christmas by throwing out thirty of his workers, on the eve of the holiday season.

Stop the profiteers, ver.di says:
Nobody should earn less than 7.50 Euro per hour

It is a scandal, a human and a political scandal, a scandal for our society, the system of paying hunger wages! Throughout this country, people are toiling at work, often more than 40 hours per week. Still they cannot feed their families with what they earn in wages.

Frank Bsirske, president of Germany's largest trade union ver.di, does not spare his words.

- This is a form of modern slave trade, a violation of the value of human beings. This is not morally and humanly acceptable.

The UNI affiliated union is now introducing the demand of a minimum wage of 7.30 Euro into the German election campaign which is about to be launched.

Social partnership at home, poor performance abroad:
Tesco's global labour relations raised eyebrows at UNI-Europa Commerce Conference

Thailand is one of the countries where Britain's leading retailer Tesco has found it difficult to live up to its corporate principles of good labour relations. When the Tesco Lotus workers created a trade union some years ago, the British retail giant was not prepared to accept it and resorted to repression instead of dialogue. Workers report on poor employment conditions, with pay levels that don't support a decent life. Similar messages come in from Turkey, where the company refused to accept a government decision that recognised UNI Commerce affiliate Tez-Koop-IS as a negotiating partner. In South Korea, Tesco Homeplus is considered as a strongly anti-union employer. And in the United States, the retail giant is trying to establish itself through a non-union convenience store chain, in an attempt that will most likely fail.

Tesco's approach to trade unions and social dialogue puzzled the participants of last week's UNI Commerce Conference in Geneva. The highly successful British retailer is known as a good employer in its home country and has developed an innovative social partnership agreement with UNI Commerce affiliate Usdaw.

30 November 2007 - Full story

UNI-Europa Commerce Conference took stock of collective bargaining:
The right to join a union is largely respected in European commerce, but collective agreements are under attack

Pierangelo Raineri, UNI-Europa Commerce Vice President, stressed the need for Europe's commerce trade unions to prepare for a regional dimension to parts of their collective bargaining. During the last few years, a broad discussion has been going on about this subject, actively supported by the three UNI Commerce affiliates in Italy. This will now turn into a more concrete approach where particularly some company specific issues will be approached on a European Union level by UNI-Europa Commerce, with a view of gaining experiences for a future widening and deepening of collective agreement cooperation. Ulrich Dalibor listens attentively, as does UNI-Europa Commerce President Jörgen Hoppe (right).

Europe's commerce trade unions must make active use of an environment where workers' rights are largely respected by the big corporate players. Organising and developing union activities creates the worker force which is necessary to stand up against a growing pressure for further de-regulation and weakening of the collective agreement institutions. In a European and global trade union cooperation through UNI Commerce Global Union and UNI-Europa Commerce, unions can secure that workers retain and strengthen their voice in a fast developing retail and distribution industry.

UNI-Europa Commerce held its second European Conference in Geneva, Switzerland on 21 to 23 November. Much of the discussions among the 200 trade union delegates focused on multinational retail and distribution companies. These corporate giants set the trends and conditions for the whole industry, also with regard to labour relations and employment conditions. It is therefore important that this part of commerce is oriented towards social dialogue and respects the fundamental rights of its workers.

Over 90 percent sign union cards:
H&M workers in New York join UFCW - RWDSU in a break-through in US fashion retailing

This H&M store in Downtown Manhattan is now unionised in UFCW - RWDSU. Its workers voted overwhelmingly in favour of the union negotiating a collective agreement and representing them towards the employer. The unionisation of H&M, which has now started, is a result of a close cooperation between UFCW and UNI Commerce. UFCW and H&M agreed on how the organising campaign and the card check based recognition procedure should be, on the basis of the Global Agreement concluded by UNI with the central managemennt of the Stockholm Sweden based company.

The US employees of Sweden's giant apparel retailer H&M have now began to join their union UFCW. The first block of nine stores was organised on Manhattan in New York last week, where over 90 per cent of those who participated in the union information meetings decided to join. The organising campaign will now continue.

25 November 2007 - Full story