Quality assurance workers won a vote for union recognition in the spring of 2002 and are still fighting for their first contract. The production workers in the plant lost votes for union representation by United Food and Commercial Workers (UFCW) Local 1996 in the spring of 2002 and 2003. The recent election was hotly contested and saw the union lose by a whisker—only 16 votes, said Pace.

“I am not fighting for myself, and we don’t plan on waiting,” Pace said. “In fact, the union met the day after the last election to keep the pressure on and get ready for a new contest.”

Pace and other union fighters recently won a round against the company. When he reported for work at the conclusion of a three-day suspension, the bosses said that their investigation was not complete. “I knew I wasn’t guilty of anything—they were trying to get me out of the plant,” Pace said. “But with the union, I fought to get my job and after seven days I won.”

The quality assurance workers’ request for unionization was challenged by the company, which claimed that their jobs made them not workers, but “management support,” said Pace. He testified in the case of the 21 workers before the National Labor Relations Board last year. Workers here are fighting for a union in response to indiscriminate firings, increased line speed, timing of bathroom breaks, long hours, seven-day workweeks, a draconian attendance policy, and other abuses. “The company said that when the union lost, we would get a raise,” said a union activist who requested that her name not be used. “Now they are giving us 15 cents more an hour. If you are late, if you miss work, if you don’t scan in and out, you lose the bonus.”

The union effort is picking up support. Willie Head, a vegetable and tobacco farmer in a nearby town, is backing the workers’ struggle. “I worked at the same facility on the kill floor, when it was a Swift plant and when it was union in the late 1970s,” he told the Militant. “I know from personal experience that the question of the union is urgent—whether your fight is to build a union or maintain one,” Head stated. He is the vice president of the People’s Tribunal, which fights against police brutality and around other social questions. “Every day the bosses push against the union, seeking to make it weak,” he said. “Every day the workers must push back. Educating people—not talking at them—but educating makes a difference in the strength of the union which affects the quality of our lives…. After meeting some of the workers at National Beef, I know they can do it”.  
 
 
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