While all of the Democratic candidates voted in favor of the Employee Free Choice Act, we all know by now (or should) that the EFCA was squelched at the President’s desk. As we go forward into 2008 and closer to a new administration, it is critical to keep the EFCA on everyone’s radar. A case-in-point reasoning for this is a current events item out of Kingsport, Tennessee.
Kingsport is home-base for a company called the Tennessee Commercial Warehouse (TCW), which fired 33 workers the other day in retaliation to the employees exercising their legal right to join a union. An overwhelming majority of the TCW workers had signed authorization cards with Teamsters Local 549 in Blountville, Tennessee to retain the union as their bargaining representative.
In October 2007 the drivers from TCW approached the local union for assistance in addressing issues they encountered in the workplace. The company was constantly making payroll errors and altering the wage structure with little or no notice to the workers. Insult to injury with this company was around the very expensive and largely insufficient health insurance that continued to rise in cost but not in quality, go figure.
"TCW’s actions are sickening," said Teamsters General President Jim Hoffa. "This is yet another example of how the deck is stacked against workers seeking union representation in this country. The laws are heavily weighted in the employer’s favor, giving anti-union companies the ability to coerce, intimidate, and in extreme cases like this, eliminate anyone who wants to form a union," President Hoffa added.
To rest assured, TCW staged a very aggressive anti-union campaign against these workers, "but the drivers stood strong," said Scot Armstrong, President of Teamsters Local 549. "Nearly 80 percent of the drivers had signed authorization cards, so the company permanently laid off the entire unit rather than bargain for fair pay and benefits," President Armstrong added.
This company is not hurting, mind you. "Before we got laid off, the company had us working six days a week and was giving us job applications to pass along to other commercial drivers we knew because they couldn’t keep up with the volume," said Tony Davenport, a former driver who had worked at TCW for more than three years. "Now they have hired independent contractors and shifted work to another trucking company to make up for the layoffs," Mr. Davenport added.
Over the next day or two The Teamsters will have a take action link set up around this issue. Our first and foremost goal is to have these workers reinstated at the jobs that they love and do very well. Following that, we will proceed with the organizing campaign for the workers to have the needed representation that they requested.