Transport Workers Solidarity Committee

Activists tell shipping firm Zim -- Israeli ships not welcome in Vancouver
http://rabble.ca/news/2010/08/activists-tell-shipping-firm-zim-israeli-ships-not-welcome-vancouver
Activists tell shipping firm Zim -- Israeli ships not welcome in Vancouver
BY BOYCOTT ISRAELI APARTHEID COALITION | AUGUST 24, 2010

Vancouver - Port truck traffic slowed to a crawl along the Deltaport causeway as a group of about 50 protesters approached drivers with leaflets containing information about the illegal Israeli blockade of Gaza. They also offered the drivers coffee and muffins in a gesture of solidarity. The protesters were there to draw attention to the fact that the Israeli container ship Zim Djibouti had landed in Vancouver to unload its containers.
Zim is an Israeli shipping company, one of the largest in the world.
"This action was part of the growing international campaign to pressure Israel to comply with international law and stop killing innocent civilians," said Gordon Murray, spokesperson for the Boycott Israeli Apartheid Coalition (BIAC).
"Workers in South Africa, Scandinavia, the United States, Turkey and India have already responded to the Palestinian call for action to end the illegal Israeli blockade of Gaza and the suffering it is causing," said Mike Krebs, BIAC's other spokesperson.

A Thriving Industry Built on Low-Compensated Temp Workers In Chicago-The Union Free Environment

http://www.nytimes.com/2010/08/27/us/27cncdryport.html?_r=2&emc=tnt&tntemail0=y

August 26, 2010
A Thriving Industry Built on Low-Compensated Temp Workers
By KARI LYDERSEN
Tory Moore worked at the same packaged-food warehouse in Kankakee for six years, but he was denied a loan and apartment rentals after being told he did not have a real job.

Mr. Moore, 37, was a “perma-temp,” one of thousands of workers in the Chicago area’s massive warehouse complexes who are laid off and rehired every few months by temporary-staffing agencies.

He said he never received paid vacation days, holidays, sick days or affordable insurance. He was fired in December, he said, for rallying other workers to demand better conditions.

“I’m someone who loves to work hard,” he said, “but you want the company to make you feel appreciated.”

The Chicago area is widely described as the country’s largest inland “dry port,” where the nation’s six major railroads converge with packed shipping containers from China and other far-flung locations. The containers are moved from train to truck at sprawling intermodal facilities, then hauled to hundreds of warehouses where they are unloaded by hand so the goods can be distributed to retail stores across the country. In early August, a new $2 billion intermodal facility was opened in Joliet, where Union Pacific trains bring goods from Western seaports and factories.

Women at Houston Port Win a Round in Potty Wars
http://www.labornotes.org/blogs/2010/08/women-houston-port-win-round-potty-wars
Women at Houston Port Win a Round in Potty Wars
by Andrea Gardner | Wed, 08/04/2010 - 11:14am

On the door it says “Women’s Room.” The lock is broken on the inside, so you walk in to a darkly painted, dimly lit room. The broken toilet seat is up and the bowl is full of urine from the last visitor who obviously was male. Rolls of toilet paper sit on the floor next to it. One wall is smeared with ancient dried feces, again today there is no soap, and the one cold water spigot drips in a grimy sink with old soap scum covering the wall next to it. There are no paper towels in the long-broken holder. The return vents in the ceiling are covered with years of grime. The ceiling tiles are pushed over and a steady drip from the air conditioning overflow makes the floor wet in front of the commode. The whole room reeks and is a bacterial nightmare.

What makes these conditions worse is the struggle just getting to a bathroom at all. Sometimes it takes a hike down a 60-foot gangway from a ship as long as a football field. Houston summers often get up to 100 or more degrees, and standing on steel or concrete makes it even hotter.

Around the World, Dockworkers Blockade Israeli Ships
http://inthesetimes.com/working/entry/6286/dockworkers_around_the_world_create_a_worker_blockade_of_israeli_ships/
Around the World, Dockworkers Blockade Israeli Ships
Wednesday
August 4
12:40 pm
By Mike Elk
On June 20, ILWU Local 10 dockworkers in Oakland, Calif., refused to unload an Israeli Zim Lines ship for 24 hours. Their protest was supported by more than 800 rallying local activists, the San Francisco Labor Council and the Alameda County Labor Council (the equivalent of local branches of the AFL-CIO).

Workers around the world have been joining the call to blockade Israeli ships from being unloaded, in essence creating their own blockade to protest the blockade of food and humanitarian supplies Israel has placed on Palestinians in the Gaza strip. On June 7, by the Palestinian General Federation of Trade Unions (PGFTU), the General Union of Palestinian Workers (GUPW), the Federation of Independent Trade Unions (IFU), and several other organizations produced a call for dockworkers to refuse to unload Israeli ships.

Their statement, released after the flotilla massacre that killed nine people earlier this year, said:

Turkish Dock Workers Union Joins Boycott against Israel
http://www.sendika.org/yazi.php?yazi_no=31229
Turkish Dock Workers Union Joins Boycott against Israel
24 Haziran 2010 -

The working class movement in Turkey is starting to join the Boycott Against Israel Campaign. While the working class movements around the world has escalated the campaign against Israel by refusing to unload Israeli cargo ships, the Dock Workers Union “Liman-Is” is the latest union in Turkey joining the anti apartheid, anti racist campaign against the state of Israel.

The recent campaign against Israel started by the left and progressive organizations is beginning to get support from the workers’ unions as well. The movement against Israeli apartheid was successful in bringing the entire spectrum of the left against Israel’s racist and imperialist regime. However now, the movement is starting to gain support within the working class organizations as well.

The Boycott Against Israel movement aims to cut all ties, military, economic, diplomacy, academic and cultural, with the state of Israel.

Following the Physicians’ Association of Turkey which had endorsed the campaign from the very beginning, the dock workers’ union Liman-Is is now also calling for a comprehensive boycott against the reactionary state of Israel. The movement had organized a successful symposium for Palestinian rights and against Israel where the representatives from the world had gathered to discuss the the strategy of such a boycott. During the discussions, the Chamber of Agricultural Engineers of Turkey, a participant in the symposium announced it was joining the boycott against Israel.

7/26 ILWU 10 Organizing Meeting For Labor/Community Rally:Justice For Oscar Grant! Jail Killer Cops

Longshore workers call for labor/community rally for:

Justice for Oscar Grant! Jail Killer Cops!

A labor/community organizing meeting is called for this Tuesday
7 PM at the Longshore Hall in San Francisco
You are urged to attend!

Information from the Labor Action Committee To Free Mumia Abu-Jamal.
Please forward!

26 July 2010 - Following the outrageously light-weight conviction-- involuntary manslaughter--given to ex-BART cop Johannes Mehserle, who murdered the unarmed Oscar Grant in cold blood in 2009, longshore workers in Local 10 of the International Longshore and Warehouse Union (ILWU) have called for a labor community rally at City Hall in downtown Oakland.

Calling the Mehserle verdict "another example in a racist justice system where police officers go free for killing young black men," the longshore workers resolved that "the labor movement organize a mass protest rally...with participation from community groups, civil rights organizations, civil liberties organizations and all who stand for social justice [to] demand jail for killer cops."

YouTube - Australia Maritime Workers Memorial Service For Stephen Piper-3 Killed In Five Months
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=s398J_R8Vws&feature=sub
MaritimeUnion | July 26, 2010
NSW Premier Kristina Keneally expressed deep sorrow over the death of wharfie Stephen Piper and the awful statistic of 3 deaths on Australian wharves in 5 months.
Filmed, edited and produced by Jamie McMechan Maritime Union Film Unit.

The Premier was visibly moved as Mich-Elle Myers read the email written by Fremantle wharfie Ash Huish, the message encapsulated in "No family should sit and wait at the end of the working day for a loved one who never returns". Ash's words were recited at every service around the country.

Unions leant their support headed by Unions NSW's Secretary Mark Lennon. Wharfies and their families held up banners with the faces of 8 workers killed on the wharves in less than 10 years. One of those bore the smiling face of Nick Fanos, crushed to death at Port Botany in April. Nick's sister Maria bravely held up his banner.

The Sydney service was repeated across the country, lead by the highly emotional and dignified funeral in the Boyd Chapel, Springvale in Melbourne. National Secretary Paddy Crumlin said that the church service was a celebration of the wonderful life of a loving dad and husband. "It was about family and friends from the wharves and all walks of life. They paid homage to the joyful and generous character that was Steven Piper", said Crumlin. A full service could not hold some 200 wharfies who gathered outside the church.

Longshore Workers, Bidding to Protect New Hires, Are Locked Out in Montreal

http://www.labornotes.org/blogs/2010/07/longshore-workers-bidding-protect-new-hires-are-locked-out-montreal
Longshore Workers, Bidding to Protect New Hires, Are Locked Out in Montreal
by Mischa Gaus | Tue, 07/20/2010 - 6:20pm

Dockers in Montreal were locked out Monday in a dispute over income security for new workers.

Longshore workers with the Canadian Union of Public Employees Local 375 have refused to work overtime since July 9, telling their employer to call in more help before assigning OT. They’ve worked without a contract since December 2008.

The Maritime Employers Association responded by locking 910 CUPE members out of work. Another 125 port checkers with Longshoremen’s (ILA) Local 1657 were laid off.

Daniel Tremblay, CUPE Local 375 president, called the company’s moves illegal and reiterated the union’s desire to get back to the table as soon as tomorrow.

“We want to settle this problem the fastest way possible,” he said, noting that at least five ships are waiting in the St. Lawrence River.

Tremblay said the dispute rose from the MEA’s decision to hire 65 workers in 2008, anticipating that the global economic crash wouldn’t affect Canada. When shipping volumes suffered, the larger workforce produced an $11 million annual cost in guaranteed income for the dockers, $4 million more than normal.

Montreal Dockers locked out amid contract row

http://www.morningstaronline.co.uk/index.php/news/content/view/full/93063
Dockers locked out amid contract row
Tuesday 20 July 2010 Printable Email
Dockers picketed the Port of Montreal on Tuesday after bosses imposed a lockout in the middle of contract negotiations.
Workers at the port, Canada's second largest after Vancouver, handle about 80 per cent of goods destined for the country's eastern and central regions.
Merchandise including alcohol and furniture could be delayed indefinitely because organised dockers across the eastern seaboard have vowed that cargo ships diverted from Montreal to other ports won't be unloaded.
Montreal dockers have been without a contract since December 31 2008.
Bosses decided this month that 169 of the most recent recruits would not be eligible for the guaranteed revenue clause in the expired collective agreement.
The Maritime Employers Association (MEA) has long resented the payments, which dockers receive when they are on call and waiting for work.
The revenue guarantees were won by dockers during tough contract negotiations in the 1970s.
On July 9 members of the Canadian Union of Public Employees (CUPE) responded to the attack by voting to work less overtime.