[Marxism] WSJ: Steelworkers, Big U.K. Union Plan to Merge

["Walter Lippmann" <walterlx@xxxxxxxxxxxxx>]

They seem to have a better foreign policy than US unions:
http://www.tgwu.org.uk/Templates/Internal.asp?NodeID=92585
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WALL STREET JOURNAL
May 24, 2008 

Steelworkers, Big U.K. Union Plan to Merge
By KRIS MAHER
May 24, 2008; Page A3

The United Steelworkers said it is close to completing a merger with
Unite, the United Kingdom's biggest union, creating the first
trans-Atlantic union in a move aiming to bolster labor clout
globally.

Unlike loosely affiliated international union federations, the new
organization is expected to function like a single union, using its
combined three million members in the U.S., Canada, England and
Ireland to coordinate organizing and bargaining with multinational
employers.

There is the question of the extent to which union members in one
country will back the use of their resources in another country.
Union officials say members will support each other because they
believe their own working conditions and compensation are at stake.

"Now we've got globalization running rampant over workers all over
the world, and there's not a counterforce in the labor movement. We
want this to be something that can deliver for workers," said Leo
Gerard, president of the Steelworkers, which currently represents
850,000 workers in the U.S., Canada and the Caribbean in steel,
aluminum, paper, tire and rubber, and health care, among other
industries.

The Steelworkers union has a history of growing through mergers, amid
declining employment in U.S. manufacturing. In 2005, it merged with
the Paper, Allied-Industrial, Chemical and Energy Workers
International Union, adding 275,000 members. Now, despite its name,
only about a fifth of the union's members work in the steel industry.

Mr. Gerard said his union and Unite, which represents workers in a
range of industries from manufacturing to financial services, will
likely reach a final agreement by mid-June and register the new labor
organization in the four countries by September.

A spokesman for Unite couldn't be reached to comment.

Unite itself was created last year by the merger of two large unions,
Amicus and the Transport and General Workers Union.

Labor experts say union mergers have become critical as the
percentage of workers who belong to unions declines in most
countries. In the U.S. and some European countries, a major factor in
this dwindling membership has been the decline of jobs in industrial
sectors that were heavily unionized traditionally. In many instances,
union workers have been forced to take wage and benefit cuts during
contract negotiations.

How effective the new cross-border union can be at reversing such
trends for its members is uncertain. The merger "doesn't
fundamentally change the dynamics" the unions face, said Marick
Masters, a labor expert at the University of Pittsburgh. But he said
the Steelworkers need to find strategic partners to gain leverage
with employers. "London increasingly is becoming the financial
capital of the world, and I believe having a presence in the U.K.
will enable them to perhaps exert more economic power," he said.

Megamergers between unions can be difficult to pull off. In 1990s,
the Steelworkers were involved in plans to merge with the
International Association of Machinists and the United Auto Workers
to create an industrial superunion in the U.S. The merger never came
together after the unions reportedly couldn't agree on basic issues
such as how officers should be elected or where the union should be
based.

Initially the new union formed by the Steelworkers and Unite will be
run by a steering committee with members chosen from each union, but
eventually it will have a single leader, Mr. Gerard said. Leaders
will meet once a month by video conference and four times a year in
person to start, he said.

Mr. Gerard said the new organization will go well beyond the efforts
of international labor federations and pacts in which unions agree to
support each other with research on companies or protests. "We don't
want this to be a social event," he said. "We want this new union to
be an activist organization."

The new organization's staff will plan joint organizing campaigns and
other actions, he said. Each union will continue to set policies that
are country-specific and operate with some autonomy.

Mr. Gerard wouldn't comment on specific organizing or bargaining
plans but said a focus of the new union would be on the impact of
private-equity acquisitions on workers. He said the new group would
initially target companies such as London's BP PLC; International
Paper Co., based in Memphis, Tenn.; and India's Tata Steel Ltd., part
of conglomerate Tata Group.


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