A couple of weeks ago, on Feb 21, I wrote a piece about Caterpillar, Inc nastily and disgustingly Locking-Out workers at a diesel locomotive plant in London, Ont., Canada (see CAT & Rats & Elephants). It was a story about honest, hard-working Canadians in a small city in Ontario where workers had built diesel locomotives since 1949. Caterpillar bought the company and plant in June 2010, and by the end of 2011 when the CAW contract expired, they demanded these workers take a 50% cut in pay! Obviously the workers declined, but before they could STRIKE!, they were locked-out – Dec 31, 2011 On Feb 6, CAT announced they were closing the plant and moving operations to a “suspect” start-up in Indiana, our newest Right-to-Work state!
Just when it seemed that this story was at its low point, more twists came along. To further recap, a large American corporation (now multi-national), CAT, has abused Canadian workers. They get to appear as though they are the “good guys” because they are bringing manufacturing jobs back to the U.S. Non-Union scale, non-Union jobs in a Right-to-Work state, but they are bringing manufacturing jobs back to America! ElectroMotive Diesel (EMD) is headquartered in Peoria, IL, but CAT is bringing this operation to Muncie, IN, where the workers will flock to the $14.50/hr wages But the story can’t quite end there. It’s just not as simple as the U.S. being reduced to the scab pool that supplies the labor for companies who choose to Lock-Out their long-term, Unionized workers.One of the most needed raw materials in the manufacture of diesel locomotives is iron ore. It is used for the steel & various iron parts of those huge machines. The need is so great that these huge machines are also used in obtaining the raw materials needed in their manufacture. In Canada, the largest producer of iron ore pellets is Iron Ore of Canada, in Labrador. Exploration and geologic surveying for iron ore deposits took place in Labrador as early as the 1890’s, but development wasn’t fully begun until the 1950’s when large deposits were discovered in western Labrador, after the building of Goose Bay Air Force base. Yes, mining large quantities of iron ore in those places would require diesel locomotives to move the raw materials for processing and to market.Iron Ore of Canada is now owned by a rather LARGE multi-national corporation called Rio Tinto, which according to a Google search definition is “a world leader in finding, mining and processing the earth’s mineral resources.” Confused yet? This poor writer surely is. Rio Tinto is based in the UK, named after a river in Spain and was begun as a multi-national “consortium” in 1873 according to Wikipedia. That’s right, 1873; they’ve been in business as a multi-national mining consortium for 140 years. In March of 2008 they announced a $400 million capital expansion project in it’s Labrador iron ore operations. That was put on hold later that fall when the global economy headed south! These plans were resumed in May of 2010. With Phase Two amounting to $289 million and set to kick in. Guess what? As part of Phase Two, Iron Ore of Canada needs some new diesel locomotives.
New diesel locomotives just like the ones that CAT used to build in London, Ont. As Americans, we’d like to see work done in our country by our folks, with equipment made here. For the Canadians this time, that won’t be a possibility. I suppose as Americans, we should be happy that our country will get to export these diesel locomotives. However, it just can’t stop there. Remember, CAT brought this work “back” to America because some of our neighbors are willing to work for less than Union scale – to cut the throats of Sisters and brothers in Canada. Remember Rio Tinto? The LARGE multi-national, “harvesting” the planet on six continents, for 140 years? You’d think they have enough money of their own. After all, they did announce a $400 million improvement project!
The last nail (thus far) in this coffin is this. The U.S. is subsidizing the loans for CAT to sell the locomotives in Canada. NAFTA be damned!, well, only when it hurts workers! Something called “The Export-Import Bank of the United States” (known as Ex-Im), owned by the U.S. federal government, recently announced (Feb 27) approval of $83.1 million in loan guarantees to support the purchase of locomotives. In a letter to Trade Minister Ed Fast, Canadian Auto Workers Pres. Ken Lewenza said ““Canada is surely the only country in the world that would allow a multinational corporation to purchase an important industrial asset, blackmail our workers, shut down the plant entirely – and then sell the same products back to us, helped by government subsidies, to extract our own natural resources.”
Let’s recap this quickly. Dec 31, CAW workers Locked-Out. Feb 1, Indiana becomes Right-toWork state. Feb 4, Caterpillar announces the closing of Canadian plant, workers are DONE!, Feb 7, CAT announces move to Indiana. Feb 27, Ex-Im Bank announces loan subsidies for locomotive sales – loans to be made by Comerica Bank, Detroit. So, we undercut the union workers to help boost Caterpillar profits, have our government break a treaty to help boost Caterpillar profits, and then have our government use our money to help boost Caterpillar profits. Don’t forget Rio Tinto, they aren’t shiny either & probably didn’t need our money to buy CAT’s products!
That’s right, Rio Tinto, the mammoth consortium that seems nearly too big to unravel, had, in the adjacent Canadian province on the same day, locked-out 750+ unionized employees. Members of a USW affiliate, the French-speaking Quebecois operated an aluminum smelter. The primary sticking point is the percentage of “contract” employees that would be allowed to operate in the facility. The union contends that the company’s demand to nearly triple the number of those scab workers would create a downward spiral throughout the entire community. Also of note in regard to Rio Tinto, but not pertinent to this lock-out, are the charges under the Occupational Health and Safety Act. These charges, filed Feb 23, stemmed from an accident in Labrador in March 2010 where “allegedly the company failed to ensure that adequate fall protection was in place.” Two workers tumbled about 23 feet from a work platform that was being used to access spill chains. One of the workers died.
Let’s try again to recap this saga. After Indianans undercut the Unionized workers at CAT’s London, Ont. facility, we paid CAT to sell the diesel locomotives to Rio Tinto, to whom we loaned the money. They, too, have an ongoing Lock-Out of over 750 union workers. All of this not only is exceedingly anti-Union, it violates the NAFTA treaty that was supposed to solve ALL of these kind of problems! It is time for workers everywhere to STAND UP! Stand firm, stand tall, stand TOGETHER!
Additional References:
http://www.theglobeandmail.com/...
http://www.newswire.ca/...
http://www.railway-technology.com/...
http://caw.ca/...
http://www.agoracosmopolitan.com/...
http://www.usw.ca/...
http://www.solidaritealma.org/...
http://www.reuters.com/...