Transport Workers Solidarity Committee

3/6 SF Forum-Report On The Struggles From Three Continents-Japan, US &
Turkey "The Global Struggle For Public Education, Against
Privatization & For Working Class Solidarity"
Report On The Struggles From Three Continents-Japan, US And Turkey
The Global Struggle
For Public Education, Against Privatization & For Working Class
Solidarity
Reports/Video/Songs
Saturday March 6, 2010 7:00 PM
522 Valencia St./16th St San Francisco
Donation Requested $5.00
Potluck
Funds will be sent to Tekel hunger strikers in Instanbul, Turkey
Join with Japanese Zengakuren students from who have been fighting
privatization and militarization. They are visiting the US to join in
the March 4, 2010 day of action and strikes. Also US transport
workers, Students and trade unionists and a Report & video on the
national struggle of the Turkish Tekel Workers
The global struggle against capitalism and the defense of the working
class is escalating internationally. A delegation of Japanese student
activists who are members of Zengakuren will report on the fight
against privatization of the Japanese universities and the repression
against workers and students fighting militarization as well as the

Release The Japan Hosei University 6
Statement Of The Transport Workers Solidarity Committee

The Bay Area Transport Workers Solidarity Committee www.transportworkers.org calls for the immediate release
of 6 student activists from jail. They were jailed as a result of a political crackdown of
students protesting and organizing against privatization and militarization of Japanese education.
The university management went to the Tokyo Metropolitan Court to get an injunction to prevent the leafleting and
rallying on public streets in Tokyo next to Hosei University. Students and activists were arrested for leafletting and rallying
next to the university. This attack on basic democratic rights is inexcusable and we call for the immediate release of
these students and the dropping of charges of many others who have been arrested.
These students have stood against privatization of education and public services including transportation in Japan.
Transport Workers Solidarity Committee
2/18/2010

New NYC TWU 100 Transit Union Crew Hits Hard at Former TWU Leaders, MTA on $
http://blogs.villagevoice.com/runninscared/archives/2010/01/new_transit_uni.php

Runnin' Scared
Labor
New Transit Union Crew Hits Hard at Former TWU Leaders, MTA on $
By Roy Edroso, Friday, Jan. 29 2010 @ 10:51AMComments (0)
Categories: Featured, Transportation

​The new administration of Transit Workers Union Local 100 -- which swept out the old regime on a Take Back Our Union ticket last year -- is apparently looking back in anger, and leaking details of questionable expenses under the leadership of former Local 100 boss Roger Toussaint and his successor, Curtis Tate. amNYhas learned that in 2008, the union sprang for atwo trips to Great Adventure for thousands of its members, costing $1.7 million.
Toussaint tells amNY that the union had scaled back its annual Great Adventure "Family Day," which it started in 2001, after litigation resulting from the 2005 transit strike ate into its finances, but went ahead with these last hurrahs -- one held last year, another scheduled for later this year -- because they couldn't cancel the reservation. He said union officials have constantly and conscientiously re-negotiated its deals with the amusement park, and that this expense was only coming up as "a political issue more than anything else."

British Airways cabin crew vote for Christmas strike

http://news.bbc.co.uk/2/hi/business/8411214.stm

Page last updated at 19:59 GMT, Monday, 14 December 2009
E-mail this to a friend Printable version
British Airways cabin crew vote for Christmas strike

Len McCluskey on the reasons behind the strike action

British Airways cabin crew have voted overwhelmingly in favour of strike action in a dispute over job cuts and changes to staff contracts.
The strikes are set to begin on 22 December and run until 2 January.
Cabin crew voted by nine to one in favour of the strike action, with an 80% turnout.
BA's chief executive Willie Walsh said the decision was "cynical" and betrayed "a lack of concern for our customers, our business and other employees".
Len McCluskey, assistant general secretary of the Unite union, said: "It goes without saying that we have taken this decision to disrupt passengers and customers over the Christmas period with a heavy heart."
He stressed that the union was keen to continue negotiations.
"We will wait, ready to meet, anytime, anywhere, 24 hours a day, to try to see if we can resolve the dispute."
Contacting passengers

Customers who are booked to travel between 22 December and 2 January, and 48 hours either side of those dates... can change to another BA flight departing in the next 12 months at no charge

http://momento24.com/en/2009/11/10/subway-strike-in-buenos-aires/

Subway strike in Buenos Aires, free parking in most Avenues
Posted on10 November 2009 at 12:15. Tags: buenos aires, parking, strike, subway

Buenos Aires subway unionists, after the failure of negotiations, began a strike an hour before the service ended yesterday, surprising users who attempted to travel at that time of night.
This morning, crossed versions began to com eout from both sides, unionists and Company managers.
Union representatives confirmed tha workers were on strike in all lines and there was no service in any section.
Company Representatives, for their part reported that “there was an emergency service in some sections of lines D and E”.
The last report from the company at 6:30 am said that lines A, B, C and H were interrupted while the line D trains were circulating between Cathedral and José Hernández stations , and E was running only between Bolivar and Avenida La Plata.
Unioniosts refused accuisations from the company and accused them of “lying to society”.
The company’s spokeswoman Lucila Maldonado said that a presentation was made before the Federal Court for Criminal and Correctional Issues 4.

Capitalism in crisis:Challenges for the transport sector ITF

http://www.itfglobal.org/transport-international/ti36crisis.cfm

Capitalism in crisis

The scale and scope of the global financial crisis is unprecedented. According to the OECD (Organisation for Economic Cooperation and Development) the developed world economy is in the midst of its deepest and most widespread recession for more than 50 years. Output has declined in almost all OECD countries in the past six months and, with non-OECD countries slowing sharply, world growth has turned negative.

Viewpoint: the big rethink

Elizabeth Cotton outlines her view of the global labour movement's role during the crisis. continue readiing ...

The results for workers are potentially disastrous: job losses, pay cuts and the prospect of more precarious working and unemployment. Labour markets are weakening throughout the OECD area, according to its data, in some cases dramatically. In the United States, this process has been under way since early 2008, with the unemployment rate rising at an accelerating pace to its highest level since the early 1980s. In the euro area, job losses are now becoming widespread.

So what does this mean for the labour movement? At first glance, there is little to be cheerful about. But the massive shift in the global economy presents opportunities as well as challenges for trade unions.

SeaTV. Television for and made by seafarers

http://www.watchseatv.com/

Consult the updated database by using this link.

Seafarers have their own Television Station
SeaTV is television about seafaring. The programs are about aspects of the life of seafarers such as the need for legal assistance, health, family life, technology, art, entertainment, recreation and spiritual matters.

SeaTV can be watched on board. Free DVD-discs are available (soon) at seafarers centres in Amsterdam, Antwerp, Durban, London, New York, Rotterdam, Singapore and many other stations.

SeaTV can also be watched at the download section of this website. At our youtube channel even more movieclips can be found.

The SeaTV-DVD's also contain a port database. It gives access to information like the adresses of many seamen's centres in the world. The database can also be downloadedfrom this website.

SeaTV is partly made by seafarers themselves. Everybody working at sea can join the SeaTV-team and even earn some money. Click at the participate button to find out how!

NEED HELP?
CALL FREE:
+800 73232737

Use Seafarers Mission Telephonecards and support the Seafarers Centres!

AFL-CIO, Delta at Odds Over Unionization Rule
http://online.wsj.com/article/SB125444047080257765.html

CTOBER 2, 2009
AFL-CIO, Delta at Odds Over Unionization Rule

MORE IN POLITICS »

By MIKE ESTERL

A high-stakes labor battle is looming at the National Mediation Board as organized labor pushes the federal agency to change decades-old election rules to make it easier to unionize airline and railroad companies.

The request by the AFL-CIO is being fought by Delta Air Lines Inc., a largely union-free company that merged last year with heavily unionized Northwest Airlines to become the world's largest air carrier. Other airlines also are opposed to the measure; among those that could be affected are nonunion JetBlue Airways Corp. and smaller airlines with little or no organized labor.

The issue also could become another litmus test on whether recent Obama administration appointees at key regulatory agencies will shift from Bush-era labor policies to create a more friendly environment for unions. Earlier this year, the White House named Linda Puchala, a former flight-attendant-union leader, to the three-person Mediation Board, replacing Read Van de Water, a former Northwest lobbyist. The board oversees labor relations at companies -- mostly airlines and railroads -- that are governed by the Railway Labor Act of 1926.

http://www.mercurynews.com/news/ci_12970005?nclick_check=1

Death on the tracks: For Caltrain crews, trauma of suicides may never go away

By Mike Swift
mswift@mercurynews.com
Posted: 08/01/2009 09:43:21 PM PDT

On a bright Easter Sunday afternoon in 2008, Sean Morgan was driving aCaltrain passenger train north from San Jose. But as the engineer entered a tunnel in San Francisco at about 40 mph, in the train's cylinder of light he suddenly saw a man lying with his head on the rails.
Morgan slammed the red brake lever, throwing the train into emergency braking, and hit the horn. The sunlight at the end of the tunnel had kept him from seeing the man until almost the last moment, but as the booming sound filled the dimness, the head on the rail lifted. For an instant, their eyes met.
That moment is long over for the man on the tracks; it may never be over for Morgan.
"One of the things that really sticks with an
engineer is the sound of striking somebody. It just is a very distinct, hollow sound, and it's got a metal ring to it," said Morgan, a Caltrain engineer since 1996. "The other thing is this feeling of helplessness. When it's an obvious suicide and somebody is putting themselves out there, there is nothing you can do."

International Transport Workers Call For Action Against Honduran Ships To Protest Honduras Coup
http://www.itfglobal.org/press-area/index.cfm/pressdetail/3512

Honduras ship action declared (También en version española)

17 July 2009

The ITF (International Transport Workers’ Federation) today called for all its union members to oppose the coup in Honduras by focusing protests on the Honduran merchant fleet.

The global union organisation, which represents 656 unions worldwide with four and a half million members, has made the call as its latest move to defend democracy in the coup-stricken Central American nation, and in support of the Organization of American States’ (OAS) condemnation of the military takeover. The action call is likely to affect the loading and unloading of the 650 ships flying the Honduran flag, which the ITF considers a flag of convenience – a low cost cosmetic ship registration by companies with no link to the country and no intention of employing its citizens onboard.

ITF General Secretary David Cockroft stated: “We have to put real pressure on the Honduran military to allow the country to revert to democracy. We are therefore calling on our member unions to consider taking lawful action to defend the rights of the citizens of Honduras. That is likely to include protests that centre on Honduran ships. All such actions will be peaceful, will respect the rights of the seafarers on the ships, but will send a clear message to those in authority – for now – in Honduras, that the outside world does not accept their seizure of power.”