Friday, April 29, 2011

USW local 7884 has a tentative agreement

 Over the last few months the  USW Local 9346 bargaining committee has recieved a lot of critisism for their timing on calling the strike at the Sparwood mine. Many of the critics felt that they should have timed it to better line up with the collective bargaining at Elkford. Before i go further on this i will explain that the bargaining committee works independant from the executive committee. The bargaining committee has two members from the executive ( the local president and grievance chairman) plus four others elected from the membership at large. They will formulate a bargaining strategy and gather information from the membership to start the bargaining process for a new collective agreement. The executive committee basically runs the local and deals with the company in administrating the contract. The two committees may meet and seek direction during the negotiation process but it is the bargaining committee that will reach a tentative agreement with the company. After that the executive has the same right as the rest of the members and that is to voice their opinion and vote on the offer. Our collective agreement expired October 31/2010 and the Elkford agreement expires on May 1/2011. From our previous negotiation process in 2005/2006 I can tell you that each local will do what it takes to get a contract for their own members. The locals do work together throughout the terms of their individual contracts but cannot make deals that would affect their own bargaining position. Their obligation is to their membership only during negotiations, that is the proper thing to do. As a matter of fact on April 29/2006 the Elkford Local 7884 actually reached a tentative collective agreement before theirs had expired the last time the two locals lined up their bargaining process. That left Sparwood local 9346 hanging in the wind. We eventually settled without a strike because the bargaining committee felt they lost their bargaining power. The company offer was recomended to the members and was narrowly accepted. The members were very bitter over this--- flash forward five years.  When our strike was called on January 30/2011 it was felt under the circumstances it was the best time to do it. The expression was used that it was a train that was not going to be stopped. Many of our members were still upset over the previous settlement in 2006. The mood was there and some members were pushing for the strike before Christmas. Our strike started after the negotiating committee turned down the companies offer on January 30/11. We were given another offer that was recomended to the membership on March 14/11 it was turned down 56.9% by a ballot vote. Again on April 2/11 we voted on another recomended offer this time it was accepted by 59% of  the membership. Both votes were close and split the workers, exactly what the process was intended to do as viewed by the company. The Elkford Local had already started negotiating in March and reached a tentative deal  April 28/11 just before their contract expires on May1/2011. They surpassed our deal without going on strike. Had we still been out on strike the offer to the Elkford Local would have been even better than what they got now. Our issues still linger and will lead to another strike in 2015. The company likes to refer to these issues as slight variations of their collective agreements. Lets see bussing from your community and a pension plan are only  slight variations. See you in 2015.     "Any fool can criticize, condem and complain and most fools do" ---- Benjamen Franklin

3 comments:

  1. Peter

    I went through two strikes in my times at the mine, the moment the membership is spilt you are done. A 99% strike vote means nothing if you are then going to turn down a contract by 59%.
    Either accept or reject it by a big number.
    Yes I know all the arguements why people accept or reject, but the last thing you as a union needs is a spilt vote.

    Two things that always amazed me was one, the lack of honesty on the part of people, three months after you are back to work try to find anybody that voted for that contract. Whatever the reason you voted for it man up and say so.
    Don't run around for the next four years saying I can't believe the guys voted for this piece of shit.

    Second the people that disagreed with the leadership, they will say this should have been done and that should have been done. But how many of those critics will step forward next union elections to show the right way to run a union?

    Its kind of like grievances, the most common statement I heard was "somebody" needs to do something about this. Whenever I made the statement maybe that somebody should be you.
    The book of excuses came out.

    Just my thoughts,
    Dean

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  2. i cant argue with any of this you are right on all accounts. The members will complain but thats as far as their commitment goes. First regular meeting after the strike was over we only had five members show up. Not a good showing considering we have over 700 members now. Next April are the local elections and the same people will most likely get in because the rest dont have their meetings in that qualify them to run for office. You must have attended 1/3 of the last 24 meetings. Maybe i was raised differently but i just dont get it. Why would you loose two months wages and before that your job& pension and still not get involved.

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  3. Good comments Dean.

    Peter, in reply to your question, I was initially going to say the reason was apathy. But then I thought on it some more and believe the answer is other than that, in this case. I believe it's about being satisfied and content with their 'good fortune' in what they already have.

    People today are too nihilistic, too self-absorbed in their own little lives’ to give a shit about the world out there, and their fellow man. Spiritualism is lacking ("God is Dead") having been replaced by the god of mammon. And now with the financial collapse, credit crunch, debt, etc. people are forced to wean themselves off being consumers, and as such find themselves today with no purpose or meaning in their lives, or fall back position. Knowing nothing else and no better they just want to get back to being greedy little capitalist consumers again, prepared to be part of the machine that rapes, pillages and despoils the land and everyone on it, so that they can continue maintaining their accustomed lifestyles and status quo. Ya, I think that's it. :-)

    Seriously, in other words, you can’t ask or expect people with 'fat bellies' to stand up for you and your fellow man when they can’t, or won't, stand up for themselves, now can you?

    Sometimes in order to see the big picture one has to step outside oneself. That's when the awakening happens... and the revolution starts.

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