6-13-06, 9:45 am
The gains of UAW members made through collective bargaining and struggle are being eroded by dishonest corporations and the right-wing politicians who side with them, Gettelfinger stated. 'Everything the UAW has fought for at the bargaining table is under attack by a number of multinational corporations who want to rip up our contracts and impose poverty-level wages on workers. Everything we’ve fought for in the political arena is at risk from those politicians who want to destroy the social contract and roll back the clock on 70 years of social and economic progress for working families.'
Multinational corporations and their political allies seem more concerned about increasing profits than working families, Gettelfinger charged. Taking aim at the Delphi Corporation, Gettelfinger said, they care little 'about what happens to real people and real communities when companies misuse the bankruptcy process to break promises to workers, retirees, customers, suppliers and stockholders.'
He accused the auto parts maker of 'using bankruptcy as a perverted business strategy to make certain executives, lawyers and financial advisers wealthy at the expense of workers, investors and creditors.'
Gettelfinger praised the broad unity of several unions in the Mobilizing@Delphi Coalition that includes the IUE-CWA, the Steelworkers, the IBEW, the Machinists and the Operating Engineers. Workers have won the support of both AFL-CIO and the Change to Win unions. The UAW and its allies will fight Delphi’s machinations on the picket lines, in the courts, in Congress, and on Wall Street, Gettelfinger promised.
He urged broad support for the Fairness and Accountability in Bankruptcy Reorganizations Act introduced by Sen. Evan Bayh (D-IN) and Rep. John Conyers (D-MI). This law would prohibit corporate executives from giving themselves huge bonuses while filing for bankruptcy (as was the case with Delphi) and would broaden the scope of what the bankruptcy court would consider as assets before allowing a company to tear up collective bargaining agreements or eliminate jobs. Currently, Delphi is allowed keep its profitable overseas ventures out of its bankruptcy proceedings.
Corporate policies have declared the death of the 'American Dream,' Gettelfinger said. '[O]ur shared vision of an America that lives up to its promise of freedom, opportunity, dignity and social and economic justice for all' has been sacrificed by 'those who measure their lives by the value of their stock portfolios, the square footage of their homes in gated communities, and their exotic vacation homes.'
Gettelfinger pointed out that one prime example of this corporate attitude is Delphi CEO Steve Miller who has said basically 'that American workers need to get over the idea of having a middle-class lifestyle and resign themselves to barely scraping by.'
Gettelfinger rejected the negative attitudes of naysayers who believe the UAW isn’t up to the challenge of fighting back. 'We’re not going to surrender,' he thundered. 'We’re going to keep fighting for what we believe in … at the collective bargaining table … in the courts … in statehouses and the halls of Congress … in our communities … and where push comes to shove, on the picket lines.'
Gettelfinger recalled the fighting spirit of the founders of the union who in the depths of the Great Depression fought and bled to win the right to organize. '[I]t’s worth remembering that there were many difficult days when the odds were long and success seemed uncertain – but solidarity saw us through.'
The contemporary challenges facing the union are related to right-wing policies of free trade, opposition to universal health care and workers’ rights, tax cuts for the rich, and so on. Economic policy has created a condition in which while productivity has increased steadily over the last three decades, workers’ wages have stagnated.
Gettelfinger argued that while working families are being told that they must settle for harsher economic conditions and weak social services in order to be 'globally competitive,' the wealthy have seen their incomes grow at unprecedented rates. In 2003, the 'average income of the top one percent of American households increased by nearly $49,000 – that’s more than the total income for most American households,' he noted.
'It’s no wonder the people at the top of the economic ladder think globalization is working just fine; they’re making out like bandits,' he added.
Gettelfinger contrasted the wealth and power of the very rich to the lives of working families turned upside down by plant closings in places like Greenville, Michigan when the Electrolux moved its production facilities out of the country to find low-wage workers and increase its profit margins.
Gettelfinger pointed out that since 2001, 3 million manufacturing jobs have evaporated. He accused the Bush administration of fostering such a climate with 'free' trade deals that encourage a race to the bottom in wages and working conditions.
'Our fight has never been with workers in other countries,' Gettelfinger added. 'Our fight is with those who want to give multinational corporations free rein to pit workers in the advanced industrialized nations against workers in the newly-industrialized countries in a brutal race to the bottom that none of us can ever win.'
'Our fight is with those who believe corporate profits are more important than workers’ rights, human dignity and decent environmental standards.'
'And our fight is for a global economy that works for working people – that raises living standards, expands freedom, strengthens human rights, improves our environment and lifts people up instead of shoving them down.'
Gettelfinger then turned to the crisis facing the US auto industry. He described the US auto market as the largest in the world, which continues to grow. Growing competition from international carmakers have cut into the market share of the Big Three with resulting financial losses for GM and Ford. Layoffs, especially in the auto parts sector, have been in the hundreds of thousands.
These conditions 'demand new and farsighted solutions,' Gettelfinger said. They just can’t be waited out.
He accused Bush of ignoring this problem and detailed the UAW’s so-called Marshall Plan for revitalizing auto.
Thousands of jobs could be created in auto with a system of government subsidies to automakers and parts suppliers for developing and making 'advanced technology vehicles, like hybrids and clean diesels, and their key components.' Gettelfigner saw this as a way to both create jobs and take real steps to end our dependence on oil.
'It’s good for jobs, good for the environment and good for consumers,' he said.
He also called for 'new approaches to trade and health care.'
Trade policies should promote fair trade, strong labor standards, and environmental protections.
While the Bush administration has basically ignored the growing health care crisis, Gettelfigner said, 46 million people go without coverage with millions more underinsured. This crisis, he argued is 'a national problem that demands a national solution,' adding that the problem can’t 'be fixed at the collective bargaining table.'
The UAW has long called for a system of universal single-payer national health insurance.
On the recent announcement by GM and Ford to layoff as many as 60,000 workers, Gettelfinger stated that 'shedding workers and shrinking production capacity is not a winning strategy…. these companies cannot downsize their way to profitability.'
Gettelfinger cited some major organizing successes over the last few years. In 2002, Johnson Control workers, after a tough picket line battle, won car-check recognition that organized 8,000 auto parts workers. Similar agreements were won with several other parts makers.
Gettelfigner pointed to major organizing victories in the South. Freightliner Truck workers in Gastonia and Cleveland, North Carolina, after a tough fight that involved two challenges by the anti-union National Right to Work Legal Defense Foundation and Bush-controlled National Labor Relations Board, voted to join the UAW and recently ratified their first contracts.
Gettelfinger admitted the lack of success in organizing the so-called transplants, or factories owned by companies based outside of the US. He promised not to give up on the workers in those plants, however.
He also pointed to major organizing and contractual victories for academic workers who affiliated with the UAW, especially at the University of Massachusetts and New York University, though in the latter, workers have had to renew the fight to win recognition of their right to organize.
Since the previous convention, the UAW has added 66,000 new members. This comes as no small accomplishment, said Gettelfinger, in the current climate of anti-unionism fostered by big corporations and the Bush administration.
An important position the UAW must demand of politicians who seek its support, Gettelfinger asserted, is that they must view 'the right to organize and the right to bargain collectively… as a basic human right.' He urged passage of the Employee Free Choice Act, which currently has 215 co-sponsors in the House of Representatives and 43 in the US Senate.
Getelfinger pointed to the Novemebr 7th congressional elections as 'a window of opportunity … to put America back on the high road.' He urged a determined fight to back Congress from the Republicans and rejected calls for the UAW to retreat from the political arena.
'We are not going to do that – not now, not ever.'
--Joel Wendland can be reached at
