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German affiliate IGBCE used an innovative collective bargaining agreement with BASF to win 500 jobs for Berlin. The jobs and a new worksite, to be created late 2005 when BASF centralizes its financial, accounting and human resources into a shared service center, were possible after IGBCE proposed a forward-looking plan to the German chemicals producer, which had been considering many different sites. IGBCE President Hubertus Schmoldt said the social partnership the union has with BASF doesn’t just exist on paper, but has evolved into lateral thinking on how the two parties do things. The new service center “benefits everybody concerned: the people who find work (at the Berlin site), the company that can run a cost-effective business operation, and it is an important testimony to Germany’s industrial competitiveness,” said Schmoldt.

IGBCE in Germany Achieves Innovation Agreement with BASF

Frank Hanley, president of US affiliate International Union of Operating Engineers (IUOE) since 1989, retired effective 1 March. Secretary-Treasurer Vincent Giblin will serve the remainder of Hanley’s term to April 2008.

Operating Engineers President In US Retires

Nepal’s national labour centers GEFONT and NTUC, along with ICEM affiliates, had received permission from the district administrator to conduct silent commemorations on International Women’s Day, 8 March. Banners and placards declaring support for gender equality in the workplace and in society were to be displayed by hundreds of trade union activists in Katmandu and in towns and cities across Nepal. But late the night of 7 March, security forces cancelled the permit and intermittent demonstrations the next day were met by baton-charging riot police. Some 226 arrested.

Nepal Cancels International Women’s Day Celebrations

In Brazil, the chemical workers union FEQUIMFAR in Sao Paulo, affiliated with CUT, won a reduction in weekly work time from 44 to 42 hours. The agreement was signed 8 March with pharmaceutical and other companies, and also includes a 2% increase in real wage terms for workers in chemicals, plastics, cosmetics, fertilizers and other industries. “This is the first step toward a 40-hour week, which is our goal for all workers in all industries,” declared FEQUIMFAR President Danilo Pereiro.

Chemical Workers in Brazil Win Gains Through Union

UPM Kymmene and other Nordic paper companies are retaliating against affiliate Paperiliitto and paperworkers in Finland over industrial action banning overtime. At a UPM Kymmene mill in Kajaani, the company refused to pay workers already on the job when a paper machine was forced to stop because of the overtime ban. Other paper companies are applying the same tactic, unusual in such circumstances. 
Workers demonstrated late last week at Stora Enso mills in Kaukopää and Tainionkoski over lack of progress in paper industry bargaining, and demonstrations also occurred earlier at Metsä-Botnia mills in Joutseno and Rauma. Paperiliitto called the overtime ban because the Forest Industries Federation of Finland, after dropping from the national incomes policy agreement, is stalling in reaching agreement for 29,000 paperworkers.

Finnish Paper Companies Taking Hard Approach Against Union

Nepal’s monarchy continues its irrational restriction of civil liberties by targeting labour leaders for arrest on even the slightest provocation. On 8 April, national center GEFONT’s Vice Chairman Lalit Basnet and Hetaunda Zonal Chairman Madhusudan Khatiwada were jailed for speaking out against curtailment of basic trade union rights, including assembly. 
Similarly, GEFONT’s Bara Zonal Chairman Kamalesh Jha was arrested in Kalaiya while protesting King Gyanendra’s harsh authoritative measures. GEFONT’s Kanchanpur Zonal Chairman Dharmananda Panta was arrested 25 March hours after he was re-elected. He was released 6 April. Official government response to his incarceration: “(Dharmananda Panta’s) continued freedom would allow him to conduct interviews which are against the spirit of His Majesty’s proclamations, and would further escalate unrest, thus hampering peace and tranquillity.”

Nepal Clamping Down on Trade Union Leaders, Trade Union Rights

Industrial action in New Zealand is escalating over ICEM affiliate Engineering, Printing and Manufacturing Union’s (EPMU) call for 5% wage increases across all sectors of the country’s buoyant economy. On 15 April, 238 EPMU miners at collieries of Solid Energy in Huntly East and Rotowaro struck. Coal miners across NZ are seeking a 6% pay hike to offset lost wages from government passage of the Employment Contracts Act in the late 1990s. Miners are also seeking pay parity between operations of the North Island and South Island. Underground miners in the South are paid less than workers in the North, while open cast miners on the North Island earn less than those of the South. Metals and manufacturing workers, also represented by EPMU, are on the verge of striking if the 5% demands are not met.

Miners in New Zealand Take Strike Actions

US affiliate PACE filed a formal inquiry to the US Contact Point over French-based Imerys’ labour conduct at a calcium carbonate operation in the state of Alabama. The inquiry hopefully will start an investigation by US and French Contact Points under OECD’s Guidelines for Multinational Enterprises. Unlawful complaints issued by the US labour board have been levied against Imerys for interference in union activities and for failure to provide PACE with necessary information to process workers’ grievances. Imerys management says it will not comply with US labour board investigations of its illegal actions, and PACE is seeking injunctive relief under the labour code in a federal court.

PACE Seeks OECD Investigation on Imerys’ Labour Conduct

Canadian affiliate CEP is challenging the decision by Finnish firm UPM Kymenne to shut a kraft pulp mill in Miramichi, New Brunswick. “We have questions about this announcement and we are not getting logical answers,” said the CEP’s Max Michaud. Citing the union’s recent decision to seek mediation in bargaining with the company. CEP also is concerned about wood source policies that hamper the mill and is asking the provincial government to investigate. Some 400 high-paying and family-supporting jobs are at stake in the rural community.

CEP in Canada Seeks to Keep Pulp Mill Open in New Brunswick

South African affiliate NUM sees no harmony, only dishevel in the hostile takeover of Goldfields by smaller gold-mining company Harmony. In a statement, NUM said that considering the high gold price, companies should be investing in development and job growth rather than consolidation and shrinkage. Both South African companies have retrenched numerous workers this year alone. NUM is calling for dialogue between the two companies instead of hostile “approaches that send jitters into the market and economy,” in the words of Gen. Sec. Gwede Mantashe. NUM is also opposed to a Goldfields preferred deal with Canada’s Imagold and said the mining industry in South Africa suffers an “anti-patriotic spirit” in terms of abandoning national investment.

South Africa’s NUM Chastises Harmony’s Takeover Bid

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