AMERICAN LABOUR-CALIIFONIA:

HUNGER STRIKE AGAINST DISNEY:

You know I've always held a visceral dislike of "The Mouse". The reasons are many and various, but one of the main ones is an understanding of how Disney has always exploited the workers who maintain its paper-mache fantasy worlds. Down Los Angeles way some workers are fighting back publicly against Disney management's attempts to squeeze the last drop of blood out of their labour. Their weapon- a public hunger strike which they hope will shame the Corp into some sort of decency. the idea that Disney management can feel shame may be a forlorn hope, but they may fear the adverse publicity. Here's the story from the AFL-CIO Blog.

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Disneyland Hotel Workers Fast For Safer Work:
by James Parks, Feb 9, 2010
Disneyland hotel workers began a water-only fast Tuesday to protest what they describe as life-threatening safety issues on the job. The more than 2,000 bellmen, dishwashers, room attendants, and cooks, members of Unite Here! Local 11, have been working without a contract since February 2008. They say new work requirements at three resort hotels and the villas at the Grand Californian Hotel have led to serious health problems among workers, including heart attack, stroke and musculoskeletal injuries.

Disney management also is demanding to make drastic cuts in workers’ health insurance.
During the fast, eight Disneyland hotel workers, two Los Angeles International Airport food service employees–who also are members of the local–and one adult son of a Disneyland hotel worker will refrain from eating and consume only water. Fast participants will remain, 24-hours a day, in front of the Grand Californian Hotel, sleeping in tents on the sidewalk and surrounded by a large shrine to injured workers.

Part of the shrine will pay tribute to Grand Californian housekeeper Rosario Casas, who is out of work on disability after suffering a heart attack on the job in October. Casas said her doctor said the heart attack was due to stress.

Narciso Guevara, a houseman at the Grand Californian Hotel, who plans to fast, said:
"We’re fighting for our health. We need better, safer conditions on the job, healthcare we can afford, and even more importantly, we need the company to respect us."

Maria Navarro, a housekeeper at the Grand Californian, who was injured at work just three days after Disney remodeled the hotel, said she is fasting to bring attention to the injuries she and several of her co-workers have suffered.

Since the changes were implemented at the Grand Californian, things have gotten worse. There are many people in my department who are hurt, but work through the pain because they are afraid of losing their jobs. So much pressure creates an unsafe place. We must make it stop.

Throughout the fast, community and religious leaders, unions, musicians, students and residents will call on Disney to address the health and safety issues at the hotels to by participating in daily actions, rallies and concerts.

The fasting workers are blogging about the action at:

http://www.disneyisunfaithful.org/work-shouldnt-hurt

and more information also is available here.

AMERICAN LABOUR-LOS ANGELES:

FREE SPEECH FOR SOME:

Now I must admit that anyone who makes a living from giving orders to anyone else has to be an A-hole, at least during working hours. Some, however, go over and above the degree of A-holeishness required and set themselves up for an induction to the Anal Hall of Fame. Such are the owners of the 'Vermont Hand Wash', strangely enough located in the city of Los Angeles California. I'm sure that simply naming a car wash on one end of a continent after a state on the other side indicates pig-headishness over and above the usual. Or am I missing something ? Does the state of Vermont have some sort of marketing connection to either car washes or "hands" ? Your guess is as good as mine. Up here in the frozen north nobody names a business after another province. The British Columbia Head Shop ? The Alberta Quick Oil Change ? The Newfoundland Fish Market ? Never, never, never.

In any case, abandon your previous conceptions of what lengths bosses will go to. Read the following article from the AFL-CIO Blog with at least two beer at the ready.

ALALALALALALAL
Justice for Car Wash Workers Too Radical for L.A.:
by James Parks, Aug 19, 2009


Looks like a billboard supporting workers’ rights is too controversial for the corporate hacks who seem to run Los Angeles.

The billboard, outside the Vermont Hand Wash in downtown L.A., carried this “radical” statement: “Wash Away Injustice! Support Carwash Workers.” Before it was unveiled, the Vermont Hand Wash, one of the most notorious anti-worker car washes in the city, pressured CBS Billboard to pull it down before a rally took place in support of car wash workers who are fighting to join a union to improve conditions in the industry. Never mind that the language and design of the billboard had been approved in advance.

As the workers took down the sign, car wash workers and their supporters chanted, “Shame on you!” and “Don’t take it down!” The rally, with hundreds of workers in the Los Angeles area joining AFL-CIO President John Sweeney, members of Congress and local union, clergy and community leaders for the unveiling, carried on below the symbolically blank billboard.

Henry Huerta, director of the Community-Labor-Environmental Action Network (CLEAN) campaign, said:
"We came here today to unveil a billboard with a message to Angelinos to “Support Carwash Workers” in their struggle against exploitation by the owners of this carwash. Unfortunately, the company that owns this billboard caved to pressure from the Pirian family. They have violated our First Amendment Rights to Free Speech and are complicit in this employer’s violation of workers’ rights to Free Association. SHAME ON CBS BILLBOARD! AND SHAME ON THE PIRIAN FAMILY!"

Earlier this year, the Los Angeles City Attorney filed criminal charges against Benny and Nisan Pirian, the owners, and Manuel Reyes, manager of the Vermont Hand Wash, with 220 counts of criminal misconduct altogether—including conspiracy, witness intimidation, grand theft, brandishing a deadly weapon, failure to pay wages and failure to comply with wage orders of the state’s Industrial Welfare Commission regulating workplace conditions.

Vermont Hand Wash worker Pedro Guzman said:

"We have suffered retaliation and intimidation by the owner, Benny Pirian. He took us into his office and interrogated us about our union activities. And he even offered to compensate me if I would work on his side against the union and my companeros. But I would never do that. Our struggle continues with the incredible support from unions, students, faith groups, old people, and young people, all of them willing to come out and sweat under the sun to show us their solidarity."

Sweeney told the crowd the car wash workers’ struggle is a perfect example of why the Employee Free Choice Act is needed. (Molly Note- the official unions in the USA seem to always promote the Employee Free Choice Act as the be all and end all salvation of the American labour movement. I think that an objective comparison to the civilized world in which similar legislation is in place shows that it hardly reduces the difficulty of organizing by any significant amount.)

"These workers have gone through hell trying to form a union to win just living standards.
No worker should face that treatment in this country we share. In America, every worker should enjoy freedom of speech and freedom of association.

In America, every corporation should be held accountable to the law. In America, every worker should be free to join a union and bargain for a better life."

Last year, the mostly immigrant car wash workers throughout Los Angeles formed the Carwash Workers Organizing Committee (CWOC) of the United Steelworkers (USW) to raise their standard of living, secure basic workplace protections and address the serious environmental and safety hazards in their industry.

The National Labor Relations Board (NLRB) also issued a complaint in June alleging that Vermont’s management targeted and then fired three workers because of their organizing activities.

Rep. Judy Chu (D-Calif.) reminded the audience the state’s Car Wash Worker law, passed in 2003, is set to expire this year if it is not reauthorized by the legislature. The law requires all car wash operators to register with the state as a means to promote good labor practices. Chu, who helped pass the law as a member of the state assembly, called on California regulators to reauthorize and fully enforce the law. (Time for another Molly Note here. If this law was so effective then why didn't it prevent the present abuses at the Vermont hand Wash ?????. This seems like rather special pleading to me. Is legislation some magic answer ?)

The effort to gain justice for the “carwasheros” is being led by CLEAN, a coalition of more than 130 organizations, including labor unions, immigrant rights organizations and environmental and worker health and safety advocates, working to improve working conditions in the car wash industry.

Huerta said the tragedy is that although the Pirians are among the worst offenders we have encountered in the industry, they are not alone.

The exploitative treatment of workers is rampant throughout this industry. Carwashes are simply sweatshops operating in plain site.

But with support from unions and the community, carwash workers from across the city are building a union and building a movement—for respect, dignity, and fairness on the job.

INTERNATIONAL ANARCHIST MOVEMENT:

NORTH AMERICAN TOUR OF ISRAELI ANARCHIST:

The fighting in Gaza is hopefully coming to a halt, but the continuing oppression of the Palestinians in Gaza and the West Bank continues. For years now the Anarchists Against the Wall group has been working with others, both Israeli and Palestinians, against the more oppressive aspects of the occupation. An Israeli activist from AAtW is soon to begin a North American tour to both rise public awareness and to gather funds for the legal costs involved in what the group does. Here is the announcement from the A-Infos website.

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Israeli Anarchist tours North America:

A member of [the Israeli] Anarchists Against the Wall (AATW), Shachaf Polakow, will be embarking on a speaking-tour in the US and Canada, from Feb 1st to March 9th, in order to raise money for the mounting legal costs of our activities. The funds are more desperately needed now, as an internal assault on dissidents is waged by the state these days, along with its assault on Gaza.Detailed information on dates and locations will follow soon.

---- for more information please contact aatwtour@gmail.com

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And here's the announcement of the first stop of the tour.

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US, Beware - Anarchist Against the Wall Speaks in L.A.

Sunday, February 1; 7 PM

Shachaf Polakow, representing [Israeli] Anarchists Against the Wall (AATW) will speak and present films on the Anarchists' struggle against the separation wall. Working with Palestinians AATW members have put their safety on the line by physically and non-violently opposing the bulldozers, the army, and the occupation.

Levantine Cultural Center studio,

5998 W. Pico Blvd,

Los Angeles (street parking available)

Requested donation $10-$20 to support AATW's work, especially legal support for both Palestinian and Israeli activists who are arrested and charged in the course of the struggle.

Sponsored by LA Jews for Peace and the American Friends Service Committee