Submitted by Jason Willoughby
On Oct. 3, thousands of academic student employees throughout
the University of California system ““ members of United Auto
Workers Local 2865 ““ engaged in a one-day unfair labor
practice strike to protest what they say is the UC’s
continuing pattern of unproductive, uncooperative and unlawful
behavior in contract negotiations. UAW Local 2865 has filed 64
unfair labor practice charges against the UC. The charges detail
numerous examples of the university’s efforts to stall
negotiations and prevent the parties from reaching settlements by
not meeting its legal obligation to bargain in good faith. Sadly,
the ASEs’ protests are echoed by the experience of the entire
labor movement at the university.
For decades, the UC has been known as the most anti-union public
employer west of the Rockies. It fought the unionization of ASEs
for over 15 years. When recognized unions do come to the bargaining
table to negotiate contracts, the university bargaining team
responds time and time again with unfair labor practices such as
stalling, refusing to provide the union with information necessary
for bargaining, making regressive proposals and sending people to
the bargaining table without authority to negotiate.
The UC has also repeatedly tried to undermine the strength of
unions by attempting to implement unilateral changes in
employees’ working conditions and otherwise striving to
bypass the union.
Three years ago, however, then-UC President Richard Atkinson
promised the California Legislature and the UC community that, from
then on, there would be a “new day” of productive and
cooperative labor relations at the UC. The period since Atkinson
made this promise, unfortunately, has been marred by increasing
labor unrest. In the past three years, there have been four unfair
labor practice strikes and two threatened unfair labor practice
strikes at the UC, involving a total of four unions ““ the
Coalition of University Employees, the University Council ““
American Federation of Teachers, the California Nurses Association
and the UAW ““ collectively representing 40,000 workers, or 60
percent of the unionized workforce at the UC. These strikes to
protest the UC’s unlawful behavior were very disruptive to
the campuses and to students’ educations.
In addition to these four strikes, related sympathy strikes and
support actions undertaken by a total of six unions ““ CUE,
UC-AFT, UAW, CNA, the American Federation of State, County and
Municipal Employees and the University Professional and Technical
Employees ““ have added to the disruption. These unions
collectively represent over 60,000 workers, or 90 percent of the
unionized workforce at the UC.
In recent months, the UC’s response to this labor unrest
has not been to improve its labor relations practices, but rather
to try to limit the right of unions and their members to protest
the UC’s bad labor practices. At the beginning of 2003, five
unions (CUE, CNA, UAW, UPTE/CWA and UC-AFT), collectively
representing over 50,000 workers, or 75 percent of the unionized
workforce at the UC, had virtually identical contract language that
did not prohibit the right to honor other unions’ picket
lines. In May 2003, however, the UC succeeded in forcing the
AFT-represented lecturers to agree to contract language
surrendering the right to engage in sympathy strikes. Then, in
September 2003, the UC forced the AFT-represented librarians to
similarly surrender their right to honor other unions’ picket
lines. Notably, the lecturers and the librarians were the two
smallest bargaining units with contract language that did not
prohibit sympathy strikes.
The next step in the UC’s campaign to remedy its labor
relations problems was the university’s recent attempt to
condition settlement of the UAW contracts, changing its contract
language to explicitly surrender the right to engage in sympathy
strikes. What the UC didn’t anticipate, however, was that the
UAW and the other unions at the UC would stand firm in defense of
cross-union solidarity.
As a strategy to maintain labor peace, demanding that unions and
their members surrender the right to protest unlawful treatment of
other unions and workers does not work. Fundamentally, the idea
that one can achieve peace through the suppression of rights is
fool’s gold. Any respite from unrest gained through such
tactics is doomed to be temporary, since it does not address the
root cause of the unrest. With such an approach, the UC clearly
cannot maintain labor peace, and even contributes to the likelihood
of the recurrence of disturbance. This strategy is simply bad
public policy and bad labor relations.
The UC must quit its present path. It needs to truly improve its
labor relations and desist from committing unfair labor practices.
It also needs to leave the current “no strikes/no
lockout” language in the UAW, CUE, CNA and UPTE/CWA
agreements as is and meet with the UAW to settle the contracts
immediately. To do otherwise risks further unrest.
Written by Daniel K. Lawson, President, UAW Local 2865;
Claudia Horning, President, Coalition of University Employees;
Deborah Burger, President, California Nurses Association; LaKeisha
Harrison, President, AFSCME Local 3299; Jelger Kalmijn, President,
UPTE/CWA Local 9119.