Not to steal the thunder from those who won the lawsuit. But consider the fact that that the furloughs were at first an illegal lockout which violated the no strike no lockout clause of the state workers contracts. Consider that the negotiators for SEIU 1000, in the last year of Schwartezenner, then signed a contract which accepted the furloughs while CAPS did not, thus after Jerry Brown was elected with the assistance of all the state workers organizations the SEIU 1000 workers were no longer illegally locked out but the BU 10 workers were. Brown thus extened the illegal lockout until BU 10 finally submitted and signed a contract essentially the same as the SEIU 1000 contract, and thus lealized the lockout by accepting it contractually. Yet when the agreed upon furloughs were to end, Brown continued his vinctive practices against the very workers extending the furloughs two days longer for engineers and scinetists whose organizational leaderships continued to pour money and resources into Browns campaigns. Today the usurpers of BU 9 & 10 workers dues are polishing their fingernails on their lapels and backslaping over this victory, and indeed the enginners and scientists are glad to get the back pay from the illegal lockout. But that does nothing to make up for the 15% cut in pay all state workers took for close to 3 years. Nor does it make up for the fact that since the end of the furloughs the new contracts do nothing to catch workers up to their purchasing power from 15 years ago. Nor do the current contracts make up for the increases in pension contributions charged against the workers which are needed because the employeer took contribution holidays during the fat years, or the increased costs to our medical plan options. The lawyers engaged by the labor consultants at Blanning and Baker will take credit, but this was low hanging fruit, the fact that th governor refused to appeal has more to do with the evidence than with any strong lawyering, or the ongoing campaign of bootlicking of the politicians by the CAPS and PECGs leadership. For workers to gain decent contracts, win COLAS an catch up to what as stolen from them during the imposition of the austerity by the agents (the Dem and Repu politicians) of the 1% (the capitalists) we will have to create class struggle unions that use class struggle methods, do not rely on the courts, the lobbyists or the politicians and instead develop a transitional program that unites all sectors of the workers and oppressed around demands and actions for our concrete needs to be met at the expense of the capitaists. When scientists and engineers and nurses and teachers fight for Jobs For All and massive public workes programs by instituting 30 hours work for 40 hours pay, when they fight to nationalize the hazardous, energy, extraction, refining and distrubiton industry from the capitalists without compesation to the big shareholders and run under worker community control, then the public workers will gain the street credibility to gain the broadest working class support so that they can have decent contracts. But stuck as they are today, licking the boots of the 1% the public workers organizations leaderships limit the workers ability to catch up from what has been taken.
Posted on: Thu, 23 Oct 2014 15:52:39 +0000
Trending Topics
Recently Viewed Topics
© 2015