Strike

Alabama Miners Reject Tentative Agreement, Continue Strike

April 12, 2021 Madeleine Freeman, Left Voice. Resist! Alabama, Mining, Strike, Worker Rights

Striking mine workers at Warrior Met Coal overwhelmingly voted down the tentative agreement reached earlier this week between UMWA and the company. Workers will continue the strike until the contract addresses the central demands for better wages and conditions that workers have been demanding. The results of the vote were overwhelming. A miner’s facebook group highlights that at one mine, the “no” votes were unanimous. In another, the vote was 256 No to 7 Yes. This is what a landslide looks like. The workers want to continue the strike until they get a better contract. These workers have been on the picket lines for over a week and show no signs of stopping. Their struggle is strong, their conviction is stronger and the strike has the strength to be victorious.

Farmers Block Expressway In Indian State Of Haryana To Protest Against Farm Laws

April 11, 2021 Priya Yadav, Sputnik News. Resist! Farmers, India, Privatization, Strike

Hundreds of farmers from across India have been camping out Delhi's borders for the past four months to protest against newly introduced agricultural laws by the federal government. While the farmers are demanding the laws, passed last September be repealed, the government has agreed to only making amendments and refused to repeal them. Intensifying their protests against newly introduced agriculture laws, farmers blocked the Kundli-Manesar-Palwal expressway at several places in state of Haryana on Saturday. Several farm leaders were detained by the Haryana Police even as farmers sitting on the expressway were forcibly removed for allowing the traffic to pass. Huge jams on the highway have been seen since morning when farmers hit the expressway.

Amazon Employees Stage Walkout At Distribution Center

April 8, 2021 Nick Blumberg, WTTW. Resist! Amazon, Chicago, Strike, Worker Rights and Jobs

Chicago - A group of Amazon employees walked out of the mega-retailer’s Gage Park distribution center Wednesday morning, calling on the company to stop understaffing the facility and to provide accommodations for people working a 10.5-hour overnight “megacycle” shift. “We’re tired of being used,” said Rakyle Johnson of Amazonians United Chicagoland on a livestream. “We work so hard, we give so much to our company … but they don’t give anything back.” An organizer told WTTW News that 20-30 workers walked out, leaving management frustrated and angry. The organizer said 5-10 people who weren’t scheduled to work Wednesday joined in support. They were also joined by Ald. Byron Sigcho-Lopez (25th Ward) who said workers were being “exploited.”

How Oil Workers And Environmentalists United In Struggle

April 6, 2021 Paul Morao, Left Voice. Organize! Environmental Movement, France, Oil Workers, Strike

Total’s objective in recent years has been to close its refineries in France. It has found ways to refine elsewhere: in Dubai, India, China, and with plans for Africa. The objective is twofold: to refine as close as possible to the crude oil deposits, but also to do so in countries where working conditions are worse and environmental standards are lower. Disastrous consequences have resulted, such as the forced displacement of entire populations in Uganda. Even though oil refining fulfills important needs in the region around Paris, and it is very profitable, Total’s refinery in Grandpuits was put on the list to be closed. In 2018 a lack of structural maintenance led the pipeline to burst, which accelerated Total’s plan. The company refused to invest the several hundred million needed for repairs and decided to shut down the refinery.

1,100 Mine Workers In Alabama Are Going On Strike

April 2, 2021 Sou Mi, Left Voice. Resist! Alabama, Coal Mining, Strike, Worker Rights

Over 1,100 workers at two Alabama coal mines and related facilities will go on strike starting Thursday, April 1, at 10:30 pm. United Mine Workers of America (UMWA) issued the strike notice against Warrior Met Coal on behalf of the workers in the company’s two coal mines and related facilities after negotiations over the latest contract failed. The last contract was negotiated in 2016, as Warrior Met Coal was bringing the company out of the bankruptcy caused by its erstwhile owner, Walter Energy. As the union’s press release details, it was on the backs of the labor and sacrifice of their workers that the company turned itself around. Since then, the company has raked in millions in profits. Coal mined by Warrior Met is used for steel production in Asia, Europe, and South America.

Citing Unfair Labor Practices, 1,300 Steelworkers Strike In Five States

April 2, 2021 C.M. Lewis, In These Times. Resist! Pennsylvania, Steelworkers, Strike, Worker Rights

Brackenridge, PA - At 7:00 AM on Tuesday, March 30, 1,300 Steelworkers employed by Allegheny Technologies Incorporated (ATI) walked out in protest at facilities in Pennsylvania, Ohio, New York, Massachusetts, and Connecticut. The strike comes just over a year after United Steelworkers began negotiations with ATI. According to a statement released that day, the union is dissatisfied with company demands for “major economic and contract language concessions.” United Steelworkers further claims that ATI has committed unfair labor practices. A charge filed with the National Labor Relations Board on March 9 alleges that the company is refusing to furnish the union with essential bargaining information.

Amazon General Strike In Italy

April 2, 2021 Peter Olney, Stansbury Forum. Resist! Amazon, Italy, Labor Unions, Strike

It can be said with certainty that the strike was successful, especially among the drivers where participation was around 75%, with peaks of up to 90%. This probably delayed a substantial chunk of deliveries on March 22, but of course it is impossible to know how many customers were unable to receive packages from Amazon. There are around 19,000 Amazon drivers in all of Italy. For the 9000 direct employees in the warehouses (fulfillment centers) and the delivery stations participation was around 70-75% on average nationally, with peaks in the northern sites, and a little lower in the south of Italy. Among the 9000 temporary agency warehouse workers, participation in the strike was 25-30%, but that level was considered a positive by the trade unions given the total blackmail of these workers...

When Rank And File Postal Workers Whipped Bosses, Union Leaders, And Richard Nixon

March 24, 2021 Patrick Murfin, Heretic, Rebel, A Thing to Flout. Resist! Strike, US Postal Service, Wages, Worker Rights

The day after St. Patrick’s Day in New York City was often little more than an intense, city-wide hangover. But on March 18, 1970 residents of the Big Apple awoke to more than just a headache. Thousands of local Postal workers were on the picket line in defiance of both Federal Law which prohibited strikes by government employees and their own union leadership. Within days business in the commercial and financial center of the nation ground to a halt in those pre-electronic communications days and the strike spread to more than 30 cities with 200,000 off the job. It was a big deal. A very big deal.

Amazon Workers In Italy To Go On First Strike

March 12, 2021 Rory Sullivan, Independent. Resist! Amazon, Italy, Strike, Worker Rights

Amazon’s workforce in Italy will go on its first collective strike later this month, trade unions have confirmed. All 8,500 employees in the country are expected to hold a 24-hour walkout on 22 March after negotiations between their representatives and the online retailer broke down. The three national unions supporting them accused Amazon of showing an “unwillingness to positively address” issues including working hours and results-based bonuses. They also claimed that the online giant was “chronically unavailable” for meetings and was opposed to “a system of fairness”. A spokesperson for the company called the allegations “false”, adding that Amazon had met unions twice in January. The trade unions’ announcement of industrial action comes two months after the US retailer said it would open two more logistics centres in Italy at the cost of 230 million euros (£197m).

Medical Technicians’ Strike In Oregon Could Be The First Of Many

March 5, 2021 Lizzie Mulvey, Al Jazeera. Resist! COVID-19, Healthcare workers, Oregon, Strike

As a registered respiratory therapist, Rachel Maida spent the past year caring for COVID-19 patients at St Charles Medical Center in Bend, Oregon in the United States – challenging work that has taken both a physical and mental toll on the 48-year-old. The powered air purifying respirator (PAPR) she wears for 12 hours a day causes headaches, she said, and her mask leaves bruises on her face. She loves her job, but “it’s exhausting, day in and day out,” Maida told Al Jazeera, explaining that earning between $25 and $35 per hour, she is not compensated enough. That is why nearly a year into the coronavirus pandemic, Maida and more than 150 other medical technicians – a group of highly skilled healthcare professionals who typically don’t have the labour protections afforded to nurses and doctors – have been negotiating their first union contract as part of the Oregon Federation of Nurses and Health Professionals (OFNHP).

How India’s Farmers’ Protests Could Upend The Political Landscape

March 4, 2021 Vijay Prashad, People's Dispatch. Educate! Elections, Farmers, India, Strike

For the past three months, Indian farmers and agricultural workers have been in the middle of a difficult struggle against the government of Prime Minister Narendra Modi. Tens of thousands of them have gathered around the capital city of New Delhi; they say that they will not disband unless the government repeals three laws that negatively impact their ability to remain economically viable. The government has shown no sign that it will withdraw these laws, which provide immense advantages to the large corporate houses that are close to Prime Minister Modi. The government’s attempt to crack down on the farmers and agricultural workers has altered the mood in the country: those who grow the food for the country are hard to depict as “terrorists” and as “anti-national.” Modi’s party—the Bharatiya Janata Party (BJP)—currently holds power in several of the states that border Delhi.

As Farmers Expand Their Agitation, Indian Government Intensifies Repression

February 21, 2021 Wasantha Rupasinghe, WSWS. Resist! Farmers, India, State Violence, Strike

Pushed on the back foot by the popular support for the farmers’ agitation against its pro-agribusiness farm laws, India’s right-wing Bharatiya Janata Party (BJP) government is systematically intensifying state repression against protesters and their supporters. Since late November, tens of thousands of protesting farmers, principally from the nearby states of Punjab, Haryana and Uttar Pradesh, have been encamped on the outskirts of the Delhi National Capital Territory. Their Delhi Chalo (Let’s go to Delhi) protest, which is demanding the repeal of all three recently-enacted farm laws, was prevented from entering the capital by a massive police mobilisation organised by the Modi government.

Argentine Vegetable Oil Workers Win Big Raises With Coordinated Strike

February 17, 2021 Julia Soul and Ernesto Torres, Labor Notes. Resist! Argentina, Big Ag, Strike, Worker Rights

Argentina’s vegetable oil workers ended 2020 on a high note, with a triumphant 21-day national strike for higher wages. They were pushing to make the minimum wage a living wage, as the constitution mandates. It was the country’s longest national strike of the year, and it ended in total victory: the unions won a 35 percent increase in wages for all of the workers, not just those earning the minimum. More than 20,000 working-class families won a decent wage for 2021. (In Argentina wages are negotiated in annual rounds of collective bargaining.) Vegetable oil workers mainly work in factories and on docks, processing, classifying, and storing seeds and making oil.

The Largest Strike In Human History

February 15, 2021 Anya Parampil, The Grayzone. Resistance Report Big Ag, Farmers, India, Strike

Radhakrishnan explains why farmers are rising up, how they are organized, and how the neoliberal government of Narendra Modi has responded to the movement. Just one day after this interview, the Modi government raided the offices of Radhakrishnan’s employer, Newsclick.in, and detained its editors in what has been denounced as an act of intimidation against critical media. Learn more about the disturbing press crackdown here.

Striking Workers Halt Construction At Future Amazon Warehouse

February 9, 2021 Lauren Kaori Gurley, Vice. Resist! Amazon, Labor Unions, Strike, Wars and Militarism, Worker Rights

Roughly 75 workers walked off the job on Thursday at the construction site of a future Amazon fulfillment center in southern California—forcing most of the construction operations, including a large crane, to come to a halt. Workers are striking at the future Amazon fulfillment center in Oxnard, California, because an Amazon contractor at the site, Building Zone Industries, has hired non-union, out-of-state workers to work on the project. This comes amid high rates of unemployment stemming from the COVID-19 in the predominantly agricultural, working-class Latinx community.

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