Wednesday, July 07, 2004
Our story thus far...
As a member of the Negotiations Team, I was more than happy to tell our members to reject the first and second offer, as those decisions were "no cost" to them. The first rejection showed the company that there were more of their employees who didn't like the offer than just we five on the Team. The second rejection let us go back with the weapon of The Threat of a Strike.
But now the Negotiation Team has gone as far as we can and have come to the place where our coworkers need to decide for themselves if our strike authorization vote was to bluff the company into offering more or was it an action that we’re willing to carry out. Thatwill be today’s vote: Yes, to accept the contract, or No, to strike on Thursday.
Now, the Negotiations Team will answer all the questions about the content of the contract and tell the folks what could happen with acceptance or rejection. But the decision to strike or not is the membership’s, as each of us decides whether or not we'd support, honor, or ignore a strike. The Team will tell the audience, one way or the other, what the contract MEANS, but we won't tell ‘em how to vote it. (But we’ll definitely tell ‘em that we’ll need to strike if we want more than the offer, because sending us back to talk without the walk won't do a freakin’ thing...)
What this Negotiation Team member can recommend is that we should behave as a Union and fully support the majority decision that's made, whichever it is: if we accept the offer, we should all work as hard as we can to respect and enforce the contract; if we vote to reject and strike, we should all walk and shut the place down.
-- Bill, who’ll be voting the latter...
But now the Negotiation Team has gone as far as we can and have come to the place where our coworkers need to decide for themselves if our strike authorization vote was to bluff the company into offering more or was it an action that we’re willing to carry out. Thatwill be today’s vote: Yes, to accept the contract, or No, to strike on Thursday.
Now, the Negotiations Team will answer all the questions about the content of the contract and tell the folks what could happen with acceptance or rejection. But the decision to strike or not is the membership’s, as each of us decides whether or not we'd support, honor, or ignore a strike. The Team will tell the audience, one way or the other, what the contract MEANS, but we won't tell ‘em how to vote it. (But we’ll definitely tell ‘em that we’ll need to strike if we want more than the offer, because sending us back to talk without the walk won't do a freakin’ thing...)
What this Negotiation Team member can recommend is that we should behave as a Union and fully support the majority decision that's made, whichever it is: if we accept the offer, we should all work as hard as we can to respect and enforce the contract; if we vote to reject and strike, we should all walk and shut the place down.
-- Bill, who’ll be voting the latter...
