Industrial Workers of the World - Toronto GMB

NC Truckers to Formalize Union Over MLK Weekend - Negotiating Committee Already Formed in Preparation for Talks

x344543 — Thu, 18 Dec 2008 01:27:00 +0000

On the weekend of Martin Luther King Day, log truckers and container haulers from Eastern North Carolina and Virginia will be gathering to formally charter the United Truckers Union. This event will be the culmination of a nearly year-long organizing drive that led to a work stoppage on the morning of December 8, 2008. That action, which saw small but lively pickets outside of Weyerhaeuser mills along coastal North Carolina, reduced the amount of logs entering the New Bern mill by approximately 35% and shut down several tree stands in the Plymouth area. Only six trucks left BTT's yard, one of Weyerhaeuser's primary subcontractors and a target of the strike. Following the mornings' stoppage, a unnamed Weyerhaeuser representative announced to local media that management agreed to the workers' key demand: that mill management recognize the drivers' organization and arrange a meeting between the drivers' negotiating committee, Weyerhaeuser, and representatives of the subcontractors who employ the drivers. Accordingly, the union has directed a letter to the Vice President for Southern Timberland in Seattle, Washington offering several dates and places for an initial meeting.

Community support has proven integral to the drivers' success. In particular, local churches have vocally supported the organization. "Preacher," a union member and an ordained reverend, described this relationship: "The drivers represent the community, the church represents the community. What affects one of us, affects all of us. We're all in this together." Along much these same lines, the solidarity shown by the larger labor movement has been a source of moral as well as real world support. The drivers would to take this opportunity to thank the unionists and environmental activists who picketed Weyerhaeuser corporate headquarters on the day of their recent strike. Likewise, they are extending their sincerest appreciations to USW Locals in North Carolina and Washington State, UE 150, and the Northwest Log Truckers Cooperative.

The drivers have already announced their intention to affiliate with the Industrial Workers of the World Motor Transport Workers Industrial Union (IWW IU 530). Founded in 1905, the IWW is a democratic and militant rank-and-file industrial union. The IWW believes that only through organization can the men and women who carry everything our communities need break the pattern of injustice faced by America's truck drivers.

Fired from Starbucks for Selling a Few Pounds of Coffee/Tea on eBay

x344543 — Tue, 06 Feb 2007 06:57:00 +0000

Starbucks recently fired barista Tina [not her real name] without warning from her store near Toronto. Tina sold a few of her leftover "partner-markouts" [a bag of tea or coffee each employee is entitled to each week] on eBay to save for a Disney World trip with her daugthers. The coffee and tea were her property and she had never been made aware of any policy against selling it.

What do folks think: Did she deserve to get fired? If so, should she have at least received a warning?

Is it creepy that a multibillion dollar company found a single employee selling a few pounds of product?

Here is Tina in her own words:

I am not a younger person; I am 42 and was in Information Technology for over 17 years. After having two girls, I decided to stay home for a couple of years like a lot of mothers. I had entered our local Starbucks and really liked the atmosphere. My husband suggested maybe coming and working for them part time while our girls were at school. Great idea I thought!

IWW Launches Toronto Organizing Drive

x344543 — Tue, 30 May 2006 07:49:00 +0000

This story was psoted after May 20th, so the tense doesn't agree with the date of the posting. We will bring more news about this campaign as it develops.

TORONTO – Members of the Toronto branch of the Industrial Workers of the World (IWW) are pleased to announce a recruitment drive in several targeted workplaces in the city’s service and retail sectors. The IWW will kick off this campaign on May 20 with a public event at 18 Eastern Ave. (lower level), at 7 pm, featuring a presentation by Tomer Malchi. Malchi is involved in the union’s highly publicized organizing initiative at Starbucks coffee shops in New York City. On May 21, Malchi will lead an organizing workshop for interested participants.

The Cincinnati-headquartered IWW, which celebrated its 100th anniversary in 2005, is presently at its highest membership level since the 1940s, having recently enjoyed recruitment successes in, among other areas of the economy, New York food services and the California trucking industry. The union’s Toronto branch was re-established in the summer of last year.

While supportive of other trade unions, the IWW – informally known as the Wobblies – differs from mainstream organizations in its emphasis on rank-and-file initiative. IWW staff is minimal and dues paid by members are much lower than in other labour bodies.

According to Toronto branch secretary Rachel Rosen, this approach is appropriate in an economy where low-wage positions with high turnover constitute much of the “final frontier” for organizers. In retail, she added, “many workers can barely support themselves. They can’t afford expensive dues. But they could use the assistance and solidarity of an organization that’s been around for a long time. They need to come together to improve their wages and benefits in workplaces where employers clearly don’t have their interests at heart.”

Young workers, according to Rosen, are also drawn to the IWW because of its alternative image, its commitment to a green, de-centralized economy and its standoffish approach to political parties.

Aside from unorganized workers, the IWW also recruits the unemployed, students and dues-paying members of other unions (with no raiding intentions). The IWW “organizes the worker and not the job” and takes the view that those of its members who belong to other unions have a responsibility, in those organizations, to promote Wobbly values of grassroots democracy and militant action.