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26 April, 2010
A relentless, two-year campaign by ICEM US affiliate, the Utility Workers Union of America (UWUA), against Covanta gave 140 workers in the state of Massachusetts their first labour agreement last week. The collective agreement, actually two contracts with one giving workers huge retroactive backpay and bonus awards, punctuates a capitulation by the American waste-to-energy company in resisting full workers’ rights following a successful organizing drive.
That recruitment drive by UWUA Local 369 at an incinerator in Rochester, Massachusetts, that burns solid waste for conversion to electricity occurred in May 2008. Following the union vote, conducted by the US labour board, Covanta did what so many American companies do following union certification; engage in “surface bargaining,” never intending to reach a first labour agreement, and they punish workers for voting union by withholding scheduled pay gains.
Under US labour statute, after a one-year period has elapsed from the certification vote, workers have an option to de-authorise the union as bargaining representative.
But at Covanta in Massachusetts, the UWUA would have none of it. The Washington, DC-based union began an unyielding campaign that blocked the publicly-traded Covanta from expanding its waste-to-energy business into Canada, Ireland, the UK, and the Netherlands. That meant engaging trade unions, civic organizations, and environmental groups as Covanta sought to gain municipal contracts to collect trash and the necessary permits to built incinerations in those countries in order to sell power to electric grids.
UWUA impeded Covanta both at home and abroad by highlighting the company’s negligent health and safety ledger, its environmental record, and its appalling labour relations conduct, which included serious and malicious breaches of US labour law (see earlier ICEM dispatches here, here, and here).
The end result was a three-year collective agreement, plus a separate contract granting workers sizeable backpay and bonus payments that had been withheld. Local 369 members at Covanta’s SEMASS facility voted to accept the pair of agreements by a wide margin on 22 April. The pay and other gains are exceptional, and the working agreement now in place contains the best features of US union contracts.
The backdated bonus and pay accord gives the 140 workers a retroactive wage increase of 3% to early 2009; an incentive bonus of 8.1% of total wages for 2008; an annual wage increases backdated to 1 January 2010 of 2.7%; and a further missed incentive bonus of 4.85% of total wages for 2009. Added up, these retroactive gains average US$17,000 per worker.
And on top of that, comes the three-year pay, bonus, and other union protection items took effect 14 April 2010. That includes a 2.8% increase each year, a ratification bonus of US$1,250 per worker, additional incentive bonuses of up to 7% in each year of the contract, as well as new safety and health protections, including a medical surveillance programme to monitor workers’ blood levels from handling hazardous materials, and limits on sub-contracting.
UWUA President D. Michael Langford
The ICEM considers UWUA’s campaign and the end result of the Local 369-Covanta contract exemplary and an inspiring example inside America on how best to fight a recalcitrant employer attempting to deny its employees their lawful rights. In congratulating UWUA President D. Michael Langford, General Secretary Manfred Warda termed the initial labour agreement an excellent one that “all UWUA members – in fact, all union members in America – can be justly proud of.” (See the full letter here.)
In a joint release issued by UWUA Local 369 and Covanta, Local 369 President Gary Sullivan stated, “Our UWUA Bargaining Committee has done an outstanding job pressing for a fair and just contract. We are hopeful this is the first step to a productive relationship with Covanta.”