27 January, 2009KMWU's "one union, one worksite" initiative to organise the precariously employed proves positive for migrant workers threatened with job dismissals.
KOREA: At Samwoo Precision Industries, an auto parts manufacturer in Daegu's Seongseo Industrial Complex, permanent workers alternate taking two-week holidays during a partial work stoppage to allow irregular and migrant workers to keep their jobs.
While precarious workers are often the first to go in hard economic times, witnessed by the mass layoffs of temporary employees around the world, at this particular branch of the Korean Metal Workers' Union, 18 migrant workers, many of them from Indonesia, and 40 permanent production workers share the burden of the company's December decision to slow production.
After management announced its plans to reduce the number of temporary employees, the KMWU proposed an alternative plan in an effort to save jobs. On January 12, the new plan went into effect. Plan details include:
- the worksite's 40 permanent production workers will divide themselves into two groups and alternate taking two-week holidays for the next three months;
- the company will then be able to apply for government financial assistance designed to help companies keep people in their jobs during temporary work shutdowns, allowing the permanent workers to receive 80 per cent of their wages during their off-times; so that
- the 18 irregular or precarious workers, who as such are not able to receive governmental assistance, are able to keep working.
The cooperation between Samwoo permanent and non-permanent employees under one union banner, the KMWU, is clearly an indication that the KMWU's bold efforts to organise precarious workers through a national directive of "one union, one worksite" is starting to pay off. While many KMWU worksites still have separate unions for non-permanent and precarious workers, the KMWU is hoping to build on the Samwoo branch model.
For the migrant workers, all of whom were hired through broker agencies and often exploited or denied their basic rights, they now share the same working conditions as their permanent counterparts under KMWU regulations.