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<img src="/sites/default/files/migration/icem/InBrief100.jpg" width="100" height="39" alt=""/>
Four contractors of Royal Dutch Shell, who were kidnapped in Nigeria while enroute to work at a power plant on 12 January, were released early last week. The four, three British nationals and one Colombia national, work for Shell sub-contractor NETCO-Dietsmann NV. The Colombian expatriate, Fabien Sanchez, was hospitalized after winning his freedom with shrapnel wounds. 
 
The four were abducted by despicable thugs between on the northeast border of Rivers State where it junctures with Abia State. A police escort was shot and killed, and the driver was wounded. The criminals reportedly demanded a US$2 million ransom. Police put up a US$16,000 reward for information leading to the crime. It was not clear if ransom money was paid to win the freedom of the expatriate workers or not. 

<img src="/sites/default/files/migration/icem/Nigeria.png" width="250" height="115" alt=""/>
The Rivers State branch of the Trades Union Congress (TUC) condemned the crime. Branch Chairman Hyginus Chika Onuegbu called on state police forces in all the oil-rich states surrounding Port Harcourt to beef up road patrols around border junctions, since this is where kidnappings and killings happen. 
 
The kidnapped workers are part of a team of contractors working on the Afam VI power station, managed and 30% owned by Shell. They work for the sub-contractor NETCO-Dietsmann, a 40/60 joint venture between the Nigerian National Petroleum Corporation subsidiary, National Engineering and Technical Co., and Dietsmann, an upstream oil services company based in the Netherlands. Capital improvements are being made on Afam VI in order that higher flows of liquid natural gas will double the power plant’s capacity to 650 megawatts. 
 
The names of the British contractors that were kidnapped are John Bennet, Kevin Gray, and Martin Phillip.

Kidnapped Shell Workers in Nigeria Released, One Injured

<img src="/sites/default/files/migration/icem/InBrief100.jpg" width="100" height="39" alt=""/>
Workers’ Memorial Day this year will use the moniker “Unions Make Work Safer,” as global labour moves 28 April – the Commemoration Day for Dead and Injured Workers – as the one day that every day must bring in the fight for safe, healthy, and risk-free workplaces. The International Trade Union Confederation (ITUC) has designated that theme for 2010 in order to emphasize the vital role trade unions play in constantly improving occupational health and safety. 
 
In the UK, the government became one of over 20 countries worldwide to officially designate 28 April as Workers’ Memorial Day when Work and Pensions Secretary Yvette Cooper announced formal recognition of the day on 28 January. After beginning consultations in July 2009, it became clear to the government that the growing number of observances and health/safety renewal commitments on 28 April each year merited official designation. 

<img src="/sites/default/files/migration/icem/international.commemoration.day.candle.logo.gif" width="46" height="276" alt=""/>
What UK recognition now means is that the government will encourage commemorations of the day throughout the country, with ministers committed to support and promote public commemorations. “Workers’ Memorial Day has been an important date in the trade union calendar for many years and we look forward to working with ministers to increase its profile,” stated Trades Unions Congress (TUC) General Secretary Brendan Barber. 
 
The ITUC expects 2010 to exceed the 10,000 activities that occurred in over 100 countries around 28 April 2009. The ITUC itself will produce and release background materials, campaign ideas, and additional tools as 28 April 2010 nears. 
 
“Workers’ Memorial Day gains more local, national, and international recognition with each passing year,” stated ICEM General Secretary Manfred Warda. “And it is only fitting this year to draw attention to workers who, through their unions, have done so much to improve everyday workplace safety and health.” 
 
The facts bear this out. In Canada, a recent report by the Ontario Safety and Health Agency found that 79% of unionised worksites report high compliance with health and safety legislation, while between 54% and 61% of non-union workplaces report such compliance. 
 
In Australia, unionised workplaces are three times more likely to have a safety committee and twice as likely to have performed a safety audit as non-union-sites. 
 
The ICEM encourages affiliates to begin preparing now for 28 April. The day became officially recognized by the ILO in 2001 as the “International Day of Action for Safety and Health at Work,” but had its origins before then. The ITUC marks the day to 1996 when the UN lit Commemorative Candles for the 188 victims of the Kader toy factory in Thailand in 1993. 
 
But the commemoration day has its true roots in the Canadian trade union movement, where unionists worked for several days before the Canadian Parliament in 1989 passed Bill C-223, designating 28 April as the official “Day of Mourning” for the North American country.

‘Unions Make Work Safer’ Theme for 28 April, Now Official Day in UK

<img alt="" src="/sites/default/files/migration/icem/InBrief100.jpg" width="100" height="39"/>
German union IG Metall and the employers’ federation Gesamtmetall set the tone inside Germany for 2010-2011 bargaining when the two sides came to an early and enlightened accord on a pair of collective agreements covering 700,000 metal and electronics workers in North Rhine-Westphalia state. The agreement, two months ahead of schedule, is sure to serve as the boilerplate for collective agreements contracts covering 3.4 million German workers in the metals and electronics sectors. 
 
Most profoundly, the new North Rhine-Westphalia pilot contracts guarantee job security until the middle of 2012 and establish a precedent-setting protocol against job redundancies as a lesson to this global economic crisis. 
 
The 25-month pair of agreements was crafted congenially in Dusseldorf between IG Metall and the employers’ federation in two sets of talks that concluded in the early hours of 18 February. One pact defers a wage increase until spring 2011, while the other assures no operational redundancies will occur before 30 June 2012. This agreement also sets new and far-reaching regulations on shortened work-time, including partial wage adjustments for short-term work and lowered costs for employers who utilize short-time work. 

<img alt="" src="/sites/default/files/migration/icem/1002.igmetall.agreement.gif" width="120" height="120"/>
A key and unifying part of the job-security agreement, called the “future in work” pact, is a joint and vigorous call on the German government to extend crisis-fostered benefits beyond the end of this year for workers taking shorter work weeks. It also guarantees that shorter work weeks, from 35 to 28 hours with pay of 29.5 hours, will be an option, with that short-time work to be met with sickness, vacation, and Christmas benefits based on 12 months work. 
 
A 2.7% wage increase will take effect around April 2011, with Works Councils given the mandate to negotiate that sum within two months prior or two months after that date. Between May 2010 and March 2011, two single, one-off payments totaling €320 per worker will be made. An important underlying element to the accord is that it allows employers to undertake the precise planning necessary to dig out of the crisis. 

<img alt="" src="/sites/default/files/migration/icem/People/Berthold Huber IG Metall.jpg" width="142" height="158"/>
IG Metall President Berthold Huber
IG Metall President Berthold Huber termed the job protection provisions of the agreement “a good result in securing jobs in the biggest economic crisis in 80 years.” He added that the government must now do its part to supplement the agreement with extended social insurance benefits. And more precise to the German economy, the agreements serve as a bellwether statement that mass job losses weaken purchasing power far more than nominal wage increases do to spike buying power. 
 
The agreements not only will protect the jobs of hundreds of thousands of workers but equally, they assure that German enterprises will retain the skilled and seasoned staff in a sector so crucial to Germany’s economy. 
 
By late last week, IG Metall and the metal, electronics employers were already tabling the accord in negotiations in Baden-Württemberg state. And this week the novel social contracts will come before the parties in Lower Saxony and Saxony-Anhalt, talks that take place in Hannover.

German Metalworkers, Employers Reach Historic Job Security Pact

<img src="/sites/default/files/migration/icem/InBrief100.jpg" width="100" height="39" alt=""/>
The ICEM-affiliated General Union of Electricity Workers and Technicians in Basra, Iraq, has been faced with a hostile new general manager of the electricity network in Southern Iraq. The union, led by President Hashmeyia Muhsin Saadawi, is attempting to gain wage arrears for power station security guards, who have been illegally refused back wages. 
 
The salary arrears are for overtime work and work that had previously been approved by management. The union has been attempting to negotiate the issue with the manager throughout September, but Hashmeyia Muhsin recently told the ICEM that she has grown frustrated with his intransigence. Of late, the new general manager admitted that “the security guards are entitled to the allocation of extra hours, but I am not paying them, so let them complain to the Inspector-General or any other authority.” 

<img src="/sites/default/files/migration/icem/0707 iraqHashmeyaElectUnion.jpg" width="190" height="128" alt=""/>
President Hashmeyia Muhsin Saadawi
The claim of the Basra Electricity Workers and Technicians is clear; security guards at the company are contractually allocated 154 working hours per month, distributed over morning, evening, and night shifts. However, those workers work an average of 192 hours per month, and rightfully expect overtime pay. 
 
On 21 September, a large number of the affected security guards, joined by other members of the union, assembled in front of the headquarters of the authority for Power Transmission in Southern Iraq. That action, which illustrated the level of solidarity for the security workers by all segments of workers in the union, did succeed in attracting the attention of the Department of the Inspector General, as well as the Electricity Commission of local government. 
 
But a settlement to the issue still has not been reached. The ICEM will continue to follow and report on this story as, hopefully, positive developments occur.

Iraqi Electricity Trade Union Faces Intransigent Manager in Southern Iraq

<img src="/sites/default/files/migration/icem/InBrief100.jpg" width="100" height="39" alt=""/>
The ICEM has strengthened its connections with mining unions in Albania after attending the 5th National Congress of the Union of Independent Trade Unions of Albania (BSPSH). Two ICEM affiliates, the Independent Trade Union of Mines and the Trade Union Federation of Chemical and Metal Workers are key members of the BSPSH. 
 
The BSPSH and the Confederation of Trade Unions of Albania (KSSH), a second trade union confederation, have been under attack by the government of Albania after they were forcibly and illegally removed from their offices and had computers and records destroyed or confiscated. The ICEM pledged to support efforts to have the property of the trade unions returned. 

<img src="/sites/default/files/migration/icem/0910.albania.miners.conference.jpg" width="244" height="189" alt=""/>
BSPSH Congress
Joe Drexler, ICEM Director of Industry and Corporate Affairs, represented the ICEM at the Congress and saluted the work of the BSPSH in developing democratic trade unions. He particularly noted the historical contributions of miners and their president, Kezim Kalaja, who in 1991 led a general strike that ushered in an era of political change and democracy that allowed trade unions to develop. Kalaja also became president of the BSPSH and was re-elected at the 5th Congress by acclamation in recognition of his decades of leadership. 
 
Also attending the Congress were national federations from Italy, Azerbaijan, Kosovo, Serbia, and Poland. 

<img src="/sites/default/files/migration/icem/0910.albania.miners.jpg" width="226" height="222" alt=""/>
Joe Drexler & Kezim Kalaja, centre
Drexler visited an underground copper mine and enrichment plant, owned and operated by a Turkish-based company, in the Northeast of the Albania. President Kalaja and Gjon Zeka, the trade union’s regional secretary, joined the tour. 
 
Albania is only one of only 23 countries which have ratified International Labor Organization Convention 176 on Health and Safety in Mines.

ICEM Strengthens Connection with Trade Unions in Albania

On 15 October 2009, 50 workers from four Dutch unions, including ICEM affiliates FNV Bondgenoten and CNV Bedrijvenbond, will assemble at the European headquarters of Sappi in Brussels. There, between 14h00 and 15h00 European time, they will present a petition signed by nearly 800 paperworkers at Sappi’s Nijmegen and Maastricht mills. 
 
Since early in the summer, the unions have been unsuccessful in negotiating a new collective agreement with Sappi at these two mills. Finally on 17 September, Sappi presented a final offer. It called for a 0.5% increase effective 1 July 2009, and a 0.9% increase on 1 April 2010. Workers rejected it with better than a 95% vote. 
 
What’s more, Sappi seeks to eliminate days off that senior workers, age 55 and over, have accrued due to longevity of service. These no-work days, called “seniorendagen” in Dutch, are very few per year for each worker of that age, but Sappi made it clear in negotiations that its wage offer was so low because Dutch workers insist on keeping this rightful benefit. These no-work days have been earned by Dutch staff who have long years of service, and they should not have to be given up. 
 
Below, please find a letter that ICEM is hopeful your union can send to the European CEO of Sappi on 15 October. Please cut and paste it (or feel free to change it to fit your union’s style), attach it your letterhead and send to the e-mail address of Mr Berry Wiersum, as well as the two fax numbers of Sappi’s Brussels office. 
 
It is important to do this on Thursday, 15 October, in order to support our Dutch colleagues who will be traveling to Brussels to present a petition on that day. Thank you for your support and initiative on behalf of our colleagues in The Netherlands.
Please be sure to copy your letter to the following:
Ans van den Akker
<a href="mailto:ansvandenakker@orange.nl">ansvandenakker@orange.nl</a>
Ilja Philippen-Nijssen
<a href="mailto:I.Philippen@bg.fnv.nl">I.Philippen@bg.fnv.nl</a>
Mariska Razoux Schultz-Helbig
<a href="mailto:M.Razouxschultz@bg.fnv.nl">M.Razouxschultz@bg.fnv.nl</a>
(do not hesitate to send your own solidarity message to these trade union leaders.)
 
<img alt="" src="/sites/default/files/migration/icem/paper logo.jpg" width="280" height="76"/>
 15 October 2009 
 
Mr. Berry Wiersum 
CEO, Sappi Fine Papers Europe 
154 Chaussée de la Hulpe 
B-1170 Brussels 
Belgium 
 
Transmit to <a href="mailto:berry.wiersum@sappi.com">berry.wiersum@sappi.com</a> and fax numbers +32 2 676 9601 and +32 2 676 9660 
 
Dear Mr. Wiersum: 
 
Our trade union, representing pulp and paper workers, has learned of the contract dispute at Sappi’s two mills in the Netherlands, at Nijmegen and Maastricht. We understand that in late September, 800 workers at these two mills, represented by all Dutch unions solidly rejected a very inferior company proposal. 
 
We want it to be made known that Sappi’s pay offer over the next 21 months is insulting. We also want it to be made known that Sappi’s insistence on taking away the “seniorendagen” for workers with long-time service to the company is unfair. Workers age 55 and over have earned these days off and Sappi must adhere to contractual commitments it has made in the past. 
 
We urge you to instruct your managers in the Netherlands to return to dialogue with the workers’ representatives and raise the level of salary adjustments over the next two years, as well as assuring that senior workers retain what they have earned in their many long years of employment service to Sappi. 
 
Our union will be watching closely this dispute at your two mills in the Netherlands, and we intend to take further action if need be. We will strongly support our Dutch colleagues in all ways possible, and urge you now to prevent a dispute that will only deepen if Sappi does not return make an acceptable contract offer to Nijmegen and Maastricht workers. Thank you. 
 
Sincerely,

Sappi Dispute in Dutch Paper Mills; Act 15 October 2009

<img alt="" src="/sites/default/files/migration/icem/InBrief100.jpg" width="100" height="39"/>
Mobil Producing Nigeria (MPN), the subsidiary of ExxonMobil, has begun dialogue with ICEM affiliate PENGASSAN to address the growing use of casual and temporary workers among its contractors in the upstream oil and gas sectors of the country. But it still refuses to take responsibility for the abuse and sudden disposal of casual workers of it contractors. 
 
That is according to Bayo Olowoshile, the General Secretary of PENGASSAN. In talks with Mobil Producing, the company has stated that it is willing to be an observer if contractors and labour brokers do choose to sit down with the union, but not to be an active participant. 

<img alt="" src="/sites/default/files/migration/icem/0805BayoOlowPenGS.jpg" width="150" height="225"/>
Bayo Olowoshile, PENGASSAN General Secretary
“That is unacceptable,” said Olowoshile. “The use of these workers is a disguise for MPN. They use Mobil’s equipment, they use Mobil’s facilities, and they perform the same work that full-time PENGASSAN members perform.” He added that PENGASSAN’s mandate is equal pay for equal work, and making all casual workers regular, rostered, and full-time employees with the multinational. 
 
Olowoshile said MPN uses 12 such companies, easily characterized as labour brokers, which utilize some 600 casual workers. They earn 40 to 50% less than regular workers, and are denied most social benefits, as well as the right to join a union. 
 
There has been some progress, however. Since an early February strike by PENGASSAN and junior staff belonging to NUPENG, and an ICEM intervention with US-based ExxonMobil over the issue, MPN has converted some 10% of all casual workers to full-time staff. The company has also encouraged its contractors to talk with the union. 
 
PENGASSAN is waiting on the federal Ministry of Labour to issue a ruling on the casualisation issue under Nigeria’s local content policies. 
 
Meanwhile, NUPENG’s Petroleum Tanker Drivers’ Division is preparing to strike another multinational’s subsidiary over the same issue. NUPENG’s Western Zonal committee could take industrial action any day against Shell Nigeria Exploration and Production Co. for using contractors to employ casual workers, who are then retrenched at will without payment of entitlements. Similar to MPN, Shell uses contractors to disguise the employment relationship, with NUPENG saying that such “pay masters” gain far more money than what is paid casual workers.

Mobil Producing Nigeria Takes Some Steps to Address Casualisation

<img alt="" src="/sites/default/files/migration/icem/InBrief100.jpg" width="100" height="39"/>
Chemical workers employed by French-based Rhodia in University Park, Illinois, chose the United Steelworkers (USW) in a US National Labor Relations Board (NLRB) union certification election on 15-16 July. The vote for USW representation, by an overwhelming 62-11 count, came after the union enforced plant management neutrality through the ICEM’s Global Framework Agreement (GFA) with Rhodia. 
 
When University Park workers contacted the USW in spring 2010, they were seeking a voice at work and economic parity with other unionised Rhodia workers in the US. Rhodia bought the specialty surfactants, polymers, and cosmetic preservatives plant earlier in 2009 from privately-held McIntyre Group of US. Among seven Rhodia plants in the US that are organised by the USW, three are in the Chicago, Illinois, area, so University Park workers did not have far to go to do comparisons. 
 
But their bosses had a different idea. They began traditional efforts to dissuade workers from joining the USW, including pay offers and work-time meetings in which anti-union messages were delivered. 
<img alt="" src="/sites/default/files/migration/icem/0803Rhodiasigning.jpg" width="200" height="133"/>
ICEM General Secretary Manfred Warda and Rhodia CEO Jean-Pierre Clamadieu at the 25 March, 2008, signing
The USW responded by reaching out to corporate leadership in France through the ICEM in order to halt local management’s violation of the GFA neutrality commitment. With ICEM Chemicals and Rubber Officer Kemal Özkan working directly with senior leaders of Rhodia in Paris, a joint ICEM-Rhodia declaration was distributed in early July to University Park workers by both the USW and local managers. 
 
It was signed by ICEM General Secretary Manfred Warda and Rhodia Group Vice President Pascal Jeury, with CEO Jean-Pierre Clamadieu endorsing the joint message. The declaration reminded that Rhodia’s “commitment to remain strictly neutral” in workers’ unionization campaigns is intact, and cited seven points in Article 3, Paragraph 7 of the GFA (found <a href="/sites/default/files/migration/icem/0809RhodiaGFAEnglish.pdf" type="internal">here</a>), including the point: “Rhodia respects the right of employees to organise themselves collectively and will remain strictly neutral concerning their choices in this matter.” 
 
Özkan also secured a pledge from the corporate office to stop the in-plant managers’ meetings. 
<img alt="" src="/sites/default/files/migration/icem/USAUSW.jpg" width="180" height="99"/>
With the government-supervised election nearing, workers became unconstrained by management rhetoric and harassment and voted for USW by 86%. Warda said the vote reflects a promising future for labour-management harmony at University Park, and thanked corporate Rhodia for its immediacy. 
 
The USW effectively put the language of the agreement in motion, and won US government certification. “Rhodia has committed to strict neutrality under an ICEM agreement and pledge,” said USW Organising Director Mike Yoffee. “While the US managers did not fully live up to this, it still had somewhat of an impact on neutralizing the company’s campaign, and gave our organizers the opening to make an issue of whether the US managers could be trusted to live up to their commitments.” 
 
The new bargaining unit at the 18-month-old Rhodia-owned plant numbers 83. 
 
The USW also won union bargaining rights for miners in British Colombia, Canada, last week. Some 260 workers at molybdenum mines and operations owned by US-based Thompson Creek Metals had their union finally certified by the provincial labour board. They voted 26-28 May, but details prevented the BC labour board from opening the ballot box until 22 July. The miners work at the Endako Mines and now are proud members of USW Local 1-424 based in Prince George, BC.

In America, USW Forces Neutrality to Win Labour Rights for Rhodia Workers

<img alt="" src="/sites/default/files/migration/icem/InBrief100.jpg" width="100" height="39"/>
The 14-year exchange and engagement between ICEM and the All China Federation of Trade Unions (ACFTU) took a major step forward recently when a 13-member ICEM delegation, led by President Senzeni Zokwana, visiting Beijing for top level meetings with several leading ACFTU officials. 
 
The 15-16 July meetings, attended by 45 people, found discussions centering on the theme “The Global Crisis and Job Protection.” The meetings mark a new crest in ICEM-ACFTU relations, following participation by ACFTU representatives in ICEM Asia-Pacific activities this year. The activities include the regional committee meetings in Sydney, Australia, in April, and an electricity network meeting in Korea. 
 
In the near future, ACFTU representatives will take part in an oil and gas workers’ workshop in Vietnam in August and a pharmaceutical unions’ workshop in Indonesia in September. 
<img alt="" src="/sites/default/files/migration/icem/1007.acftu.china.group.jpg" width="343" height="154"/>
The mid-July Beijing forum opened with presentations by Zokwana and Jiang Guangping, ACFTU’s Director-General of the International Department, who welcomed the ICEM by stating engagement with an active industry-based Global Union Federation is crucial to the ACFTU. 
 
ICEM General Secretary Manfred Warda gave reports related to Contract and Agency Labour, ILO Convention 176 (the Health and Safety in Mines Convention), Sustainable Development and Just Transition efforts, Global Framework Agreements, and Social Dialogue initiatives. Chinese industry sector leaders then reported on coal, electric power, petroleum, petrochemical, chemicals, pharmaceutical, and land resource matters in China. 
 
Other ACFTU officials that lead structures within the Chinese Defense Industry, Postal and Telecommunications Workers’ Union, the Chinese Finance, Commerce, Light Industry, Textile and Tobacco Workers’ Union, and the Machinery, Metallurgical and Building Materials Workers’ Unions also gave reports. 
 
Participants shared country experiences on trade union actions, and also discussed plant-level responses and solutions regarding for job protection. Germany’s Petra Kronen, for instance, the head of the Works Council and a supervisory board member of Bayer, explained flexible work-time arrangements taken between her union, IGBCE, and Bayer in order to avoid layoffs during the financial crisis. 
<img alt="" src="/sites/default/files/migration/icem/ChinaFLAG.gif" width="140" height="94"/>
Besides Zokwana and Warda, the ICEM delegation consisted of ICEM leaders from several affiliated unions, including: Per Sörensen of 3F Union, Denmark; Mats Svensson of IF Metall, Sweden; Michael Mersmann and Petro Kronen of IGBCE, Germany; Isidor Boix of FITEQA-CC.OO, Spain; François Laurent, CSC Bâtiment, Industrie & Energie, Belgium; Yoshio Sato of ICEM-JAF, Japan; Ian Murray of Construction, Forestry, Mining, Energy Union (CFMEU), Australia; and Robert Reid of the National Distribution Union (NDU), New Zealand. Also in attendance were Kemal Özkan, ICEM Chemical and Rubber Industries’ Officer, and Phee Jung-sun, ICEM Materials Industries’ Officer and Regional Contact Person for Asia-Pacific Region. 
 
The ACFTU officials participating included Zheng Chengfu, President of the Chinese Energy and Chemical Workers’ Union; Fang Dan, Vice President of Chinese Defense Industry, Postal and Telecommunications Workers’ Union; Cai Ruixia, Vice President of Chinese Finance, Commerce, Light Industry, Textile and Tobacco Workers’ Union; Ma Hua, Director of Chinese Machinery, Metallurgical and Building Materials Workers’ Union; Zhang Jianguo, Director General of the Collective Bargaining Department of the ACFTU; Enyi Xu, Vice Chairman of the Chinese Energy & Chemical Worker’s Union; Guo Wencai, Director General of ACFTU’s Organizing Department; Xie Liangmin, Deputy Director General of the Law Department of the ACFTU; and Chen Jieping, Deputy Director of ACFTU’s Social Security Department. 
 
A full and detailed report on the mission, prepared by the ICEM’s Özkan, can be found <a href="/sites/default/files/migration/icem/ACFTU%20Edited.pdf" type="internal">here</a>.

ICEM, ACFTU Complete High Level Mission in China

<img alt="" src="/sites/default/files/migration/icem/InBrief100.jpg" width="100" height="39"/>
Elections for Germany’s Works Councils occur every four years, with votes cast in May and June 2010. The ICEM-affiliated IGBCE received strong backing in these elections. With some results still to be analysed, around 81.2% of newly-elected council members in the union’s industrial sectors are IGBCE members. 
 
IGBCE is present in approximately 3,450 companies in Germany. The 2010 results show a stabilisation of the turnout (74.3%) and of IGBCE’s strong position, with very little change from the 2006 and 2002 elections. The number of council chair-people who are members of IGBCE has risen slightly, to 92%, as did the number of women who were elected – 26.2%. 
 
The IGBCE is now running a support project for newly-elected Works Councils in small companies, with less than 200 employees. The coaching lasts 14 weeks, and includes an online password protected forum, where views and guidance can be exchanged for newly elected council members. 
 
IGBCE also recently won a legal case, entitling Works Council members to have internet access in the workplace. Employers are now obliged to supply council members with a computer connected to the internet, in addition to an office. 
 
Works councils are employee representative bodies with a range of co-determination, information, and consultation rights with respective companies. 
<img alt="" src="/sites/default/files/migration/icem/1007.Ulrich.Freese.IGBCE.jpg" width="150" height="112"/>
IGBCE Deputy Chairman Ulrich Freese
The recent results are seen as a clear indication of trust and confidence in the IGBCE. “We have played a major role in ensuring that the financial crisis did not break through on jobs. Strong unions and strong works councils have prevented redundancies and ensured stability,” stated IGBCE Deputy Chairman Ulrich Freese.

German Works Council Elections Cement IGBCE’s Strong Mandate 

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