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Declaring that its negotiations with the National Association of Broadcast Employees and Technicians (NABET) were at an "impasse," Disney-owned ABC-TV is imposing its own contract terms on its 2,400 employees in five major cities. The new terms include an increase from 14 percent to 26 percent in the number of daily hires for its work force. The union had opposed the increase of daily hires as a way to eliminate full-time employees, but ABC claimed it needed greater flexibility in its operations.
ABC will also reduce its contributions to the pension fund because it says it is more than adequately funded. It plans to introduce a new health plan for its NABET employees in the near future. It is the lack of information about the health plan that caused NABET to stage a one-day work stoppage, which led the company to respond with a lockout that remained in effect for 10 weeks.
In early February, NABET members voted on the company's "best and final offer," which had the recommendation of Morton Bahr, president of NABET's parent union, the Communications Workers of America. Seven small units voted to accept the contract, but five others, including one with 1,800 members, turned it down. Since the ratification vote, there have been no face-to-face meetings between union and company negotiators.
Under the company's unilaterally-imposed agreement, the five units that voted against the contract will receive harsher terms than those who voted to accept it. An ABC spokeswoman said they will not receive the wage increases totaling 13 percent over the four-year contract that the others will get.
The CWA is considering filing an unfair labor practice charge with the National Labor Relations Board, claiming that ABC had no right to declare an impasse because the union was prepared to continue negotiating.
Crown Oil Lockout, Union Boycott Go On The struggle began on Feb. 5, 1996, when the management of Crown Central Petroleum ordered its 252 unionized workers to leave its refinery in Pasadena, Texas and replaced them the next day with low-cost, inexperienced temporary workers. Three years and a couple of months later, the struggle continues with the Paper, Allied-Industrial Chemical and Energy Workers (PACE) expanding its nationwide boycott campaign to force Crown to end the lockout and rehire a union work force. Crown's CEO and majority stockholder, Henry Rosenberg, Jr., said sabotage by workers was a cause of the lockout; yet a subsequent investigation by the National Labor Relations Board found no evidence of destructive behavior. Hardly a week later, Rosenberg was willing to end the lockout and rehire the workers he had accused of sabotage if they would accept his terms, which included a 40 percent cut in the work force, the right to unlimited subcontracting of jobs formerly done in-house by skilled workers, and the end of the union's seniority system. Of course, it was unacceptable to the union, PACE Local 4-227. Crown Petroleum has a reputation as one of the most poorly-run companies in the industry. In one five-year period, Crown lost $132 million. Rosenberg tried to blame the company's losses on the work force, even though a week before the lockout, they had been awarded 22 commendations for setting production records and reducing costs. Crown's management is not only anti-union. Its behavior has also enraged civil rights advocates, women's groups and environmentalists. In June 1997, eight African-American employees filed a class-action suit against Crown, charging the company with a series of acts of harassment and discrimination. Crown's Pasadena refinery is one of the major polluters in the region. The AFL-CIO has taken up the cause of the locked-out oil workers and has urged the public not to patronize Crown, Zippy Mart and Fast Fare gas stations and convenience stores. The boycott has cut so deeply into Crown's sales and revenue that it reportedly has hired investment bankers to seek out buyers for its refining and marketing business. Only 34 Major Work Stoppages in 1998 There were 34 work stoppages affecting 1,000 or more workers last year, involving 387,000 workers and resulting in the loss of 5.1 million workdays, the Bureau of Labor Statistics reported. This compares with the record low number of 29 work stoppages that occurred in 1997. The United Auto Workers' strike against General Motors involved 152,000 workers, by far the largest of the year's work stoppages. The strike resulted in 3.3 million lost work days. The second largest work stoppage was the Communications Workers of America strike against U.S. West Corp., which caused 340,000 idle work days. Thirty of the 34 work stoppages were in the private sector and the remainder in state and local governments, the BLS said. In the private sector, the number was equally split between manufacturing and non-manufacturing industries. Of the 15 stoppages in manufacturing, seven were in two industries: industrial machinery and transportation equipment. In non-manufacturing, stoppages occurred in construction, broadcasting and telecommunications and health-care services. Average length of the 1998 work stoppages was 28 days, but a majority lasted two weeks or less. Only 12 percent continued for 60 days or more.
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