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23 February, 2009
At a founding meeting in the US city of Pittsburgh, state of Pennsylvania, on 9 February, five unions organised the North American Cement and Building Materials Union Network. The founding of the network was sponsored by the ICEM, in cooperation with the Building and Woodworkers’ International (BWI).
The unions include US affiliates of the ICEM: the International Brotherhood of Boilermakers (IBB), the United Steelworkers (USW), the United Mine Workers of America (UMWA), the Laborers International Union (LIUNA), and the Teamsters Union.
The IBB and the USW will coordinate the network, and meetings will be held biannually.
“The creation of this network is a major step in dealing with multinational companies in this sector,” said ICEM General Secretary Manfred Warda. “We believe companies will pay attention to our demands when the various unions are unified and working jointly together.”
Global companies operating in North America, whose unionised employees make up the network, include Lafarge of France, Holcim of Switzerland, Buzzi Unicem and Essroc of Italy, Cemex of Mexico, and Heidelberg of Germany. Delegates to the initial conference passed a resolution in support of the UMWA at Lafarge’s Joppa cement facility in Grand Chain, Illinois. The union has organised 120 workers at this Ohio River cement plant, but managers are attempting to decertify the UMWA as bargaining representative.
The resolution calls for French senior managers of Lafarge to dispatch its Reference Group to the site to investigate whether or not American managers are violating the Global Framework Agreement, which ICEM and BWI are signatory to with Lafarge.
The network’s aims are presenting a unified message to the North American cement industry; pursuing organising neutrality at non-union worksites; enforcing Global Agreements in North America; promoting higher standards and better working conditions; developing coordinated collective bargaining strategies; recruiting and developing the next generation of union leaders; promoting labour-management dialogue on sustainable development; and continuing to coordinate with unions globally at key multinational employers.