5 July, 2011General Electric (GE) workers in America ratified a four-year labour agreement in late June that now sets a pattern for 15,200 unionised GE workers in the US.
4 July, 2011About 170,000 workers, the vast majority of whom are members of the National Union of Metal Workers of South Africa (NUMSA) embarked on a nationwide strike in the engineering sector on 4 July after a deadlock in wage negotiations. The strike action which brought Johannesburg to a standstill, was also carried out in other major cities nation wide.
28 July, 2011In a secret ballot election conducted by the National Labor Relations Board, an agency of the United States Federal Government, workers at Swedwood's operation in Danville Virginia voted to be represented by IMF and Building and Wood Workers International (BWI) affiliate, the International Association of Machinists and Aerospace Workers (IAMAW).
22 July, 2011MAS-DAF workers fight for reinstatement after being summarily fired for joining the Turkish union, Birleşik Metal-İş, were detained by gendarmerie in an effort to stop the union's second round of actions to force the government to intervene.
28 July, 2011The global International Federation of Chemical, Energy, Mine and General Workers' Unions (ICEM) family last week congratulated the victory by South Africa's National Union of Mineworkers (NUM) to block Brazilian mining group Vale's efforts to invest in the country, and to operate elsewhere in the region.
1 August, 2011Indonesia's National Court in Central Jakarta finds Indonesian President, Vice President, Head of Parliament and eight Ministers guilty of not implementing the Social Security law for the protection of workers
2 July, 2011The twenty percent wage increase that has been awarded to workers in the engineering, iron and steel industry has been welcomed with mixed feelings. Some union members think the twenty percent is a job well done as it meet the mandate given to the National Engineering Workers Union (NEWU), that the negotiators may not accept anything less than a twenty percent increase. For others, a much higher increase was needed as the new wage minimum still means that workers of the lowest grade get half of what is required to earn at the level of the poverty datum line.
19 July, 2011The National Engineering Workers Union (NEWU) held its 7th special congress under the theme 27 Years of Uniting, Educating and Fighting for Workers Rights on 24 and 25 June 2011 in Kwe Kwe. The special congress called for unity within the union as well as nationally and internationally to further strengthen the struggle of workers.
5 June, 2012At the latest meeting of the OECD Steel Committee workers' representatives voiced concerns over the sustainability of the steel industry when major suppliers such as Rio Tinto continue to abuse workers' rights and ignore public warnings.
14 June, 2012G20 leaders must urgently rethink policies and back job-centred growth, demands unions, after a new poll commissioned by the ITUC shows that only one in ten in G20 countries believe austerity will work.