INDUSTRIAL WORKERS STRIKE BACK IN THE SOUTH
Posted by challengenewspaper on February 20, 2008
On February 1, about 2,500 members of United Auto Workers (UAW) Local 2069 struck the Volvo Trucks North America plant in Dublin, Virginia, after failing to reach a new contract. Workers had voted by a 95% margin to walk out. The plant builds all Volvo trucks sold in North America.
Volvo is seeking wage and benefit concessions, and trying to roll back many health and safety protections in the current contract. Layoffs have reduced the workforce by 300 while the strike has put another 650-job cut on hold. A Volvo spokesman told the Roanoke Times, “We’re considering…keep[ing] the plant running as close to full production as soon as possible,” but gave no strike-breaking details.
This battle reflects a reaction to a 20-year movement of U.S. auto production to the South, impelled by a massive investment of European and Asian auto billionaires in the highly profitable U.S. market. Historically intense racism, going back to slavery, has created a huge low-wage region in the South. No wonder that, while Ford, GM and Chrysler plants close in Michigan, Missouri and Ohio, Mercedes, Hyundai and Toyota plants are opening in Alabama, Mississippi and Texas. Since 2000, 15,000 parts-supplier plants have opened in Southern states, according to the UAW National Organizing Department.
This example of the inter-imperialist rivalry rages from China to the U.S. as the world’s auto bosses fight for markets, resources and cheap labor. Imperialism inevitably leads to war, and as this rivalry sharpens, wars are spreading globally. Only communist revolution can end imperialism and its wars for good.
As industry increasingly heads south to exploit cheaper, unorganized labor, attacks will intensify and sharpening class battles will be waged by the region’s industrial workers. Just recently six workers were killed and many injured in a sugar factory explosion in Georgia.
Another fight involves the jobs of the Freightliner Five — Glenna Swinford, Franklin Torrence, Robert Whiteside, Allen Bradley and David Crisco, members of UAW Local 3520 — who were fired at the Freightliner truck plant in Cleveland, North Carolina on April 3, 2007. They had led a strike of 3,000 workers. Four were members of the Voluntary Organizing Committee (VOC) that organized the plant in 2003, the country’s largest manufacturer of the big Class 8 heavy trucks. They’re asking for, and getting support from workers worldwide.
The five were on the 11-member union bargaining committee fired by Freightliner. Six got their jobs back, but had to sign agreements requiring them to be “model employees.” The other five were not offered their jobs on any terms.
In 2002, Freightliner and its parent company DaimlerChrysler, cut wages an average of $1.15/hr and imposed healthcare cutbacks. Between 2003 and 2006, over 6,000 workers joined the UAW at Freightliner plants in North Carolina, Georgia and Tennessee. Robert Whiteside, a black worker, was elected shop chair, the union leader on the shop floor. He also headed the Local’s bargaining committee.
The bosses refused to meet with him. Daimler and Freightliner demanded give-backs, despite Daimler’s truck group record $2.6 billion profit in 2006. The bosses broke off negotiations, announced layoffs and voided the union contract and healthcare coverage. The workers followed the bargaining committee’s lead and walked out.
The strike was quickly called off by the Local President, claiming it had not been sanctioned by the UAW International. Workers rejected a tentative agreement that excluded the health and safety gains sought by the bargaining committee. But soon afterwards a similar contract was ratified in a vote held on company property, from which the five fired workers were banned.
The Freightliner Five continue to fight for their jobs. Their unemployment benefits are exhausted and they need help to support their families and to continue the fight.
This fight resembles the struggle of the Charleston 5, members of the International Longshoreman’s Association Local 1422 in Charleston, S.C., who were fired and arrested after police attacked their picket line several years ago. Next month marks the one-year anniversary of the strike of
over 7,000 shipbuilders in Pascagoula, MS, against Northrop-Grumman, a major war contractor.
Slowly but surely, the red flag of communist revolution is being planted in the South by the PLP. With patience and a long-term outlook, by building ties based on struggle and spreading CHALLENGE, industrial workers will lead the way in building a mass PLP. J
For more information about the Freightliner Five, including how to make donations, go to http://justice4five.com.
