[R-G] Surrender at the Supermarket

[Dan Murray]

I'm not sure how it is in the U.S., but the UFCW in Canada has a history of
backing down, giving concessions and just plain wimping out.
A couple of years ago there was a drive to organise the workers at M&M
Meatshops, where my wife worked. We contacted the UFCW several times with no
reply. We contacted our local district labour council and recieved help
immediately.
We lost the fight, but had absolutely no help from the UFCW.
I know people who are members and none of them are satisfied, their wages
and benefits keep dropping every time they sign a contract. All in the name
of saving the company at the expense of the workers.

Dan

----- Original Message -----
From: <shniad at sfu.ca>
To: <shniad at sfu.ca>
Sent: Tuesday, March 09, 2004 6:42 PM
Subject: [R-G] Surrender at the Supermarket


> http://www.laweekly.com/ink/04/15/news-greene.php
>
> LA Weekly     March 5-11, 2004
>
> Surrender at the Supermarket:
>
> The national failure of the grocery workers union
>
> By Robert Greene
>
> The four-and-a-half-month-long Southern California grocery strike
> illustrated perfectly the basic time-tested strategy of a successful labor
> action: Organize. Promote solidarity. Prepare for a long fight. Stay the
> course no matter how deep the financial hardship. Outlast the other side
by
> a day.
>
> Unfortunately for the 70,000 members of the United Food and Commercial
> Workers, who this week return to work under their worst contract terms in
> decades, that successful strategy was employed by the three supermarket
> chains, not by the seven UFCW locals or their Washington, D.C., head
office.
> The corporate owners of Ralphs, Albertsons and Vons/Pavilions presented an
> unmoving, united front, even when it meant absorbing a huge sales hit over
> 20 weeks. They helped their own cause with a profit-sharing deal, still
> secret when the combination strike-lockout started, perhaps even illegal.
> California Attorney General Bill Lockyer is suing them over it. But no
> matter. It did what they needed it to do, and the companies now have
pretty
> much what they demanded in October: a contract that partially shifts the
> health-benefits burden to employees and moves new hires to an inferior pay
> scale. The three corporate giants slashed their labor costs. The union got
> clobbered.
>
> "I don't think it can be read any other way than a defeat for the union,"
> said labor expert Sanford Jacoby, a professor at UCLA's Anderson School of
> Management. "I suppose it could have been worse. The stores are still
> unionized."
>
> Under the deal, negotiated in late February and ratified by employees last
> weekend, current workers at 859 stores from the Mexican border to San Luis
> Obispo and Bishop will continue to receive health benefits without having
to
> pay premiums - but only for the next two years. Beginning in the third
year,
> workers will have to pay up to $5 a week in premiums if the supermarket
> contributions to a health-care fund don't cover rising health-plan costs.
> Chances are they won't, given the continuing steep cost increases.
Premiums
> for an employee's family could be $15.
>
> A second employee tier, which the union said in October it could never
> accept, will mean greatly reduced health benefits and pay for anyone hired
> by the supermarkets after the current employees return to work. Since most
> union grocery workers in Southern California now work only part-time
> schedules, and the stores assign work hours weekly or biweekly, a two-tier
> system will give cost-conscious managers an incentive to favor the new
hires
> with the most hours.
>
> UFCW International president Doug Dority insisted on calling the Southern
> California action "one of the most successful strikes in history." But
> Dority was compelled to admit that his union was not up to championing
> employee health benefits nationwide. He attempted to recast the strike as
a
> loud call for political intervention.
>
> "We must have national health-care reform," Dority said in a statement
> released on the UFCW Web site. "No one company, no one union, no industry
or
> group of workers alone can fix the health care system . . . Now is the
time
> for action. 2004 is the year to put health care reform on the political
> agenda and demand that every candidate for office commits to
comprehensive,
> affordable health insurance for every working family."
>
>
>
> It is hard to overestimate the damage the settlement does to UFCW and its
> members. Union negotiators here gave in on almost every major point of
> contention at just the moment when grocery workers around the country
> prepare to battle the same three chains on precisely the same issues. The
> supermarket companies will now bring the Southern California contract and
> its major concessions to talks later this month with union negotiators in
> Washington, D.C., northern Virginia and Baltimore. In May, the precedent
> here could undermine UFCW efforts in Seattle. In September, contracts are
up
> in Northern California, Denver and Las Vegas. Meanwhile, workers in
Arizona
> and Indiana who stayed on the job and continued to bargain after their
> contracts expired will have a tougher time turning away concessions.
>
> The real squeeze on grocery workers around the country springs from the
> knowledge that the long strike and lockout here decimated the UFCW's
strike
> fund. Negotiators for Kroger Inc. (owner of Ralphs and a number of chains
> around the country), Safeway Inc. (Vons and Pavilions here, Safeway and
> others around the nation) and Albertsons will come to the table knowing
that
> the union they face lacks the funds to give them any serious trouble.
>
> How could this happen? UFCW is in many ways a throwback to an earlier time
> when the grocery industry was made up of locally owned chains. Ralphs,
Vons
> and Safeway were all homegrown Southern California stores, and as recently
> as the 1980s the CEO of Vons did commercials for his stores on local TV.
The
> seven locals around Southern California were a good match for the
> supermarkets.
>
> In the '80s and '90s, though, consolidation gobbled up chains like Hughes,
> Boys, Lucky and Alpha Beta, leaving three corporate giants. Kroger became
> the largest grocer in the world - until 2002, when it was overtaken by
> Wal-Mart.
>
> The three chains' coast-to-coast presence gave them the financial power to
> weather hard economic times, or strikes, in one part of the country as
long
> as shoppers were still rolling their carts through checkout lanes in other
> regions. UFCW, though, remained fractured, promoting local and separate
> control while other unions were coming to terms with the need to
centralize
> finances, strategy and organizing. New labor vigor crystallized around the
> Service Employees International Union, which promoted energetic
organizing,
> scrupulous planning and carefully targeted work actions. The SEIU culture
> became the new standard in the 1990s, when its leader, former janitor John
> Sweeney, became head of the AFL-CIO. Among Sweeney's opponents was Doug
> Dority.
>
> The drawbacks of Dority's approach became apparent as seven Southern
> California leaders squabbled over strategy, failed to acknowledge the
> corporate willingness to forgo short-term profits, and stumbled over
> outreach to other unions that stood ready with resources and good will.
>
> Among the biggest gaffes and setbacks: The union failed to present a clear
> message to the public, shoppers and even its own members. In the early
days
> of the strike, picketers outside the Albertsons at the Baldwin-Crenshaw
> plaza urged shoppers to get their groceries at, of all places, the nearby
> nonunion Wal-Mart. The union misplayed strong public support of the strike
> by lifting pickets at all Ralphs stores, thinking the move would put
> pressure on Safeway, when in fact the three chains were sharing profits.
> Having removed the pickets, some leaders invited shoppers to return to
> Ralphs while others asked them to stay away. In the words of one UFCW
> representative, "We don't want them to shop there, but they have to do
what
> they have to do."
>
> Outreach to the crucial Teamsters union was spotty. Early pickets were
sent
> to grocery-distribution warehouses, but the Teamsters crossed freely.
Later,
> just before Thanksgiving, the Teamsters agreed not to cross the lines -
but
> they returned to work a month later after the UFCW gave them the okay.
>
> Leaders realized things were going poorly and called in the AFL-CIO in
> December to take over strategy, but failed to follow up. They forgot to
give
> special consideration to their more than 800 supermarket pharmacists and
may
> lose them to another union. They got extraordinary support from
dockworkers,
> janitors and entertainment unions, but they failed to take full advantage
of
> that support or of a smattering of sympathy strikes in Washington, D.C.
>
> The day before the settlement was reached, the hotel and restaurant
workers
> (known as HERE) and the clothing, textiles and laundry union (UNITE)
> announced a strategic merger that will allow them to employ some of the
> tactics that have made SEIU successful - like lining up contract
expiration
> dates and presenting management with the prospect of a nationwide action.
> That's something UFCW was not equipped to do this time around. But in the
> future it may have to go that way.
>
> "UFCW has to critically evaluate what happened here," said Kent Wong,
> director of the Center for Labor Research and Education at UCLA. "It
speaks
> to a broader need for labor solidarity."
>
> Meanwhile, around Los Angeles, community and shopper support that was
> squandered by union leaders may remain strong. Amanda Shaffer, organizer
of
> the Community Strike Support Network in Northeast Los Angeles, said
rallies
> to support strikers will turn into efforts to fight nonunion Wal-Mart and
> promote living-wage and health benefits.
>
> "I'm disappointed that the union didn't win something bigger and better,"
> Shaffer said. "Most of the people I talked to said they just couldn't stay
> out any longer. But organizing went really well, and there's a lot of
energy
> to keep working."
>
>
>
>
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