Basic information · Web viewInstead there should have been a series of friendly, inclusive demonstrations encouraging Londoners to side with the unions as part of a powerful popular

Public Services International Research Unit (PSIRU)

Waste management workers take action on three continents

A PSIRU note

By Steve Davies

Senior Research Fellow, School of Social Sciences, Cardiff University

August 2002

Public Services International Research Unit (PSIRU) School of Computing and Mathematical Sciences, University of Greenwich

30 Park Row London SE10 9LS U.K.Email: [email protected] Tel: +44-(0)208-331-9933 Fax: +44 (0)208-331-7781 www.psiru.org

Director: David Hall. Researchers: Kate Bayliss, Steve Davies, Emanuele Lobina, Sam Weinstein

The PSIRU was set up in 1998 to carry out empirical research into privatisation, public services, and globalisation. It is part of the School of Computing and Mathematics in the University of Greenwich, London. It also has an outstation at Cardiff University’s School of Social Sciences. PSIRU’s research is centred around the maintenance of an extensive and regularly updated database of information on the economic, political, financial, social and technical experience

with privatisation and restructuring of public services worldwide.

This core database is financed by Public Services International (PSI), the worldwide confederation of public service trade unions. www.world-psi.org

© Unless otherwise stated, this report is the copyright of the PSIRU and the organisations which commissioned and/or financed it

http://www.world-psi.org/

http://www.psiru.org/

mailto:[email protected]

Industrial action in waste management 21/05/23

1. Introduction..............................................................................................................................................2

2. Germany....................................................................................................................................................2

3. South Africa..............................................................................................................................................3

4. Canada.......................................................................................................................................................44.1 Toronto..................................................................................................................................................................44.2 Ottawa...................................................................................................................................................................4

5. United Kingdom.......................................................................................................................................55.1 National Local Government dispute.....................................................................................................................55.2 South Gloucester...................................................................................................................................................7

6. Comments and some conclusions............................................................................................................7

7. Annex: Sources.........................................................................................................................................87.1 Germany................................................................................................................................................................87.2 South Africa..........................................................................................................................................................87.3 Canada.................................................................................................................................................................187.4 United Kingdom..................................................................................................................................................28

1. Introduction

Workers in the waste management industry, whether in the public or private sector, are often among the lowest paid.

To make matters worse, the spread of privatisation in the last decade has frequently been accompanied by a push to drive down wages and cut staffing levels.

As well as low pay being a major problem, the job is frequently physically demanding and health and safety is a recurrent concern.

Despite all of these difficulties, in many countries unions have maintained an important presence in waste management in both private and public sectors.

Over the last month, there has been graphic evidence that, in different parts of the world, waste management workers in are prepared to take industrial action to fight for better pay and conditions. Strikes have taken place in the UK, South Africa, Germany and Canada. In some of these cases, the campaign has been linked to a wider struggle of the municipal workforce (of which waste management workers form a part in many countries).

2. Germany

German public service union Ver.di put in a claim for a 6.5 per cent wage increase for the 160,000 workers employed in the private waste management sector. Ver.di – which is Europe’s biggest union - also demanded an end to the differential start wages for new workers. Before the strike new workers could be paid at a 25 per cent lower wage.

The strike targeted some of the larger companies such as SITA Germany, RWE Umwelt and Rethmann in particular.

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The employers initially offered just a 2.5 per cent increase.

After three negotiation rounds and strikes an agreement was reached on 6 June 2002. It will give the 160,000 workers in the industry a pay increase of 3.4 per cent as of 1 August 2002 and 2.9 per cent as of 1 August 2003. For May - July 2002 there is a one off increase of 210 Euro.1

The settlement also means that wages for new workers first entering the industry may now only be 20 per cent lower than established workers (this used to be 25 per cent). The differential will be reduced over 5 years time until it disappears. The collective bargaining commission will take a decision 12-13 June on the results.2

3. South Africa

South African Municipal Workers Union (SAMWU) members walked out on 2 July 20023 as part of a nationwide strike and campaign for pay increases for municipal workers. The union demanded the greater of a 10 per cent wage increase or R3004 a month more for its members, with a minimum wage of R2200 rather than R1900.

The SA Local Government Association (Salga) wanted the union to agree to a three-year wage deal, an offer of 7 per cent and no improvement to the current minimum wage of R1900. Salga further insisted that section 57 employees like heads of department and directors be excluded from the agreement.

The strike was supported by trade union centre, COSATU which said that the aims of the union were fully in line with the Living Wage campaign. SAMWU said that 100,000 workers were involved in the dispute in the Western Cape, Eastern Cape, Northern Cape, Free State and Gauteng. In contrast the employers claimed that the strike was poorly supported.5

After three weeks the strike ended on 18 July when union officials received a mandate from members to settle with employers’ body, Salga.

SAMWU won a R200 increase in the minimum wage, from R1900 to R2100, and gained a nine per cent increase for those earning below R3200 (most of its members) and eight per cent for the rest.6

Salga had earlier refused to budge from eight per cent, on which it had settled with the formerly all-white Independent Municipal and Allied Trade Union (Imatu).

The SAMWU-Salga wage deal, will also be extended to Imatu and non-unionised staff. It is a three-year deal, something to which SAMWU was opposed.

Next year municipal workers will get an increase one per cent greater than inflation, currently over nine per cent, and in 2004 inflation plus 1.5 per cent.7

1 Notes

? EPSU circular2 Bloomberg News, 5 June, 2002, GERMAN WASTE DISPOSAL WORKERS STRIKE FOR MORE PAY, VER.DI SAYS3 SAMWU Press Statement, Monday 1 July 2002, First nationwide municipal workers strike in seven years starts tomorrow4 Africa News, 2 July, 2002 Tuesda, Samwu Strike Will Continue5 SAPA (South African Press Association), 2 July, 2002, MIXED RESPONSE TO SAMWU STRIKE 6 The Star, 18 July 2002, R100m extra for workers after strike _____________________________________________________________________________

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There will also be an improved medical aid package for workers.

During the course of the strike, two strikers were killed.

4. Canada

4.1 Toronto

In an emergency session on 11 July 2002, Ontario legislators passed back-to-work legislation ending the two week strike of 25,000 Toronto municipal workers8. The strikers included about 1,200 sanitation workers that walked out on 26 June9. The strikers’ union, the Canadian Union of Public Employees (CUPE) described the municipal strike as ‘the biggest in Canadian history’10.

CUPE Locals 79 (representing ‘inside workers’) and 416 (representing ‘outside workers’) called a strike after negotiations with the city failed. Local 416 walked out on 26 June and Local 79 followed eight days later, on 4 July11. Garbage and recycling services all but halted following the strike12.

The workers’ concerns were job security and privatisation more than pay. Toronto Mayor Mel Lastman's last offer was a 3 per cent pay raise each year for three years and job security for permanent workers with 10 years of service as of 1 July. (By job security is meant that the workers would not lose their jobs if services were contracted out.)

Under the offer, any city worker with less than ten years seniority at the time of any deal would never have any job security. The union wanted job security after six years of service. Mayor Lastman contended that the city could not afford the deal the workers wanted.

Brian Cochrane, president of CUPE Local 416 said: "This was not a strike about money, contrary to the mayor’s assertions. It’s important to know this: we accepted the City’s proposed wage increase in our last proposal to the employer. City Hall is determined to sell our jobs to the lowest possible bidder. We know exactly what that means for the public services… - accountability, standards, and access will all plummet," said Cochrane. “Over 22 per cent of our members would not be covered by the job security provisions in the City’s last offer, which suggested protection for those with 10 years of seniority at the beginning of the contract. Any city worker with under 10 years seniority now will never have any measure of job security under the employer’s last offer.”13

The city leaders had previously made it clear that they favoured moving towards privatisation14. The council recently voted to pursue ‘alternative service delivery’. At the moment, municipal waste management workers cover about 70 per cent of the city’s residences, with private contractors covering the rest since last winter. Results comparing performances between the public and private services will be available in three or four months according to Angelos Bacopoulos, Toronto's general manager of solid-waste management.15

Brian O'Keefe, secretary-treasurer of CUPE Ontario, said: ''We never like to see back-to-work legislation… We always want to resolve issues through fair collective bargaining,'' but added that ''we reluctantly accept the back-to-work legislation because it represents the best outcome for a very bad situation.''

Both sides were ordered to agree on an arbitrator to smooth the way to an agreement16. Both sides are obliged to accept the decision of the arbitrator.17




4.2 Ottawa

Another Canadian waste management strike was averted only after the management of Canadian Waste Services (a subsidiary of US multinational Waste Management Inc) backed off and compromised with the union.

The dispute began with the aggressive approach from the company, with ‘secret’ plans to deal with the effects of a strike18.

But on 12 July 2002, negotiators for the company and CUPE Local 1338 agreed a tentative deal on pay.19

CWS is the contractor for collecting waste in the central and western parts of the city and to collect recyclables from apartment buildings. The company has a 5 year contract with the city (originally signed with the former regional government in 1999) which requires it to supply a contingency plan that describes how it would maintain service if its unionized employees walked out.

There are 160 unionised workers with CWS and the dispute focussed on the company’s attempt to impose a pay cut of $3 an hour. The union wanted 3 per cent pay rises each year for five years and improved working conditions.

On 18 July the deal was ratified by the 160 workers, members of the Canadian Union of Public Employees.

Ernie Dion, President of CUPE 1338 said: “The company wanted us to work up to 60 hours a week. We stood firm and said ‘no way’ to any increase in our back-breaking workloads. We also rejected their plan to pay new workers less than what we earn right now. I’m proud we’ve protected decent wages for young workers in our community.” Unlike in other cities, most of the drivers work alone on their trucks, both driving and picking up in weather conditions that are often punishing.

The five-year deal includes improvements in the workers’ benefits and wages increases in each of the five years. The workers will get a two per cent increase in 2002 and in 2003, followed by 2.5 per cent increases in 2004, 2005 and 2006.20

The deal was reached early on 12 July in last-minute mediation. The workers ratified the deal with 61per cent voting to accept the contract.21

“Our members know we worked hard to get the best contract we could this time. But they also let us know there are still lots of improvements to be made. Make no mistake -- we’ll be back at the table next time with those demands. We work hard and provide excellent service. We won’t stop demanding the safety and respect that we deserve,” says Dion.

Canadian Waste workers collect residential and commercial garbage and recycling in about 80 per cent of the city, as well as maintaining the trucks and the Carp landfill.

5. United Kingdom

5.1 National Local Government dispute

The three unions representing workers in UK local government co-ordinated strike action on 17 July 2002 as part of a campaign for better pay. The unions pay claim was for £1,750 or a pay rise of 6 per cent, whichever is the greater.




The strike was described by the unions as the first ever national local government strike and was the biggest action in the sector since 1979.

The industrial action involved only those waste management workers who remain directly employed by municipal authorities and excludes those who work for private companies.

The Transport and General Workers Union22 (TGWU), Unison23 and General and Municipal Workers24 (GMB) rejected the Local Government Employers offer of a 3 per cent pay increase.

Dave Prentis, general secretary of Unison said that the offer was “worth a miserly 15p an hour to over a quarter of a million low paid staff earning less than £5 an hour – frankly it’s an insult.”

The unions commissioned research showing that in real terms, pay was lower than during the last major municipal workers dispute in 1979.25

The unions claimed that the strike was well supported throughout England, Wales and Northern Ireland (a separate bargaining arrangement exists in Scotland).26

After the successful one day strike of all local government staff (including directly employed waste management workers), unions announced that there would be further strikes unless a satisfactory pay offer was received from the employers.

At the back of the pay dispute lies a growing unease among union members about the effects of the continuing policies of privatisation and contracting out under the Labour government and many Labour councils.

The very real basis for concern that workers feel about privatisation was illustrated by an article in the Guardian newspaper. The author interviewed workers collecting refuse from her house and asked why they were not on strike. One of the workers explained that their jobs had been contracted out to Serviceteam (recently acquired by waste management multinational Cleanaway). On this particular four man team there were three rates of pay: the ex-council worker retained former council rates of pay, two of the others had been hired by Serviceteam at a much lower rate and the last was recruited by an employment agency and was receiving less than the legal minimum wage because the agency took a slice off the top.

The worker explained that there was very little they felt could do, as if they went on strike the firm would sack them and employ all agency.27

Encouraged by both the response of members and of the public (which has been supportive), the unions announced that there would be further strikes in August and beyond unless a satisfactory settlement is agreed with the employers.28

On 5 August, the unions announced that they had suspended action to allow discussion of a compromise proposed by the conciliation services ACAS.

The next day, the unions and employers announced agreement on a two-year deal claimed to be worth 7.8 per cent, with a minimum rate of £5 an hour for the lowest paid.29 All three unions involved have agreed to recommend acceptance of the deal to their members over the next six weeks.30

Under the proposals, the pay of all council workers will go up by 3 per cent backdated to April, with a further 1 per cent in October, plus another 1 per cent for the lowest two grades. In April 2003 workers would receive a pay rise of 3.5 per cent and an additional 1 per cent for the lowest paid. The minimum rate would increase to £5.32 an hour (up from the current £4.80).




The employers claim that the new minimum rate of £5 an hour (backdated to April) is equivalent to an immediate 4.1 per cent for the lowest paid. It will go up to £5.32 by the end of the two years, a rise of almost 11 per cent. They say that the new deal would be worth £1,023 for the lowest paid.

The employers had previously offered 3 per cent in response to union demands for 6 per cent and a minimum £1,750 a year.

As part of the ACAS-brokered deal, an independently-chaired Local Government Pay Commission will be established to examine local government pay which has not only fallen behind the private sector, but also other parts of the public sector. It will also examine equal pay for men and women workers in local government and will report back within one year.

5.2 South Gloucester

On 1 August, it was announced that waste management workers employed by French multinational Sita (itself owned by Suez) in South Gloucestershire had won an improved pay settlement after threatening five days of strike action. The workers, numbering around 60, are members of the Transport and General Workers Union (TGWU), and rejected the company’s original pay offer of 4 per cent as ‘derisory’.

Sita responded by offering 6 per cent to the collection teams and 4 per cent to office staff and other grades.31

Although the union secured an improved offer from the company, the TGWU’s negotiator, Paul Swain said that Sita workers in South Gloucester were still earning less than waste management workers in nearby Bristol and that this needed to be resolved in the future.

6. Comments and some conclusions

This note is a snapshot of developments in industrial relations involving selected PSI affiliates in the waste management sector.

It covers strike action and campaigns over pay, jobs and privatisation in Germany, Canada, South Africa and the UK.

The unions involved in the actions are Ver.di, CUPE, SAMWU, GMB, TGWU and Unison. The report features examples of action in both the public and private sectors. As well as municipalities, the companies involved include Sita (Suez), RWE, Rethmann, Serviceteam (Cleanaway) and Canadian Waste Services (Waste Management Inc).

A range of different circumstances are covered. In some of the cases reported above, the action is large scale (in Britain up to a million workers involved, in South Africa over 100,000), and waste management workers were a part of a much wider struggle of municipal workers. In Germany the dispute lined up both sides of private industry with the employers’ organisation confronting the union. In other cases examined, the dispute involved relatively small numbers of workers with a single private sector employer.

The workers did not usually achieve all of their objectives. However there are some common features which appear in most of these disputes.

Workers quite rightly fear the effects of privatisation on their jobs, pay and conditions; There appears to be a growing mood of confidence and a determination to defend what exists and to

improve upon it; All of the employers claimed an inability to meet workers’ demands;




Once workers took industrial action, or even simply threatened action in some cases, they were able to gain some concessions from the employers.




7. Annex: Sources

7.1 Germany

Bloomberg News, June 5, 2002

GERMAN WASTE DISPOSAL WORKERS STRIKE FOR MORE PAY, VER.DI SAYS

German workers at private waste disposal companies walked off their shift for over three hours to demand a pay increase, Ver.di, Europe's biggest union said.

Some 10,000 employees walked off their shift ahead of wage talks to resume tomorrow in the city of Bonn, Ver.di said. The industry's 160,000 workers are demanding 6.5 percent higher wages. Employers have offered 2.5 percent, the union added.

"Those workers who staged warning strikes clearly demonstrated that they are totally dissatisfied with the offer employers have made so far," Ver.di board member Erhard Ott said in the statement.

Yesterday, 400 evening-shift workers in four Berlin postal districts went on strike, also seeking a 6.5 percent pay raise. Some 8 million letters weren't processed, Ver.di said. Strikes were also held at insurer VGH-Verischerungen in the city of Hanover. Insurance workers also want a 6.5 percent pay increase.

Wage talks failed last weekend between Germany's IG Bau construction union and employers, raising the chance of strikes on building sites by Germany's 950,000 builders from June 17.

7.2 South Africa

SAMWU Press Statement, Monday 1st July 2002 First nationwide municipal workers strike in seven years starts tomorrow

Over 100 thousand members of the South African Municipal Workers’ Union will embark on a national strike from tomorrow, Tuesday 2nd July 2002, onwards. SAMWU members were left with no choice but to strike after the employer body, the SA Local Government Association (SALGA), announced in the media that it would unilaterally implement an increase of their choice for the next three years. The strike will affect services but SAMWU has taken steps to ensure that essential services will be provided. The union believes that this is a draconian move. It amounts to SALGA telling the union that they don’t want to see or hear from us again until the year 2005. It amounts to them forcing the union to give up the right to negotiate wages at all. This is completely against the provisions of the Constitution and the Labour Relations Act. If SAMWU were to allow this to go unchallenged, there would be nothing to stop any employer in the country from simply informing the media of the low increase that he or she intended to implement for workers for lengthy periods of several years. This clearly is an absurd notion which would take accepted labour practices back to the 19th Century. SAMWU has offered to enter into meaningful talks with SALGA next year around a multi-year wage agreement. Yet from the start of this year’s wage talks SALGA was totally inflexible on this point, as they have been on the issue of a minimum wage. Union members are thoroughly disheartened that SALGA has refused yet again to uplift the minimum wage. It remains at the poverty level of R1900 per month. Our demand for a minimum wage of R2200 per month is both reasonable and fair. Unisa’s Bureau for Market Research puts the minimum living level at R2400 per month. More seriously, SALGA has also put out disinformation to the very public that they are supposed to be accountable to. On Saturday, they announced that there will be an average rates increase of 12.5% for all households, claiming that this




was precipitated by the wage increase. Rates increases are supposed to be decided locally based on a number of economic factors, including levels of revenue brought in by trading services, electricity hikes coming through from Eskom, and other issues. This declaration by SALGA clearly illustrates their incapacity to properly manage the financial affairs of local government. SALGA’s announcement of the rates increase is silent about the disgracefully high wages paid to municipal managers, which in many cases are in excess of the salary paid to President Thabo Mbeki.

The exorbitant salaries for top managers (see the schedule attached) have caused the apartheid wage gap to spiral out of control. It is becoming commonplace for municipal managers in rural towns to pay themselves gigantic salaries of R45 000 per month. This leaves them with no money for service delivery. When service delivery ceases to exist, the municipal manager should become redundant. Yet not only does SALGA continue to allow these practices but they then expect the worker at the bottom to be satisfied with R1900. There are never announcements about nationwide property rates increases when the enormous increases of management are processed. SALGA announced that most small municipalities in rural areas pay well in "access" of the local market, while knowing that rural unemployment levels are almost 80%[1]! In this context, a monthly salary of R20 would be in excess of that earned by the local so-called market. This kind of disinformation ignores the context of life in rural towns where many municipal workers are not paid regularly because of the ongoing financial crises in many small municipalities. Because of the rural unemployment crisis, even when workers are paid, they need to use their tiny salaries to support entire extended families. SALGA has claimed that municipalities make huge contributions to pension funds and medical aid schemes. Yet these do not even apply to the bulk of SAMWU members. The average contribution to our members retirement fund is a low 12%. Pension contributions are still racially based in many municipalities, with cases of white workers belonging to funds getting 28% contributions from the employer. Thousands of SAMWU members cannot afford to belong to existing municipal schemes at all, yet are exposed to dangerous working conditions which require them to be treated regularly at doctors – for example, the night soil workers. According to the Department of Water Affairs, there are still 428 018 households using the unhealthy bucket system, all of which are serviced by poorly paid municipal workers. This prompted the union to start it’s own medical fund for workers. SALGA has attempted to create the impression that it is the wage demands of SAMWU members which prevent local government from delivering on the promises of free services they made nearly two years ago. It is in fact the government’s GEAR macro-economic policy that is the real culprit. SALGA negotiators have said that they cannot give a living wage because they need to comply with this policy. One of the characteristics of GEAR is to cut back and reduce the role of the public sector. It reduces the amount paid in wages to public sector workers. It means that for many of our members, one quarter at least of our minimum wage is being paid over just for privatised water we are forced to buy! Last week, SALGA also refused to negotiate picketing rules as is stipulated by the NEDLAC Code of Good Practice on Picketing. Instead, they once again instructed the union that striking workers would have no access to toilets and that union members should picket 500 metres from every municipality. The NEDLAC Code calls on employers to allow use of toilets and even phones and to set up communication channels with the union for marshalling purposes. SAMWU believes that the demand for 10% or R300 and a minimum wage of R2200 is reasonable.The union does not believe that the wages of municipal workers are supposed to be subsidising the delivery of minimum services. We call on SALGA to demand of central government to radically increase the share of revenues given to local government in order that communities must receive proper services and municipal workers can get decent wages and working conditions....../endsFor comment call Dale Forbes on 083 6512959 or General Secretary Roger Ronnie on 082 2006799For comment from COSATU President Willy Madisha call 082 3792486 or 082 8217456 or 082 7832967

Annexure A: Examples of high salaries paid to Mayors and Municipal Managers * The tiny Okahlamba (Bergville, KZN) municipality has an annual income base of just R2.1 million. The municipality spends R1.35 million on salaries for councillors and its top three municipal officials. The municipal manager receives R404 000 per annum.




* Vulamehlo municipality (inland from Scottburgh, KZN) is a new Grade 1 municipality without a rates base. It is planning to pay its manager a salary of R469 655 per annum.

* Matatiele KZN, which is a Grade 2 municipality, pays its manager R520 000 per annum.

* uThukela district council pays its manager R704 000 per annum.

* The package for eThekwini unicity manager is R836 870, plus a performance incentive of R507 204.

* The uJuba district council (Newcastle KZN), pays its municipal manager R525 892, plus an R80000 performance bonus.

* Sol Plaatje (former Kimberley) City Manager Phemelo Sehunelo is paid two transport allowances totalling R15710.58 per month (see payslip attached as Annexure C). His total yearly salary is R490 579.80 excluding thirteenth cheque and any performance bonuses.

* Buffalo City Municipal Manager Mxolisi Tsika takes home R660 000. Tsika received backpay from July last year and will also receive a performance bonus of 20 percent. The directors of the Buffalo City Municipality will receive salaries of R600000 a year as well as 20 percent performance bonuses.

* Nkonkobe municipality, incorporating Alice, Fort Beaufort, Middledrift and Seymour, has set aside over R3 million councillors' benefits for the coming year, and only about R10.5 million for basic services for the entire area.

* The King Sabata Dalindyebo (Umtata) municipal area needs a rescue injection of R230 million this year. The Integrated Development Programme report showed that one of the only strengths of the area was it’s large labour pool.

Annexure B: households still using the bucket system which are serviced by badly paid workers

Province Number of households using buckets

Western Cape 37 081Eastern Cape 84 099Northern Cape 33 861Free State 128 915KwaZulu-Natal 15 754North West 48 687Gauteng 52 537Mpumalanga 22 482Northern Province 4 602

Total 428 018

Details of SAMWU marches this week Monday July 1 st 2002 q FREE STATE: o Mangaung Municipality general meeting and warm up march from the municipality to Freloga offices at 5pm, contact Kgoilwe on 083 7380545 Tuesday July 2 nd 2002

q GAUTENG: o Johannesburg – pickets all day at every workplace - contact Andrew Nkoenyane on 084 3129721 or Rob Rees on 072 2257899o Pickets at all town halls in rest of the province from 6h00 - 15h00




q WESTERN CAPE: o Cape Town – march from Kaisergracht at 10am to Civic Centre to deliver a memorandum to the Mayor – Majidie 082 8426931 or Edgar 0833374028 or Matanzima 082 7136907o Swellendam – to the Mayor – contact Patric Muller on 082 5095631o Stellenbosch – to the Mayor – contact Jan Bostander on 082 6505742

q NORTHERN CAPE:o Kimberley workers to march – for details contact Manne Thebe on 082 5878291

q FREE STATE: o Kroonstad march – from Location Hall to the municipal offices at 9:30am – Zanele on 072 4082745 or Keke Moabi on 082 3938451 q EASTERN CAPE: o Nelson Mandela Metro march from Centenary Hall to City Hall at 10am - contact Tolom on 083 4635320o Umtata march from City Hall to the municipality at 10am – contact Labatal on 0826315371o Kokstad march from the Kokstad Stadium to the municipality at 10am contact Vukile – 0837726269 o Kouga, Graaf Reinet, Grahamstown and Ndlambe municipalities will all march– contact Mvunelo 082 6962629, Ten-Ten Ndyalivani 083 9253912 and Blou on 082 7513504o Nkonkobe, Mount Ayliff and Great Kei - contact Boysie Melitafa on 072 1419847 Wednesday 3 rd July 2002

q FREE STATE: o Free State Provincial march in Memel at 10am marching on the Mayor and FRELOGA – contact Keke Moabi on 082 3938451

q KWAZULU-NATAL: o Durban 9am from Curries Fountain through the city to the City Hall – contact Sipho Mhlungu on 072 4568006 o Pietermaritzburg marches at 9am from Havelock Road to Parliament through the city to Freedom Square – contact Sipho Mhlungu on 072 4568006

q WESTERN CAPE: o Paarl and Ashton march on councilors – contact Majidie Abrahams on 082 8426931o Plettenberg Bay march on Mayor – Felicity Petersen on 082 7247152o George march on Mayor – Donald Harker on 044 8019196o Beaufort West march on Mayor – Freddy Klaaste on 083 9576349o Saldanha march on the municipality – contact Branch Sec Rodrick Pretorius on 073 2361887o Matzikama march on the municipality – contact Lydia Katsio on 073 1631625o Cederberg march on the municipality – contact Frans Jansen on 083 5862027

q LIMPOPO PROVINCE: o Polokwane march at 10am, from SABC Park to SALGA and the MEC for Local Government and Housing – contact Walter Theledi on 072 2872443

q GAUTENG: o Johannesburg - Workers to gather at Beyers Naude Square (Library Gardens) at 09h00 and march to Metro Centre - contact Andrew Nkoenyane on 084 3129721 or Rob Rees on 072 2257899




o Marches to all West Rand Municipalities between 6h00 - 15h00 – contact Moses Moerane on 082 5326465o Emfuleni, Gauteng - March from Hans Strijdom street (Taxi Rank) to Municipality office - contact Andrew Nkoenyane on 084 3129721o Lesedi, Gauteng - March from taxirank to Town Hall Building (Municipal Office) - contact Andrew Nkoenyane on 084 3129721o Midvaal, Gauteng - March from taxi rank to Municipal building - contact Andrew Nkoenyane on 084 3129721o Pretoria - workers to march from Church Square at 10am to Munitoria to hand over memorandum to Executive Mayor – contact Nale Mashapa or Mike Mthembu on 012 3205795 q EASTERN CAPEo Workers will meet at East London North End Grounds at 10am and march - contact Boysie Melitafa on 072 1419847o Workers meet at King Williams Town Victoria Grounds at 10am to march on the municipality - contact Boysie Melitafa on 072 1419847 Thursday 4 th July 2002

q GAUTENG: o Joint mini rally at Verenging City Hall with workers from Emfuleni, Midvaal joining Sedibeng workers, with cultural events starting at 10h00 - contact Andrew Nkoenyane on 084 3129721o Johannesburg: Workers to gather at Beyers Naude Square (Library Gardens) for the day – contact Rob Rees on 072 2257899

q WESTERN CAPE:o Hermanus march from municipality to mayor – Roger Oerson 082 8426954o Caledon march from municipality to mayor – I. Januarie on 082 4169080o Bredasdorp march from municipality to mayor – Moegamat Baxter on 072 3089234

q EASTERN CAPE:o Chris Hani branch Eastern Cape – contact Ntombi Ndulula on 082 7803577o Amahlathi and Mbhashe branch Eastern Cape - contact Boysie Melitafa on 072 1419847 q GAUTENG:o March to the West Rand District Municipality. Memorandum to be handed over at 13h00 Friday 5 th July 2002 o WESTERN CAPE:o Worcester march – contact Daniel on 073 1546893

q FREE STATE:o Sasolburg march leaving Zamdela Community Hall 9:30am to district council then to municipal offices – contact Patrick on 084 7496108o Mangaung march from Bastion Plain to Freloga offices at 10am – contact Kgoilwe on 083 7380545

q GAUTENG:o Johannesburg workers to picket all day at Metro Centre. Contact Silas Letsimo on 072 1824570.o For details of marches in the North West province contact Itumeleng Mosala on 072 2412888 o For details of marches in Mpumalanga contact John Nhlapo on 082 9759836 and Jabulile Hlatshwayo on 082 4315640

Africa News, July 2, 2002Samwu Strike Will Continue




The South African Municipal Workers Union (Samwu) said on Tuesday night that its nationwide strike would continue and that there were indications that even more workers, supported by the community, would join the stayaway incoming days.

The union, which is demanding the greater of a 10 percent wage increase or R300 a month more for its members, strongly disputed claims by the South African Local Government Association (Salga) that no services were disrupted on the first day of the strike.

Samwu said there was massive support for the strike. In a national teleconference last night many of the provinces said that workers felt their salaries and conditions could not get worse and that they were prepared to strike indefinitely.

"Only time will tell to what extent Salga is prepared to disrupt services to the country in order to protect their R700 000 managerial salaries and R20 000 entertainment allowances," Samwu said in a statement.

The Congress of South African Trade Unions (Cosatu) on Wednesday declared its full support for the strike.

A Cosatu statement said the aims of the strike were fully in line with the Living Wage Campaign launched by the federation's executive committee in May.

Cosatu said the struggle for a living wage was at the core of creating a better life for all South Africans.

It said Samwu was right to reject the employers' offer which would leave the lowest paid municipal workers' wages at a level which did not meet the minimum standards of acceptability.

Cosatu said the workers involved in the strike represented the majority of municipal workers, who had not enjoy any effective bargaining rights until 1996 and had suffered very bad working conditions.

"It is regrettable that Salga has seen fit to unilaterally sign an agreement with a minority union, representing previously privileged workers, in violation of the sector bargaining council constitution."

Cosatu said it supported Samwu's argument that the pay structure in local government was intensifying the inequalities in South African society, which were already far too wide.

The statement added that the federation hoped that the employers would agree to settle the dispute through egotiation.

"We will, however, be prepared if necessary to mobilise other workers to back up our members in Samwu, who are fighting on behalf of us all in the front line of the Living Wage Campaign," the statement added.

Samwu said the main marches on Wednesday would be in: -- Johannesburg, where union members would gather at Beyers Naude Square (Library Gardens) from 10am and march on the Metro Centre;

-- Durban, where members would gather from Curries Fountain at 9am and march to the City Hall;

-- Port Elizabeth, where members would gather from 9am at the North End Showgrounds and march down Grahamstown Road to the city hall;

-- Buffalo City, where East London members would march from the North End Stadium from 10am:

-- Pietermaritzburg, where members would march from Havelock Road to the provincial legislature; and

-- Pretoria, where members would march from Church Square at 10am to Munitoria.

Earlier Salga warned that continued labour action would not make it raise its offer.

Salga said no services were disrupted on the first day of the strike.

"Furthermore, the large turnout of marchers which Samwu anticipated did not heed the call for strike action," Salga labour relations manager Rio Nolutshungu told reporters in Pretoria. _____________________________________________________________________________




He said reports had been received of "sporadic and isolated" marches but most workers returned to work after taking part in pickets.

"It is clear no disruptions of municipal services are being experienced in municipalities around the country."

However, Samwu said workers in Johannesburg staged mass protests at depots and along highways.

They claimed that more than 80 members of the National Union of Mineworkers joined the Samwu strike of 2000 members in Matjhabeng (Welkom) as councillors tried to bring in poorly paid unqualified scab labour.

Samwu said there was a 100 percent worker strike in Beaufort West while workers in the Garden Route including George, Knysna and Plettenberg Bay, branch came out and marched on the town hall.

Samwu claimed there had been a 100 percent stayaway in Alberton Springs, Nigel and Brakpan while figures for Benoni were 98 percent.

Samwu said 400 workers went on strike in Newcastle in Kwazulu Natal. In Cape Town a few thousand workers marched to the Cape Town CivicCentre to voice their concerns over Salga's final wage offer.

Traffic was brought to a standstill at intersections along the five-kilometre route from the Keisersgracht.

Marchers carried an assortment of banners some of which proclaimed: "To hell, it's war", "No to poverty wages of 7 percent for next three years", and "Forward to R2200 minimum wage."

Some elements among the crowd became unruly and shouted insults at the police. One man in particular shouted at policemen behind the razor wire barricade at the civic centre: "Shoot me you pig," and "Julle boere, jou ma se moer."

Marshalls had their hands full controlling the man.

Samwu general secretary Roger Ronnie, addressing the crowd from an open ended truck said: "The city manager Robert Maydon earns R1,4-million per year while we have to beg for a paltry increase."

A Cape Town unicity delegation, including deputy mayoress Belinda Walker, Maydon and the city's director of trading services Mike Marsden came out to accept a copy of Samwu's memorandum.

Walker in a hand-delivered letter to Ronnie said their memorandum would be considered by council and city management as soon as possible.

Cape Town City Council spokesmen said there appeared to be a limited worker stay-away in the various branches.

In some areas, residents could experience delays in refuge collection, but all emergency situations will be attended to.

Marsden reported low numbers of stayaways in the electricity (8 percent) and Water Service (12 percent) directorates.

The stayaway would have limited impact on service delivery.

Marsden said it was business as usual at the Epping Market, where not a single stayaway had been reported, and at the abattoir, where only 14 out of 137 staff had failed to report for duty.

In the Solid Waste Management Directorate, 735 of 2677 staff had stayed away.

The Transport, Roads and Stormwater Directorate had experienced a stayaway by about 25 percent of a total complement of 2400 staff.

Marsden said there were 11238 Samwu members on the city's payroll. The other major union, the Independent Municipal and Allied Trade Union (Imatu) has 10492 members in the city while 5270 staff do not belong to a trade union.

Imatu members accepted the salary increase of eight percent across the board offered by Salga. _____________________________________________________________________________




The Samwu strike is being supported by the SA Democratic Teachers Union and the Congress of South African Trade unions.

In other developments on Tuesday the labour court granted Johannesburg Water (JW), the water and sanitation service provider for the Johannesburg Metropole, an interdict ordering its strike Samwu-affiliated employees to cease their participation in the strike.

The court declared the water and sanitation service an essential service and the workers' strike unprotected in terms of the Labour Relations Act.

Meanwhile the New National Party in its response to the strike said it was a pity that negotiations between Samwu and Salga had failed, which led to the strike.

NNP spokesman on public administration Adriaan van Jaarsveld said while members of Samwu had the right to voice their unhappiness over the proposed seven percent wage increase, it was a pity that the union and Salga could not have reached an agreement through constructive negotiations.

The Democratic Alliance said municipalities were struggling with very limited financial resources and an ever-increasing workload as national government devolved more functions to local government.

"Today municipal workers are on strike because of failed negotiations regarding increases and once again service delivery will be affected," DA spokesperson on provincial and local government Gloria Borman said in astatement.

SAPA (South African Press Association), July 2, 2002MIXED RESPONSE TO SAMWU STRIKE There was a mixed response to the nation-wide strike by the South African Municipal Workers Union on Tuesday over its demands for the greater of a 10 percent wage increase or R300 per month. The union claimed that between 80 percent and 100 percent of its members went on strike but the South African Local Government Association (Salga) scoffed at its claims.

Salga warned that continued labour action would not make it raise its offer. Salga said no services were disrupted on the first day of the strike. "Furthermore, the large turnout of marchers which Samwu anticipated did not heed the call for strike action," Salga labour relations manager Rio Nolutshungu told reporters in Pretoria. He said reports had been received of "sporadic and isolated" marches but most workers returned to work after taking part in pickets. "It is clear no disruptions of municipal services are being experienced in municipalities around the country." However, Samwu said workers in Johannesburg staged mass protests at depots and along highways. They claimed that more than 80 members of the National Union of Mineworkers joined the Samwu strike of 2000 members in Matjhabeng (Welkom) as councillors tried to bring in poorly paid unqualified scab labour. Samwu said there was a 100 percent worker strike in Beaufort West while workers in the Garden Route including George, Knysna and Plettenberg Bay, branch came out and marched on the town hall. Samwu claimed there had been a 100 percent stayaway in Alberton Springs, Nigel and Brakpan while figures for Benoni were 98 percent. Samwu said 400 workers went on strike in Newcastle in Kwazulu Natal. In Cape Town a few thousand workers marched to the Cape Town Civic Centre to voice their concerns over Salga's final wage offer. Traffic was brought to a standstill at intersections along the five-kilometre route from the Keisersgracht. Marchers carried an assortment of banners some of which proclaimed: "To hell, it's war", "No to poverty wages of 7 percent for next three years", and "Forward to R2200 minimum wage." Some elements among the crowd became unruly and shouted insults at the police. One man in particular shouted at policemen behind the razor wire barricade at the civic centre: "Shoot me you pig," and "Julle boere, jou ma se moer." Marshalls had their hands full controlling the man. Samwu general secretary Roger Ronnie, addressing the crowd from an open ended truck said: "The city manager Robert Maydon earns R1,4-million per year while we have to beg for a paltry increase." A Cape Town unicity delegation, including deputy mayoress Belinda Walker, Maydon and the city's director of trading services Mike Marsden came out to accept a copy of Samwu's memorandum. Walker in a hand-delivered letter to Ronnie said their memorandum would be considered by council and city management as soon as possible. Cape Town City Council spokesmen said there appeared to be a limited worker stay-away in the various branches. In some areas, residents could experience delays in refuge collection, but all emergency situations will be attended to. Marsden reported low numbers of stayaways in the electricity (8 percent) and Water Service (12 percent) directorates. The stayaway would have limited impact on service delivery. Marsden said it was business as usual at the Epping Market, where not a single stayaway had been reported, and at the abattoir, where only 14 out of 137 staff had failed to report for duty. In the Solid Waste Management Directorate, 735 of 2677 staff had stayed away. The _____________________________________________________________________________




Transport, Roads and Stormwater Directorate had experienced a stayaway by about 25 percent of a total complement of 2400 staff. Marsden said there were 11238 Samwu members on the city's payroll. The other major union, the Independent Municipal and Allied Trade Union (Imatu) has 10492 members in the city while 5270 staff do not belong to a trade union. Imatu members accepted the salary increase of eight percent across the board offered by Salga. The Samwu strike is being supported by the SA Democratic Teachers Union and the Congress of South African Trade Unions. In other developments on Tuesday the labour court granted Johannesburg Water (JW), the water and sanitation service provider for the Johannesburg Metropole, an interdict ordering its strike Samwu-affiliated employees to cease their participation in the strike. The court declared the water and sanitation service an essential service and the workers' strike unprotected in terms of the Labour Relations Act. Meanwhile the New National Party in its response to the strike said it was a pity that negotiations between Samwu and Salga had failed, which led to the strike. NNP spokesman on public administration Adriaan van Jaarsveld said while members of Samwu had the right to voice their unhappiness over the proposed seven percent wage increase, it was a pity that the union and Salga could not have reached an agreement through constructive negotiations. "Any strike should, if at all possible, be prevented because it disrupts service delivery and impacts negatively on productivity". Van Jaarsveld called on the relevant roleplayers to resume negotiations for a wage agreement acceptable to all parties. The Democratic Alliance said municipalities were struggling with very limited financial resources and an ever-increasing workload as national government devolved more functions to local government. "Today municipal workers are on strike because of failed negotiations regarding increases and once again service delivery will be affected," DA spokesperson on provincial and local government Gloria Borman said in a statement. She said workers were critical of the high salaries being paid to officials and in particular municipal managers. "The challenge facing local government today is to work within the framework of what they can afford, and unless local government face up to this challenge it will never be viable." Borman said the DA was opposed to centralising the control of municipal workers under the public service. This will only exacerbate the problem of having to pay wages beyond that which municipalities can afford, Borman said. Sapa 07/02/02 16-56 C=100

The Star, July 18 2002R100m extra for workers after strike, By Mziwakhe Hlangani

The SA Local Government Association (Salga) has awarded poorly-paid refuse collectors across the country an extra R100-million bonus.

After two days of bargaining between Salga and the SA Municipal Workers Union (Samwu), local municipalities increased the wage bill to R19,54-billion.

Don Seemise, chief negotiator for Salga, said the wage bill went up from R18-billion to R19,44-billion when local government authority implemented its 8 percent increase on July 1.

The latest proposals, however, further increased the bill by more than R100-million.

In a major breakthrough, both parties agreed to nine percent increases for employees earning below R3 200.

The basic minimum wage has been raised from R1 900 to R2 100 a month.

A final settlement is expected to be signed on Friday.

On Wednesday, workers' report-back meetings took place countrywide in preparation for the signing of the final agreement in the bargaining council.

In terms of the provisional agreement, the 8 percent increase will apply to those earning over R3 200 a month.

The revised three-year agreement is part of the new deal, with an inflation-related increase plus one percent for the second and third year.

Cape Times July 18 2002Crippling Samwu strike settled after 3 weeks




By Eric Ntabazalila, Judy Damon and Aneez Salie

The South African Municipal Workers Union (Samwu) strike, which crippled some services for almost three weeks, is over.

On Thursday night, union officials received a mandate from their members to settle with employer body the SA Local Government Association (Salga).

The union and Salga are due to sign an official agreement in Pretoria on Friday morning.

'It was a nuisance for many businesses'

Samwu has won a R200 increase in the minimum wage, from R1 900 to R2 100, and has gained a nine percent increase for those earning below R3 200 (most of its members) and eight percent for the rest.

Salga had earlier refused to budge from eight percent, on which it had settled with the formerly all-white Independent Municipal and Allied Trade Union (Imatu).

Salga's threat to unilaterally extend the eight percent to Samwu members sparked the strike.

The Samwu-Salga wage deal, to be extended to Imatu and non-unionised staff on Friday morning, is a three-year one, which the union had steadfastly rejected.

Next year municipal workers will get an increase one percent greater than inflation, currently over nine percent, and in 2004 inflation plus 1,5 percent.

Imatu was 'devious and confused as usual'There is also agreement on an improved medical aid deal for the workers.

The strike was marred by the killing of two strikers, many injuries, the dumping of rubbish on streets in several cities and towns, and damage to municipal property.

Safety and Security Minister Charles Nqakula at one stage threatened to arrest strikers.

Salga chairperson Smangaliso Mkhatshwa also threatened to take action against law-breakers and to sue Samwu for damages.

Labour Minister Membathisi Mdladlana ordered the intervention of the Commission for Conciliation, Mediation and Arbitration (CCMA).

On Thursday night the deputy director of the Cape Chamber of Commerce and Industry, Colin Boyes, said the end ofthe strike was to be welcomed although it had not had an impact on production.

"It was a nuisance for many businesses," he said.

Tony Ehrenreich, provincial secretary of Samwu's mother body, the Congress of SA Trade Unions (Cosatu), said the settlement was important because it had started to close the apartheid wage gap.

"It also deals with the exorbitant salaries of management, which were part of the problem. They are milking the system while the workers do most of the work yet do not earn proper salaries," he said.

Cape Town Tourism chief executive Sheryl Ozinsky said that although there were no complaints from tourists, the strike did send a negative message to them.

"We welcome the end of this strike. Hopefully we have learnt that we need to go to the negotiating table to avert strikes," she said.

African National Congress executive councillor Saleem Mowzer said the ANC welcomed the settlement.

"The strike has cost the city millions of rands and we believe that this resolution is in the best interests of the city." _____________________________________________________________________________




He warned though that the agreed-upon increases would cost the city R77.3-million extra in salaries in the next financial year.

Unicity spokesperson Piet Cronje said the city would comment only once the agreement had been signed.

Sapa reports that Imatu and its mother body, the Federation of Unions of SA (Fedusa), said the strike had brought more losses to workers than gains. They also condemned "the uncalled-for trashing and vandalism of cities and towns by striking Samwu members, which caused SA great embarrassment during the Organisation of African Unity summit".

Samwu said in reaction that Imatu was "devious and confused as usual", and accused them of having collaborated with Salga to break the strike.

"They also benefit from our strike," said a spokesperson.

7.3 Canada

Waste News, July 22, 2002Toronto digs out after strike BYLINE: Joe TruiniThe largest municipal employee strike in Canadian history has ended, and Toronto sanitation workers have some catching up to do.

Ontario legislators passed back-to-work legislation during an emergency session July 11, ordering 25,000 Toronto municipal workers back on the job and ending the two-week strike. The total included about 1,200 sanitation workers that walked off the job June 26.

''We never like to see back-to-work legislation,'' said Brian O'Keefe, secretary-treasurer of the Canadian Union of Public Employees Ontario. ''We always want to resolve issues through fair collective bargaining,'' O'Keefe said. ''We reluctantly accept the back-to-work legislation because it represents the best outcome for a very bad situation.''

Canadian Union of Public Employees Locals 79 and 416 called a strike after negotiations with the city failed. Local 416 walked off the job June 26 and Local 79 followed eight days later, on July 4. Garbage and recycling services all but halted following the strike.

Trash and recycling services resumed throughout the city July 12 with workers cleaning up trash that had piled up during the strike. The city earmarked $4 million for the cleanup but will only need about a quarter of that, said Angelos Bacopoulos, general manager of solid waste services for Toronto. Ontario legislators gave the city seven days to clean up the mess, but workers finished in about two and a half days.

''I'm very proud of the effort that was put in by workers to get the city looking as good as it is,'' Bacopoulos said. ''This is the first time in my 20-year career people have actually came and patted us on the back and said job well done.''

The sanitation workers' next challenge is to catch up on curbside collection of trash and recyclables. Residents are leaving two to three times as much on the curb as usual, evidence that many people stored their trash during the strike. Most workers were glad to be back, with some concerned about losing their jobs to the private sector, Bacopoulos said. City crews handle about 70 percent of the city's single-family homes. Toronto contracts with private haulers to handle the rest.

''Some didn't even know why they were on strike,'' he said. ''Of course, there's going to be the odd handful that are bitter, but as a whole, I would say the work force is glad to be back and showed a very diligent work ethic in the first few days they've been back.''

The Ontario Legislature has ordered the city and the union to choose an arbitrator to work out a deal, a move the union applauds. Both sides must agree to accept the decision of the arbitrator.




The workers primary concern is job security. Mayor Mel Lastman's last offer was a 3 percent pay raise each year for three years and job security for permanent workers with 10 years of service as of July 1. The union wanted job security after six years of service but had loosened its demand to eight years. Lastman contends that the city can't afford the deal the workers want.

CUPE press release, 26 June 2002Toronto city workers now on strike, TORONTO - 6,800 "outside" workers in the city of Toronto commenced strike action at noon today, having failed to reach a collective agreement with their employer. The Toronto Civic Employees’ Union, Local 416 (CUPE) has been in a legal strike position since 12:01 a.m., June 24th. "This was a strike we didn’t want," said Brian Cochrane, president of Local 416. "We hoped it could be avoided when we extended our deadline on Sunday night and committed to working through another few days. But the intransigence of this employer has put us in the position of having to fight for our jobs. The employer’s refusal to budge on issues that are so basic, so very common to most public sector collective agreements, has brought us to this point where we’ve had to strike," said Cochrane."Our members deserve a level of respect that we have not seen in this process. The City has chosen instead to declare war on its employees. They have repeatedly refused to effectively address our concerns about job security, the contracting out of public services, about basic, fundamental issues such as layoff and recall, and the role of seniority," said Cochrane. "This was not a strike about money, contrary to the mayor’s assertions. It’s important to know this: we accepted the City’s proposed wage increase in our last proposal to the employer," said Cochrane."City Hall is determined to sell our jobs to the lowest possible bidder. We know exactly what that means for the public services you rely on -- accountability, standards, and access will all plummet," said Cochrane. Over 22% of our members would not be covered by the job security provisions in the City’s last offer, which suggested protection for those with 10 years of seniority at the beginning of the contract. Any city worker with under 10 years seniority now will never have any measure of job security under the employer’s last offer.Local 416 represents 6,800 water and waste-water workers, sanitation workers, paramedics (EMS), parks and recreation, roads and transportation workers. Local 416 also represents an additional 2,300 library workers who are in a legal strike position on July 4th.CUPE represents half a million working women and men in Canada, many of whom work in the municipal, health care, and university sectors.

CUPE press release, 26 June 2002City of Toronto municipal strike becomes the biggest in Canadian historyTORONTO - More than 15,000 "inside" employees of the City of Toronto are joining 6,800 co-workers on the picket lines in the biggest municipal strike in Canadian history. A strike by the Canadian Union of Public Employees (CUPE) Local 79 began at 12:01 a.m. today.

"We have made every effort to negotiate collective agreements with the City of Toronto," Ann Dembinski, the president of the local, told a news conference last night. "It has become clear that the politicians in charge of these negotiations don’t want to negotiate. They want to see 24,000 municipal workers on strike."

Dembinski said that the members of her local would be joining members of CUPE Local 416, representing "outside" workers, on the picket lines because "their issues are our issues."

The two municipal union locals are on strike because the city is demanding concessions on job security language. "The city says we want jobs for life," said Dembinski. "City workers do not have jobs for life. There is no such thing. What we have had is an agreement that permanent employees with 10 years or more service cannot be laid off because of contracting out. Now, the city wants rid of that language because it wants to privatize city services and contract out our work."

CUPE National President Judy Darcy told the news conference that: "With the city hosting World Youth Day in a few weeks, what kind of signal does it send to the youth of this city and the world when this employer wants to make sure that young people have no access to employment security. This dispute is about the future of our youth, the future of our city and the future of public services."

Three thousand of CUPE Local 79’s 18,000 members are "essential" workers who do not have the right to strike -- workers in Homes for the Aged and ambulance dispatchers. Many of them will be joining the picket lines on their lunch hours and after work.




The contract talks have covered four collective agreements: for permanent and temporary full-time workers, for part-time workers in 10 Homes for the Aged, for part-time workers in the parks and recreation department, and a fourth contract for part-time workers in other city departments. Some of the hundreds of services that will be affected are child care, homeless shelters, social assistance, building inspections, city planning, public health, food inspection, and recreation centres

CUPE press release, 28 June 2002Toronto Outside City Workers: Who’s on Strike?http://cupe.ca/mediaroom/newsreleases/showitem.asp?id=5767CUPE BackgrounderToronto Civic Employees’ Union, Local 416 (CUPE)Who’s on Strike?

The outside unit of Local 416 includes about 6,800 workers, approximately 6,000 of whom are on strike.

Local 416 also represents approximately 2,300 library workers who will be in a legal strike position on July 4th, 12:01 a.m.

Water/wastewater

Workers who work in treatment plants, filtration plants, testing water, conducting street maintenance of water mains and valves, etc.

Sanitation

These workers do curbside collections (commercial and residential), recycling, and work at transfer stations.

Paramedics/EMS

This includes paramedics and support services workers. Paramedics have retained a limited right to strike under legislation governing workers deemed essential. The support workers in EMS include mechanics, oxygen techs, schedulers and support services workers, and they all have a total right to strike.

Transportation/Roads

These workers conduct road maintenance, including pavement markings, etc., construction work and street signs.

Corporate Services

These workers maintain fleet services (servicing the city’s vehicles and keeping them in repair), are trades people, work in homes for the aged (maintenance), are caretakers at police stations, look after materials management (shipping and receiving of supplies), and work at special events on city properties.

Animal Services

These workers are in animal services, performing enforcement of animal control by-laws, public safety and rescue work, sheltering and education.

Parks and Recreation

These workers do maintenance of parks, pools, arenas, community and recreation centres, and golf courses.

Local 416 also represents Port Authority workers, who are in bargaining at a separate table; Parking Authority workers, who are not in bargaining; some workers who work at Enwave Heating Corporation, who are not in bargaining right now; and housing workers who are also not in bargaining right now.

CBC.CA News, Jun 27 2002Toronto fears garbage mountain as outside workers strike TORONTO-- Toronto’s trash piled up in the summer heat Thursday as the tourism season began. And there was no indication that the city’s 6,800 outside workers were ready to return to their posts. _____________________________________________________________________________



http://cupe.ca/mediaroom/newsreleases/showitem.asp?id=5767


The workers walked off the job Wednesday, after their union and the city failed to reach an agreement. "The parties remain quite far apart on the major issues. The situation remains grim," said Andrea Addario, a representative of the Canadian Union of Public Employees.

If the strike lasts more than a week, people will have to drop off their garbage at six locations across the city. Meanwhile, hundreds of thousands of people plan to descend upon the city for this week's Gay Pride parade, next week's Molson Indy, and the Pope's visit during World Youth Day festivities in mid-July.

They'll see the strike close municipal golf courses, greenhouses, observatories, arenas, park washrooms and recreational facilities.

Road repairs and the Toronto Island ferry will also be affected.

Toronto Mayor Mel Lastman said the strike could drag on until September or October. "A strike was completely unnecessary," Lastman said. "I think they pissed away our summer, to be perfectly frank with you."

"We didn't want a strike and have tried to negotiate with CUPE but we just can't bankrupt the city to meet the union's demands," he said.

The main issues in dispute are job security, layoff and recall rights, and seniority. If the strike does last throughout the summer, Toronto will not be a pretty place, CUPE local president Brian Cochrane said.

"I imagine that within the course of a very short period of time, the city will become very chaotic and will become very, very dirty."

The outside workers' union is promising to remain at the negotiation table while members protest on the streets of Toronto.

CUPE press release, 19 June 2002City workers condemn City Council endorsement of privatisationTORONTO -- The president of Toronto’s largest city union says that today’s city council vote is evidence that city hall is rushing headlong into the privatization of city services, against the wishes of most Toronto residents.“It’s ironic that many Toronto councillors are still ideologically wedded to contracting out. They are ignoring the risks of turning services over to for-profit companies. They are ignoring the recent scandals over private contracts – scandals that have cost Toronto ratepayers big money,” says Ann Dembinski, the president of the Canadian Union of Public Employees (CUPE) Local 79. “We know that private contractors have been lobbying councillors to take over services. Unfortunately, what is profitable for private contractors is not necessarily good for the public.”CUPE says city councillors are not being honest about their objectives. “Today’s vote shows that most of our councillors have jumped on the privatization bandwagon, they’re just not willing to admit it,” says Dembinski. “City council is avoiding the public’s reservations about contracting out and privatization. People are very concerned about the threat to public safety and privacy. Haven’t city councillors learned anything from the recent water scandals?”

Bargaining stalled

CUPE Local 79 is also stymied by the city’s failure to properly negotiate with its workers. “City negotiators say they will not meet with Local 79 until June 28, even though our strike deadline is June 29,” says Dembinski. “The city is squeezing both city locals for negotiating time. Given the serious issues that remain outstanding – especially job security – and given the city’s push to contract out services, it is now very likely that 24,000 city workers will be on strike by the end of the month.”CUPE Local 79 represents 17,000 city employees, 15,000 of whom could be on strike by the end of the month.

Toronto Star, July 14, 2002 Sunday Ontario EditionPublic or private? Debate raises a stinkBYLINE: Peter Gorrie, Toronto StarPicket-line duty has ended.

Now, for Toronto's garbage collectors, it's back to the great experiment. _____________________________________________________________________________




It's a test to see whether the public sector workers who pick up household trash in the former City of Toronto, North York, Scarborough and East York can do the job as well and as cheaply as those who work for the private companies that cover Etobicoke and York.

Initial results of the head-to-head comparison, which began last winter, should be available in three or four months, says Angelos Bacopoulos, Toronto's general manager of solid-waste management.

Since the city appears bent on privatization - a recent council vote to pursue "alternative service delivery" fuelled the strikers' demand for job security - you'd expect officials could easily predict the outcome.

They can't.

It might be common wisdom that contracting out garbage collection and other municipal services cuts costs. But the reality - 25 years after former British prime minister Margaret Thatcher began reversing the postwar expansion of the public sector - is messy, and sometimes surprising.

Expert opinion is divided.

"There's a large body of evidence that says services that are privatized are of lower price and better quality. The obvious reason is that people have to compete," says Sandford Borins, head of the University of Toronto's Rotman School of Management.

Daniel Drache disagrees.

No one is saying that all private sector services will fail, "but the chance is they won't be a success," counters Drache, director of the John Robarts Centre for Canadian Studies at York University.

Public sector advocates say their services are bound to be cheaper, because they can be just as efficient and no profits are creamed off.

The other side insists waste and inefficiency are imbedded in the culture of "fat-cat" public sector unions: It takes competition and the discipline of the market to produce innovation and cost savings.

Garbage collection is the most heavily privatized of all municipal services. Across Canada, contractors do more than 75 per cent of it.

In the U.S., it's estimated garbage privatization saves 10 to 15 per cent.

Jim McDavid, of the University of Victoria's Local Government Institute, has done the most extensive surveys in this country.

In the early 1980s, he found public-sector collection was 51 per cent more expensive. By the mid-'90s, the gap had narrowed to 7 per cent. He expects he'd get roughly the same result today.

Later research showed the private sector had no cost advantage in residential recycling.

McDavid also found that costs fall dramatically on both sides when the service is divided between public and private sectors.

East York tried that system in the early 1990s. It contracted out garbage collection in two of its four wards. At the outset, the private contractor's price was much lower. But city workers rose to the competition and, after three years, were cheaper.

Now, it's Toronto's turn.

At the beginning of this year, public-sector collection cost around $60 a tonne, about $20 more than the city paid its two private contractors.




Counting wages and benefits, contractors' employees were paid about $10,000 a year less than city crews. But that didn't account for all the savings.

City workers operated with less-efficient schedules and equipment. The private contractors didn't have to deal with downtown neighbourhoods, where garbage trucks must ease past parked cars on narrow streets, and crews have to clamber over snow banks to get to the trash.

In February, city crews switched to route patterns and schedules similar to the private sector's. Although other differences remain, the changes permit a more accurate comparison.

Bacopoulos expects Toronto's costs will drop. "I think people will be surprised when we put out the numbers."

Still, he reveals a difference in philosophy that's at the heart of the privatization debate.

The private sector crews are younger, because their employers work them harder and they don't last as long on the job, he says. "They want productivity. People either leave or they're pushed out.

"City workers aren't lazy. But do you show compassion? Do you want to kill people? Do you want them to have a long career or leave at 45?"

The debate about privatization comes down to costs, quality of service and what happens to workers. The competing sides cite dozens of cases to back their arguments about the bottom line. A couple of examples:

* Moncton, N.B., says it saved $10 million in construction costs and about 11 per cent a year in operating expenses because a contractor built its new water treatment plant. The system has passed every quality test since it opened in 1999.

* Calgary contracts out half of its water pipe replacement. City crews do the work for about $100 a metre less than the contractor's price.

The private sector offers a predictable price over the life of a contract, says Jane Peatch, executive-director of the Canadian Council on Public-Private Partnerships, in Toronto.

Peatch, who used to work for the city, watched the cost of the Sheppard subway soar as politicians kept demanding changes. Contractors wouldn't accept that, she says. "The private guys bid at a certain price; their profit depends on performing as they said they would. If they don't they erode their profitability."

In general, there are savings in the short term, says Quinto Annibale, a partner with Loopstra Nixon LLP, who wrote a report on East York's garbage experiment.

However, he warns, once the private sector sees you let your fleet go, downsize your workforce and management, "the potential is there for contract increases in the future. The contractors' leverage increases."

Monitoring contracts can get expensive. That's one reason Indianapolis, an American leader in privatization, has pulled back, says city comptroller Earl Morgan. Private contractors sometimes cut corners, services decline, and, "when a taxpayer is screaming at you over the phone, trying to find a contractor is not the best thing to be doing."

But Peatch argues most contractors don't cheat. "They won't jeopardize their reputation by cutting a few corners."Critics point to the private lab that contributed to Walkerton's E-coli tragedy, and the company that apparently bungled Swiss air traffic control in the recent mid-air collision that cost 71 lives, as proof privatization threatens public safety.

"Walkerton has shown us that when it's an issue of public health and safety, maybe we ought not to privatize," says Annibale.

Peatch disagrees: Water and sewage are among the success stories of privatization, she says. In the U.S., typically water and wastewater achieve 40 per cent savings without compromising service. "They perform well and have a hell of a lot to lose if they screw up."




Experts agree that when cities consider privatization, they must be very clear about the type of service they want. They must also be sure prospective contractors are qualified, and beware of lowball bids.

Wages and benefits usually fall when contractors take over garbage collection and other low-tech services. Contractors often hire former city employees, but invariably, the workforce shrinks.

Workers might find themselves with wider opportunities for training and promotions if they're taken into a large company. But job security is a casualty.

No companies offer the ironclad protection enjoyed by some city employees. Some provide much less: In Calgary, water pipe replacement is done from April to September. For the rest of the year, the city finds other work for its employees; the contractor lays off most of its staff.

The Toronto test may well confirm that the best result comes when the public and private sectors are in direct competition.

Annibale doubts public sector workers can improve their performance without such pressure. "The impetus isn't there. You could try to achieve efficiencies, but it's difficult to accomplish. A union isn't interested in achieving the best system; its objective is to protect its membership."

Jane Stinson, director of research at the Canadian Union of Public Employees, has a different view: "We'd like to be part of more meaningful discussions about how public services can be made better. We see a lot of waste and inefficiency."

That, McDavid says, leaves cities with more options. "I'd say, of course look at privatization, but don't make it the choice without looking at alternatives, one of which is working with your own people."

CUPE press release, 17 July 2002Province names Tim Armstrong to mediate between City of Toronto and its workershttp://cupe.ca/mediaroom/newsreleases/showitem.asp?id=5881Toronto – The Toronto Civic Employees’ Union, Local 416 (CUPE), has learned through the media that Ontario’s Minister of Labour has named Tim Armstrong as mediator-arbitrator in the dispute between the City of Toronto and its workers.

The parties will now enter 60 days of mediation on issues that were not resolved before the strike, followed by 60 days of arbitration, if necessary. Armstrong will act as mediator-arbitrator for both Local 416, which represents 6,800 “outside” workers, and for Local 79, which represents 17,000 “inside” workers.

Five collective agreements – one for Local 416 and four for Local 79 - must be settled during this 120 day period.

TORONTO CIVIC EMPLOYEES' UNION, LOCAL 416 STRIKE BULLETIN #6, JULY 11, 2002Strike EndsOn Thursday, July 11th, the Tory government introduced back-to-work legislation. This put an end to our 16-day strike and to the 8-day strike of CUPE Local 79. Our legal strike by 22,000 municipal workers in Toronto was the largest of its kind in Canadian history.

Heartfelt Thanks

We want to thank the strike committee for their incredibly hard work and for their vigilance over the last two weeks. We want to thank every single 416 member who helped to hold the picket lines strong, and to keep out the replacement workers the City tried to push through. Without you, we could not have held strong to our positions at the bargaining table. We are proud of your work and humbled by your support.

We also thank the library unit of Local 416, who were incredibly supportive of the outside unit during the strike. The library workers fought hard for their agreement, which is a strong settlement. They are in ratification votes tonight on the tentative settlement reached last week, and we expect to have the results of that vote on Friday.

We also thank our sisters and brothers in Local 79 for walking the picket line with us for a week, and for helping to send a strong message to the City that we would not allow them to play divide and rule between inside and outside workers in Toronto. _____________________________________________________________________________





Back to Work Legislation: What it Looks Like

We want to be perfectly clear about this: we totally opposed the introduction of legislation. We have always opposed the interference of Queen?x2019;s Park. Back-to-work legislation is an attack on our right to freely negotiate collectiveagreements. It is an attack on the most fundamental principles of trade unionism.

The Tories and the City tried to implement a system to gut our collective agreement through implementation, when the City realized that the members would not allow this to be done through bargaining. We fought it every step of the way.

Given that legislation was going to happen despite our opposition to it, Ontario?x2019;s NDP worked hard to negotiate a fair process of mediation-arbitration within this bill. At the eleventh hour on Thursday afternoon, a deal was brokered between the political parties at Queen?x2019;s Park that should allow for a fair system, one that allows us to make gains on the current collective agreement. Virtually all of the things that the province and the city initially proposed as part of the process to gut our agreement were defeated in the name of speedy passage of the bill, and many of the things that were crucial for the union are included.

First and foremost, we want to emphasize that our current collective agreement remains in place, and as we return to work we will still be functioning under the conditions of the current collective agreement provisions. We still have an opportunity to address, through mediation/arbitration, the issues that we took a strike over. The job security provision remains in place during this period. So this means that, for now, members who reach 10 years service, even after July 1, 2002, will be protected against lay-off in the event of privatization or contracting out.

Although we?x2019;ve been legislated back, we expect the mediation-arbitration process to provide the opportunity to make gains on the current collective agreement.

Initially, the Tories proposed to undo all "agreed to" items and create a "fresh start" to bargaining (i.e. withdrawal of wage proposal, withdrawal of the current position regarding employment security, and the withdrawal of other issues that have previously been agreed to). This was defeated: all items ?x201C;agreed to?x201D; to date in the negotiation process so far will stand.

The City and the Tories were also pushing for final offer selection (FOS) of proposals - which would mean that an arbitrator would have the ability to pick either the City's entire package, or the union's entire package. This was defeated. Instead, we will have a fair arbitration process where an impartial arbitrator is agreed to between the union and the employer, and where each issue is considered separately. If the Union and the City cannot agree upon an arbitrator, the province will appoint one from a list that we can live with.

The legislation states that Toronto will be cleaned up in seven days, and if after five days the city is not close enough to back-to-normal, the City has the right to hire private contractors to share in the clean-up work. We encourage members from all departments to tell your supervisors that you would be available to assist with this cleanup (if you know how to do the work and want the overtime), so that the work is kept ?x201C;in house?x201D;, without the City using private contractors to do the work. Please call the Union hall and leave a message if this offer by you is turned down.

Timelines

The legislation states that a mediator-arbitrator must be agreed upon by the City and the Union within five days. Discussions about this have already commenced. If the parties cannot agree, the province will appoint a mediator-arbitrator from a list of three people.

Once the mediator-arbitrator is selected, the process of negotiation will recommence, and we will have 60 days in mediation. If no agreement is reached at the end of those 60 days, the process will go to arbitration for another 60 days. If we have not concluded negotiating a collective agreement at that time, the province may elect to extend the arbitration period.

Return to Work

We are expected to start to return to work tomorrow, Friday. At the time of the writing of this bulletin, late on Thursday night, we are still meeting with the City to refine a protocol on issues related to back-to-work.

A Final Word _____________________________________________________________________________




The city tried to break our spirit and bust this union by refusing to negotiate with us. They never thought you would go out on strike and be so strong on the picket lines. Despite the withdrawal of the important services we deliver, and despite garbage piling up on Toronto streets, the city consistently refused to negotiate a settlement while you were on the street defending our jobs and the city?x2019;s public services.

We want to tell you that this fight around contracting out and the privatization of city services has only just begun. We are going to need your strength and support in the months to come as we fight to finish this negotiation process and win you a fair collective agreement.

We are proud of the membership – the display of solidarity in the face of an employer who tried to break us has been overwhelming. We can only get stronger.

In solidarity,Local 416, Outside Unit Bargaining Committee

Ottawa Citizen, July 11, 2002Secret' plan set for trash strike: Company refuses to divulge strategy if its employees go on strike Even as they reassured Ottawans there would be no garbage strike here, the people in charge of collecting the city's waste were coy about how they would handle the situation if there were.

"As long as progress is being made, mediation will continue," said Wayne Beaudoin, a spokesman for Canadian Waste Services. "Whether that's into the evening, overnight, or into the weekend, I don't know."

The company, which holds the contract for roughly two-thirds of garbage collection in Ottawa, is in talks with its union, CUPE Local 1338, as the Monday night strike deadline approaches.

Its contract with the city, a five-year deal signed with the former regional government in 1999, requires it to supply a contingency plan that describes how it would maintain service if its unionized employees walked out.

"I think that'd be secret information," said Pat McNally, the city's director of utility services. "It plays a pretty key part in how the employer is going to deal with the strike. If that got out, they wouldn't like it."

He said the contingency plan would be in the hands of his boss, Rosemarie Leclair, the city's general manager of transportation, utilities, and public works. The Citizen was unable to reach her yesterday. The union's negotiator, Andy Mele, was also unavailable.

Mr. Beaudoin laughed when he was asked about the contingency plan.

"That's a very proprietary piece of information. I'm not about to divulge any of it," he said, though he acknowledged the union would certainly figure out the company's plan almost as soon as a strike began.

Mr. McNally said he thought Canadian Waste Services would use managers and non-union employees to collect the trash if there were a strike, or possibly hire an outside agency to help.

He said he thinks the company does that anyway when there was more work than its employees could handle.

Using managers was a distinct possibility, Mr. Beaudoin said. According to the company, it has about 3,500 total staff hauling waste in 58 jurisdictions in Canada, including roughly 200 in Ottawa. Mr. Beaudoin said the company is the Canadian arm of a Houston-based company of 52,000, the biggest waste-management company in the world.

"The key thing is that as much as the union members have the right to strike, the company has the right to continue operating," Mr. Beaudoin said.

Mr. Mele has said he doesn't think the company could put together enough replacement workers to do the job.

The contract with the city specifies penalties Canadian Waste Services would have to pay for missing routes or picking garbage up late, as high as $2,000 per late collection route, if there were more than 10 of them.




The company also collects recyclables from apartment buildings in Ottawa, and would have to pay $1,500 per route per day if the materials went uncollected.

"We'd have a very strong incentive to make sure the work got done," Mr. Beaudoin said.

All that aside, he said he thought a strike was very unlikely, despite the 99 per cent of union voters who approved one.

"They'd be silly not to give that mandate to their negotiators," he said "This is all part of the process."

The Canadian Press (CP), July 12, 2002Ottawa garbage strike averted as city, union reach tentative dealOTTAWA (CP) _ Ottawa residents were breathing easier Friday after local garbage workers struck a tentative agreement with their employer.

The Canadian Union of Public Employees, which represents the workers, had previously set a Monday strike deadline.

We're happy we could get a new contract without going on strike and interrupting the service we provide to Ottawa residents,'' said CUPE 1338 president Ernie Dion.

Details of the deal between private garbage contractor Canadian Waste Services and its 160 unionized employees will not be released until after a ratification vote, to be held next week.

The average salary for a Canadian Waste employee is $35,000. The union was asking for three per cent pay increases annually over five years.

A two-week strike by Toronto garbage collectors came to an end Thursday, when the Ontario government passed legislation that forced workers back to their jobs.

Ottawa Citizen, July 13, 2002Garbage strike avertedA potential garbage strike in Ottawa was averted early yesterday morning when negotiators for Canadian Waste Services and CUPE Local 1338 reached a tentative deal.

The workers would have been in a legal strike position at 12:01 a.m. Monday.

As it stands, any labour dispute will wait until the union members vote on the deal, likely next week.

Canadian Waste Services is the contractor hired by the city to collect garbage in the central and western parts of the city, and to collect recyclables from apartment buildings. Its 160 unionized workers were in mediation with the company, trying to solve a dispute primarily over wages. The company reportedly sought to reduce the starting wage by about $3 an hour, while the union wanted three-per-cent raises each year for five years and other working conditions.

Terms of the deal won't be released until after the union members have voted.

CUPE press release, 19 July 2002Ottawa garbage workers ratify contracthttp://cupe.ca/mediaroom/newsreleases/showitem.asp?id=5885 OTTAWA – Ottawa garbage, recycling and landfill workers have voted to accept a new collective agreement that helps ensure safe workloads and decent wages and benefits.

Workload and wages were key issues for the 160 workers, members of the Canadian Union of Public Employees. The employer, private waste corporation Canadian Waste Services, was pushing concessions that would have increased already unmanageable workloads, while paying new workers less to do the same jobs.

“The company wanted us to work up to 60 hours a week. We stood firm and said ‘no way’ to any increase in our back-breaking workloads. We also rejected their plan to pay new workers less than what we earn right now. I’m proud we’ve protected decent wages for young workers in our community,” says Ernie Dion, President of CUPE 1338. _____________________________________________________________________________





The five-year deal includes improvements in the workers’ benefits and wages increases in each of the five years – a far cry from Canadian Waste’s initial proposal. The workers will get a two per cent increase in 2002 and in 2003, followed by 2.5 per cent increases in 2004, 2005 and 2006.

The deal was reached early July 12 in last-minute mediation. The workers ratified the deal yesterday night, with 61% voting to accept the contract.

“Our members know we worked hard to get the best contract we could this time. But they also let us know there are still lots of improvements to be made. Make no mistake -- we’ll be back at the table next time with those demands. We work hard and provide excellent service. We won’t stop demanding the safety and respect that we deserve,” says Dion.

Canadian Waste workers collect residential and commercial garbage and recycling in about 80 per cent of the city, as well as maintaining the trucks and the Carp landfill. Canadian Waste is owned by Texas-based garbage multinational Waste Management.

CUPE represents a half-million women and men working in municipalities, health care, education, social services, libraries, utilities, transportation, airlines and emergency services.

7.4 United Kingdom

TGWU press release, 17 July 2002Bill Morris says support for strike action is total vindication of unions’ case,PR02/291For immediate release – Wednesday 17th July 2002Newsdesks: political and industrial correspondents

Bill Morris says support for strike action is total vindication of unions’ case

Commenting on the widespread support from Transport and General Workers’ Union members in today’s first national strike in local government for 23 years, Bill Morris, T&G General secretary said,

“Today’s turnout is a total vindication of the call by the T&G and the local government unions for a better offer than the 3% which has been put forward.

“The employers should take note as I say again it won’t get any easier for them if they fail to come back to the negotiating table. They cannot abdicate their responsibilities.”

ENDS

Note to editors: attached is a snapshot report of actions as collated by the T&GFor further information, please call the T&G Press Office on 020 7611 2550

Location Activity and impactLondon Woolwich ferry closedLondon South East London: majority of schools have been closedLondon LB Redbridge over 100 coach escorts on strikePlymouth Torpoint Ferries closed between 5.45am and 10.00pmScilly Isles Scilly Isles Airport closing downReading Reading Civic Centre closed Portsmouth Portsmouth ferry terminal will be closed – Tamar Bridge traffic chaoticPortsmouth Traffic wardens are outDartmouth Lower ferry in Dartmouth has stoppedPlymouth Council tip in Plymouth closedPlymouth Museums, libraries, toilets and Guildhall have been closedCornwall Cornwall schools closed




Belfast Belfast City Hall picketCardiff Cardiff markets closedFlint Flint lifeguards outBirmingham Over 200 street cleaners outLiverpool Mersey tunnel workers have downed tools at rush hour 8-9am and 5-6pmSalford Turnpike House, New Eccles Road picket in Salford. Site of ‘Life of Grime’ programme

Unison press release, 14 July 2002"Enough is Enough" Warns UNISON as Local Government Heads for First Ever National Strike. UNISON, the UK’s largest union, has today called on the government to stop sticking their heads in the sand and act now to prevent the first ever national strike of local government workers going ahead this week (Wednesday July 17). Staff have been stung into action by the employers’ refusal to budge from a derisory 3% pay offer, which gives just 15p an hour extra to over 270,000 UNISON members earning less than £5 an hour.

UNISON General Secretary Dave Prentis, said: “It is shameful that the government seems to be standing on the sidelines and doing nothing to prevent the first ever national strike of local government workers. They should stop sticking their heads in the sand and pretending this strike has nothing to do with them.

“The Comprehensive Spending Review gives Gordon Brown the ideal opportunity to stop this strike dead in its tracks and end the misery of low pay, by telling Local Authorities they will have the money to fund a decent pay increase. The Local Government Employers’ Organisation say they cannot afford to meet our claim, but if the Government increased the total grant to local authorities by just 2.1% they could meet UNISON’s claim in full.

“Of course extra spending on health and education is vital but they ignore local government at their peril. There is no doubt that local councils need extra funding, because every day of every week, every single person in this country relies on local government services in some way. Children rely on nursery nurses, teaching assistants and dinner ladies, the vulnerable, sick and elderly need home care, meals-on-wheels staff and social workers and everyone benefits from access to libraries, parks and leisure centres and it is local government workers who empty our bins and keep the streets clean.”

Ends

GMB press release, 17 April 2002Local Government Pay 2002Following a full postal ballot of GMB members covered by the NJC for Local Authority Services - the negotiating body which was supposed to deliver Single Status and equal pay - the membership overwhelmingly decided to REJECT the Employers’ offer of a 3% increase.Following a full postal ballot of GMB members covered by the NJC for Local Authority Services - the negotiating body which was supposed to deliver Single Status and equal pay - the membership overwhelmingly decided to REJECT the Employers’ offer of a 3% increase.Over 30% of GMB members covered by the agreement voted 9:1 to reject the offer.A 30% ballot is above that which applies to many Local Government elections.The ballot result clearly demonstrated that dedicated Local Government workers are: Are not prepared to accept a 3% offer. Are frustrated by the lack of progress on the implementation of the Single Status agreement. Are not prepared to accept the continual attack on Local Government Services and the threat of privatisation of services and GMB members’ jobs.The ballot result is a very clear message not only to Local but to Central Government that Local Government workers should be: Recognised for their contribution to the delivery of services to our local communities. Receive a pay increase at least equal to other public sector workers. Not be subject to the obscenity of universal privatisation of Local Government services under the guise of Best Value.GMB is seeking further urgent meetings with the National Employers and will demand an improved pay offer.Failure by the Employers to make an improved offer could force GMB to conduct an industrial action ballot.Members will be advised of any developments.Further information available from your Regional Office or visit www.gmb.org.uk.M.C. GRAHAMNational Secretary, Public Services Section




17 April, 2002 contact Mick Graham on 0208 971 4218 or mobile 07850 465006

GMB press release, 14 JULY, 2002LOCAL GOVERNMENT WORKERS IN 1979 PAY SHOCK: WAGES LOWER UNDER BLAIR THAN IN WINTER OF DISCONTENT Local Government workers now earn less as a proportion of average earnings than during the, ‘Winter of Discontent’, according to new research for the GMB union.The study, conducted by the independent Labour Research Department, reveals that pay levels for school dinner ladies, home helps and other Local Government employees are lower in relation to other workers than at the start of the infamous 1979 pay disputes.According to the study:Female Local Government workers earn just over 90% of average earnings, compared to 98% in 1979. Male Local Government workers have seen their wages fall from 86% of national average earnings to 83% today. The gap between male Local Government workers pay and average earnings has grown from £45.40 p/w in 1979 to £82.50 p/w in 2002. Over the same period, the gap for female Local Government workers has risen from £3.78 p/w to £35.80 p/w. The survey comes as more than 1.2 million Local Government workers prepare to stage their first mass walk-out for 23 years. Despite calls by unions for peace talks to avoid a dispute, Local Government employers are refusing to discuss a possible increase in their 3% pay ultimatum. Local Council Leaders recently awarded themselves an average allowances increase of 64%.Commenting on the survey, GMB General Secretary John Edmonds said, “It’s staggering to think that local Government workers are actually earning less under Tony Blair than they were under Jim Callaghan and the ‘Winter of Discontent’. No one wants to have to resort to industrial action, but with the employers refusing our offer of peace talks, and Downing Street seemingly happy to let this crisis unfold before their eyes, our members feel they have no where left to turn.”“If it is O.K. for the new breed of Town Hall Fat Cats to award themselves telephone number increases in their allowances, surely an extra 20p an hour for those who provide such a vital public service is not too much to ask.”- Ends -For further information contact Dan Hodges 0208-971-4224, or pager no. 07693-337-318.Notes for Editors:The GMB has opened negotiations with the Local Government employers by requesting a minimum Local Government wage of £5 per hour. Lowest local government wages are currently £4.80 per hour.The latest Councillors allowance award represents an average increase of 64% to £12,500 per year. 2 out of every 3 local Government workers earns less than £12,500 per year.

Unison press release, 17 July 2002So solid strike as Unison declares Action Overwhelming SuccessFrom Hadrian’s Wall to Land’s End, from Belfast to Bridlington, UNISON, the UK’s largest union, has declared today’s strike action by local government workers an overwhelming success. Reports from around the country show Council Offices brought to a stand still, schools shut, leisure centres closed, bins left unemptied and neighbourhood offices locked up, as members take to the picket line and join hundreds of rallies and marches across England, Wales and Northern Ireland.

Dave Prentis, General Secretary of UNISON said:

“Today’s strike action is an overwhelming success. Not only is the strike rock solid across the country, but support from the public has been amazing. The message from the 750,000 local government workers on strike today is - 3% is just not good enough.

“The employers need to take urgent action to up their offer and put a stop to essential services being drained of staff. Why have the worries and responsibilities of a home care worker or a teaching assistant earning a pittance, when you’d be better off stacking shelves in a local supermarket? The offer is worth a miserly 15p and hour to over a quarter of a million low paid staff earning less than £5 an hour – frankly it’s an insult.”

The Guardian, 19 July, 2002From the bottom up When the low paid go on strike, people sympathise. This must be channelled into political support for fair pay Polly Toynbee _____________________________________________________________________________




On the municipal day of action the dustmen came to empty my bins as usual. "Why aren't you on strike?" I asked the man who has been doing my bins for years. "Ah," he said, "we would be if we dared but we're afraid we'd be sacked. Council workers are badly off but it's worse for us contracted-out." He pointed to his four-man crew and explained. He was an old ex-council worker still employed by law at council rates. Two of the others were hired by the contractor, Serviceteam, on a much lower rate: he fears a new contractor about to take over might pay new employees even less. The last man was from an agency and paid just £3.60 an hour, an adult paid below the minimum wage. How? He shrugged and said the agency just takes the money off the top. So there were three rates of pay for men on the same job. "If we went on strike, they'd sack us and employ all agency." This is Lambeth, once the byword for overbearing red union rule. This council used to be run by and for union baronies, forget the public. From extreme to extreme, public service in the borough has now swung from a corrupt soviet to a US cowboy market. Go into school kitchens and there the contracted-out workers are downsized and worked to the bone. Agencies are pouring in temps employed at two removes with no chance of creating a public ethos. Yet the government is resisting an EU directive to give agency workers the same rights as other workers. Some of what goes on out there in the low-pay wild west eludes their grasp. Today local authority employers gather to ponder this week's strike. There was no doubt it was a success, not just getting out hundreds of thousands of workers but in a wave of public sympathy. Sky TV polled 75% support, local phone-ins were swamped, people honked their horns at the pickets. Who would not be touched by armies of women cleaners, carers and dinner ladies earning less than £5 an hour? The employers will probably decide today to go back to the negotiating table. It is hard to forge agreement among councils not only politically diverse, but with quite different employment problems. It is the northern old Labour strongholds that have been holding out, in areas where any council job ad is swamped with applications. Southern councils with trouble recruiting are more relaxed about pay. But both councils and unions want to keep national pay bargaining. Meanwhile "gathering storm" and "union floodgates" imagery fills an eager Tory press praying for a summer of discontent, noting how leftwing leaders are being elected to one union after another. What matters now is that there is no general panic and the government and unions themselves distinguish between justified disputes and those caused by leaders with their own agendas indulging in political grandstanding. On the one hand low-paid women cleaners and carers deserve a fair settlement. On the other, it was necessary to see off the deservedly failed strike called by the new leftwing civil service union leader against the clearly improved working conditions in new Job Centre Plus offices. Yesterday London ground to halt as the RMT struck the tube. It was a classic case of destructive trade unionism of the old school Although the cause itself - the expensive part-privatisation of the tube - was potentially popular, these political strikes were never going to be the way to win. The tube PPP was strongly opposed by Londoners in the mayoral election, opposed by most London MPs and GLA members with almost every expert and economist against. But the clever way to alienate all that support is to make the public's life such hell that they are cunningly reminded of privatisation's good points in dealing with trade union militancy. Instead there should have been a series of friendly, inclusive demonstrations encouraging Londoners to side with the unions as part of a powerful popular protest. This might not seem the best week for the TUC to demand more trade union rights, but new rights are needed to help the weak and make it easier to organise the downtrodden, the contracted out, the McWorkers, agency temps and all drudges on very low pay. Only 19% of private-sector workers belong to unions: those who do earn on average 10% more. Asked about low pay, Gordon Brown prefers every other way but raising the minimum wage: give them top-up benefits, more skills, more childcare, more flexibility so they can navigate the labour market better, he says. Indeed those are essential, though it is never clear who will do the low-paid cleaning and caring when everyone has moved up. He also says the low paid should join unions, but organising shift workers and part-timers with hostile employers requires new access to workplaces to let people know their rights to join. Ignorance of trade unions is profound and so is fear of the sack. Naturally, local authorities feel aggrieved that the problem of endemic low pay and gross inequality in Britain has landed on their doorstep. One of their negotiators says plaintively: "It is not reasonable to expect us as employers to be social engineers when we are supposed to operate in the market as efficiently as we can." And he is right. The burden of creating a national policy on low pay should not fall on them alone. The government needs a structured long-term plan for making pay fairer from the bottom right up to the fat-cat top, instead of ducking out of sight in this dispute. In the US, the Living Wage campaign is gathering pace. It began in Baltimore where the city agreed to pay not only its own workers but all its contractors' workers a living wage well above the minimum wage. Now 85 more cities and counties have followed suit. The fear of lifting the minimum wage is always that jobs might be shed in marginal businesses. But by creating a public sector minimum that danger is avoided, while pulling up prevailing wage rates. It costs money: taxes had to rise to pay for it but after a broad public debate in these US cities, it had strong public support - even in that tax-averse nation - and it saved more in poverty than it threatened jobs. Adair Turner, new head of the low pay commission that fixes the minimum wage, says there is no iron law that decrees how many jobs are lost at any particular level of pay, it's a matter of balance: he points to countries like the Netherlands with full employment (and much fairer pay distribution) who get the balance right.




Popular support is the key and unions which forget it will fail. There was a groundswell of sympathy for the municipal workers on Wednesday (which might not last if services were seriously disrupted). One of the employers negotiators put it succinctly: "People honked to support the dinner ladies on picket lines but will they still honk to support their taxes going up?" Only if that gut popular empathy is channelled into political support for a well-argued national strategy for fairer rewards.

Unison press release, 19 July 2002Local Government Strike Continues in AugustLocal government workers in England, Wales and Northern Ireland will stage a second day of national strike action on August 14 over their claim for a £1,750 or 6% pay rise.

The three main unions in local government – UNISON, the GMB and the TGWU – today agreed that a second national strike and further selective action would go ahead on August 14.

A third day of national strike action is also being planned for September. 750,000 local government workers took part in a one day strike on Wednesday, July 17 in support of the pay claim. The employers’ offer of 3% has been overwhelmingly rejected by members of the three unions.

UNISON National Secretary for Local Government, Heather Wakefield, said:

“In the face of the employers’ failure to re-open negotiations we are escalating our campaign of industrial action.

“It would be a disaster if the employers and the government took off on their summer holidays and left in their wake chaos on this huge scale in local government.

“Our door remains firmly open but the employers must be in no doubt that something significant has to come from them to prevent this action.”

The Guardian, August 6, 2002Council workers accept pay offer Kevin Maguire Union leaders last night lifted the threat of a wave of council strikes this summer after agreeing a two-year deal worth 7.8%, with a minimum rate of £5 an hour for the lowest paid. The heads of Unison, GMB and the Transport and General Workers Union agreed to suspend their industrial action, including a second national walkout on August 14, and recommend acceptance of a package thrashed out during negotiations at the Acas conciliation service. The improved offer tabled by representatives of 410 local authorities in England, Wales and Northern Ireland will be greeted with relief in Downing Street. Ministers are still braced, however, for the first postal and fire strikes since the 1970s, planned for the autumn. Under the local authority agreement, the pay of most employees will go up by 3% backdated to April, with a further 1% this October, followed by 3.5% in April 2003, making a compounded 7.8%. A minimum rate of £5 an hour will be introduced, backdated to April, equivalent to an immediate 4.1% for the lowest paid, said the employers. It will rise to £5.32 by the end of the two years, a rise of almost 11%. The employers had previously offered 3% this year, but under pressure from No 10 upped the proposal and conceded the £5 crucial to the unions, wrapping the improved offer up in the two-year deal. Union leaders had demanded 6% and a minimum £1,750 a year. The employers said the new deal would be worth £1,023 for the lowest paid. A joint committee will also be established to explore local government pay, which has fallen behind much of the public sector, as well as the private sector. Yesterday's negotiations followed a strike last month by up to 750,000 refuse collectors, home helps, traffic wardens and other staff. The dispute, the biggest since Tony Blair entered Downing Street in May 1997, revived memories of the so-called 1979 Winter of Discontent. "Today is the beginning of the end of low pay in local government," said Jack Dromey of the transport workers.

GMB press release, 6 August 2002BREAKTHROUGH IN LOCAL GOVERNMENT PAY TALKS 6 AUGUST 2002




After a marathon set of negotiations, the three unions in local government – GMB, UNISON and T&G - and the local government employers, have agreed to a set of Acas proposals to recommend to their respective memberships.Acas has proposed a two-year pay deal, with increases ranging from 7.7% to 10.9% for the lowest paid. All council workers would receive a 3% increase with a new minimum rate of £5 an hour from 1 April 2002. This would followed by a further 1% rise from 1 October this year, plus another 1% for the lowest two grades. In April, 2003 council workers would receive a pay rise of 3.5% and an additional 1% for the lowest paid. On 1 April, 2003 the lowest paid worker would receive £5.32 an hour, up from the current £4.80, a welcome increase for 284,000 local government workers who are predominantly women.The national strike planned for August 14 will be suspended while the three unions and the employers consult their respective memberships over the next 6 weeks.Mick Graham, GMB National Secretary for Public Services said:“The GMB will be recommending the Acas proposals to its members as it represent a fair deal for local government employees and a strong platform to end low pay and unequal pay. The lowest paid workers, who are predominantly women and many of whom work part time, could be earning £5.32 by April 2003, a significant rise of 52 pence.“The GMB has fought long and hard in these negotiations to have the contribution of local government workers valued and recognised. I believe that these proposals begin to reflect the hard work and dedication of classroom assistants, dinner ladies, care assistants and many others who give tirelessly in our communities every day.“Public attention has been tremendous during this dispute and the GMB would like to thanks all those that have supported us during this dispute and in our battle to achieve justice for local government workers.”The Acas proposals include the setting up of an independently chaired Local Government Pay Commission to address issues of low pay and equal pay for men and women workers in local government which will report back within one year.The three union negotiating team, Mick Graham (GMB), Heather Wakefield (UNISON), and Jack Dromey (T&G) added:“This Commission represents a real opportunity to address the long term decline in local government pay and will begin to redress the neglect of the local government workforce”- Ends –

7 Cape Times 18 July 2002, Crippling Samwu strike settled after 3 weeks8 Waste News, 22 July, 2002, Toronto digs out after strike 9 CUPE press release, 26 June 2002, Toronto city workers now on strike10 CUPE press release, 26 June 2002, City of Toronto municipal strike becomes the biggest in Canadian history11 CUPE press release, 28 June 2002, Toronto Outside City Workers: Who’s on Strike? http://cupe.ca/mediaroom/newsreleases/showitem.asp?id=576712 CBC.CA News, 27 June 2002, Toronto fears garbage mountain as outside workers strike13 CUPE press release, 26 June 2002, Toronto city workers now on strike14 CUPE press release, 19 June 2002, City workers condemn City Council endorsement of privatisation15 Toronto Star, July 14, 2002 Sunday Ontario Edition, Public or private? Debate raises a stink16 CUPE press release, 17 July 2002, Province names Tim Armstrong to mediate between City of Toronto and its workers, http://cupe.ca/mediaroom/newsreleases/showitem.asp?id=588117 TORONTO CIVIC EMPLOYEES' UNION, LOCAL 416 STRIKE BULLETIN #6, TCEU OUTSIDE WORKERS – CUPE LOCAL 416, JULY 11, 200218 Ottawa Citizen, 11 July, 2002, Secret' plan set for trash strike: Company refuses to divulge strategy if its employees go on strike 19 The Canadian Press (CP), 12 July, 2002 Friday, Ottawa garbage strike averted as city, union reach tentative deal20 Ottawa Citizen, 13 July, 2002 Saturday Final Edition, Garbage strike averted21 CUPE press release, 19 July 2002, Ottawa garbage workers ratify contract http://cupe.ca/mediaroom/newsreleases/showitem.asp?id=588522 TGWU press release, 17 July 2002, Bill Morris says support for strike action is total vindication of unions’ case, 23 Unison press release, 14 July 2002, "Enough is Enough" Warns UNISON as Local Government Heads for First Ever National Strike24 GMB press release, 17 April 2002, Local Government Pay 2002 25 GMB press release, 14 JULY, 2002, LOCAL GOVERNMENT WORKERS IN 1979 PAY SHOCK: WAGES LOWER UNDER BLAIR THAN IN WINTER OF DISCONTENT26 Unison press release, 17 July 2002, So solid strike as Unison declares Action Overwhelming Success 27 Guardian, 19 July 2002, From the bottom up28 Unison press release, 19 July 2002, Local Government Strike Continues in August29 GMB press release, 6 August 2002, National strike in local government suspended30 The Guardian, 6 August, 2002. Council workers accept pay offer31 Bristol Evening Post, 1 August 2002, Bin strike averted through last-ditch talks _____________________________________________________________________________







For further information, contact Emily Thomas on 0208-971-4226 or pager no. 07669 196 022.

Bristol Evening Post, August 1, 2002Bin strike action averted through last-ditch talksTHE threat of an all-out strike by binmen in South Gloucestershire next week has been lifted following last-ditch talks.

The walk-out was averted when refuse contractors Sita reached an agreement with negotiators from the Transport and General Workers' Union.

The binmen had threatened a five-day strike next week after rejecting a four per cent pay offer as derisory.

But Sita put forward a modified offer which gave a six per cent increase to the collection teams and four per cent to office staff and other grades.

Despite the increased offer, binmen in South Gloucestershire are still up to 60 a week worse off than their colleagues in Bristol.

Sita regional director Dave Foster said: "We have resolved the dispute with the collection staff by making an increased offer.

"It is not an across-the-board offer to all staff but the key is the increase to the collection teams of six per cent."

Sita had already started delivering extra refuse sacks to some homes in anticipation of the strike but they will not now be needed and can be kept by householders.

TGWU regional negotiator Paul Swain said: "The company has made a considerably improved offer which has been accepted. But it still means our people are earning far below their colleagues in Bristol."

Mr Swain said the difference in pay rates between the two authorities remained a problem to be solved in the future.

South Gloucestershire Council chief executive Mike Robinson played a key role in supporting the last-ditch talks and bringing both the negotiation teams together.

Council spokeswoman Stella Parkes said: "We are very pleased that the two sides have managed to reach an agreement. It means there will be no strike by refuse collectors next week."



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Basic information · Web viewInstead there should have been a series of friendly, inclusive demonstrations encouraging Londoners to side with the unions as part of a powerful popular