Sept. 2, 2002

PMA reneges on deals,

Calls Bush administration

            Just as both sides were reaching agreement on the two biggest issues in negotiations, the employer group, the Pacific Maritime Association, drastically switched the terms, sabotaging the process. The employers’ next move was to call the Bush administration, which has threatened to send military personnel to seize and operate West Coast ports.

            “Every time we get close to a agreement, PMA reneges,” ILWU International President Jim Spinosa said. “If the PMA wanted a deal, it was there on the table in front of them. But from day one of the negotiations the employers have shown that they clearly don’t want to bargain seriously. They want to create a crisis and get the government to force conditions on the union.”

            On Saturday, Aug. 30 PMA pulled its first bait and switch. After having said from the opening day of bargaining that the ILWU would get all the new jobs created by the introduction of new labor-saving computer technology, the PMA told the union flat out that there would be no new union tech jobs.

            The following day the employers did it again. After days of bargaining and give and take by both sides, the leaders of the union and the PMA agreed on a framework for the health benefits plan. But the next morning they changed the terms, demanding all the changes they want in the arbitration process or they would not sign off on the benefits package.

            “Until Bush butts out of our negotiations, the legal collective bargaining process will never get a chance to work,” Spinosa said. “The government’s interference is inappropriate. The Bush administration has informed us that it has assembled in San Diego trained Navy dock workers from bases around the world and have them ready to move on us. In a time when we are supposed to be in a war against terrorism, why is Bush using the military against American workers involved in a legitimate labor dispute?”

            To signal its displeasure with PMA chief negotiator Joe Miniace’s bait and switch tactics, the union Negotiating Committee declined to renew the old contract as it had on a day-to-day basis since it expired July 1.

            “Without a contract all economic and job actions against the employers are legal and open as options for the union,” Spinosa said. “The ILWU Negotiating Committee will reassemble in San Francisco Tuesday afternoon and decide the union’s next move.”

            ILWU officers left the negotiations Sunday at 11:00 a.m. to catch flights to Los Angeles to join the massive Labor Day march and rally attended by thousands of union members, Jesse Jackson and AFL-CIO Secretary-Treasurer Richard Trumka, the second highest ranking officer in the American union movement. The AFL-CIO has made the ILWU contract negotiations a top priority for the labor movement, since a military intervention here would set a precedent unheard of in decades of American history. Scores of elected officials, from U.S. Senators and Congressional representatives, to governors, state legislators and port city mayors, have joined the ILWU in calling for the Bush administration to get out of the negotiating process and to not send the military to the ports.

For more information contact ILWU Communications Director Steve Stallone at 510-390-4748 or visit www.ilwu.org.

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