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14 July, 2005ICEM News release No. 57/1999
Imerys, the ceramics and construction materials multinational, has just given itself a new name and a new image. But it already risks seeing them tarnished by an international dispute over its anti-union stance in the USA.
Known until recently as Imetal, the company claims to be the world leader in refractory raw materials, paper pigments, white pigments and high-purity graphite.
Imerys is headquartered in France, and trade unionists there have pledged their support to American workers who are resisting the company's attempts to destroy their union.
The US Paper, Allied-Industrial, Chemical and Energy Workers union (PACE) is fighting deunionisation campaigns by Imerys at its plants in Georgia and Alabama. At the global level, PACE is affiliated to the 20-million-strong International Federation of Chemical, Energy, Mine and General Workers' Unions (ICEM).
Last week in France, PACE and the ICEM met with Pierre Gaudin of the ICEM-affiliated chemical and energy union FCE-CFDT; Josette Mehat, National Secretary of the construction and wood workers' FNCB-CFDT; and Eliane Petit, chief shop steward at Imerys for the ICEM-affiliated mining union FGMM-CFDT. They promised active support for an international campaign on the issue, to be coordinated by the ICEM.
"Imerys has changed from a company which once sought stable relations with PACE to one which appears dead-set on destroying unions in the US," said Joe Drexler, PACE Director of Special Projects. "We are informing European unions about the company's actions."
Imerys withdrew union recognition of PACE at its plant in Sylacauga, Alabama, after the company acquired English China Clays (ECC) and merged its Georgia Marble plant with a much larger non-union ECC plant, which stands next to the Georgia Marble facility. The company's withdrawal of union recognition was based on former ECC non-union workers' outnumbering union members at the combined plant.
PACE offered to hold a new election supervised by the National Labor Relations Board (NLRB) at the combined plant, provided Imerys would be neutral in the election and let workers decide without company interference. The company rejected the union's offer, and instead has launched a union-busting campaign aimed mainly at non-union ECC workers, who outnumber union workers at the Georgian Marble plant by a 2 to 1 margin.
The union charges that Imerys, through its hired union-buster, is:
Showing unionised workers anti-union films at mandatory meetings
Arranging for its supervisors to meet individually with workers, in order to discourage support for the union
Recruiting higher-paid workers to carry its anti-union message
Using scare tactics by associating union membership with plant closings, strikes, violence, and union dues in order to keep workers from supporting the union.
PACE has filed several charges with the NLRB alleging illegal activity by the company.
PACE believes Imerys has laid off all but 5 of its union workers at it Jeffersonville, Georgia plant and moved production to its non-union operations as part of its campaign to destroy the union. The union contract [collective agreement] at the Jeffersonville plant expires in mid-November.
PACE attributes much of the anti-union actions to Dennis Redeker, former CEO of ECC and an American, who was offered over 1.2 million US dollars for his ECC stock and was given a board seat and top-level job with Imerys. Redeker has a history of conducting union-busting campaigns in the US to prevent unionisation of ECC plants.
"Our European union colleagues have been shocked by the barbarism of Imerys's actions, since these things just don't happen in Europe," said Drexler. "European trade unionists understand that being a union member should be an individual decision and should not require an act of courage."
PACE has approximately 600 members at three Imerys plants in Alabama and Georgia. The union is also making other contacts with trade unionists in Britain and Canada.
"Imerys has got off to a bad start with its new identity," commented ICEM General Secretary Vic Thorpe. "We hope that justice and common sense will prevail and that the company will abandon in the USA an attitude that it would not dare to adopt in France. The ICEM has considerable experience of mobilising global campaigns against anti-union multinationals. In the case of Imerys, we would prefer not to use that experience, but we will do so if necessary."