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Vol. 71/No. 47      December 17, 2007

 
On the Picket Line
 
Broadway stagehands return to
work after 19-day strike
NEW YORK, November 30—After shutting down Broadway for two and a half weeks during the height of the holiday season, striking stagehands returned to work yesterday. They are set to vote on a contract December 9. The members of the International Alliance of Theatrical Stage Employees (IATSE) Local 1 went on strike November 10 in the face of sweeping concessions demanded by the bosses’ association, the League of American Theaters and Producers. The League had amassed a $20 million fund in anticipation of the strike.

Union officials would not comment on the details of the proposed pact. According to the Associated Press, the contract includes some of the work-rule concessions that were at the center of the employers’ drive. It also reportedly includes a higher wage increase than the original offer.

—Paul Pederson

Auto workers strike Ford
in St. Petersburg, Russia
November 30—Hundreds of auto workers have been picketing a Ford plant near St. Petersburg, Russia, since 1,500 walked out November 20. The workers are demanding the shortening of the night shift from 7.5 hours to 6.5 hours and a 30 percent wage increase to keep pace with soaring inflation.

“Month after month, workers see their monthly take-home pay eaten away by high prices for goods and services,” Sergei Khramov, chairman of the independent labor federation SotsProf, told the International Herald Tribune. Annual inflation in Russia is expected to reach 11 percent this year. The central bank estimates that the price of bread has increased by 22.7 percent.Workers at the Ford plant won 14 to 20 percent wage increases after a one-day strike in February.

Ford began limited production November 28 using line-crossers. The pickets countered by getting the vehicle identification numbers of the cars produced during the strike and publicizing them.

A St. Petersburg car dealer told the Itar-Tass news agency that prospective buyers “have already phoned, saying they did not want to purchase cars assembled during the strike.”

—Paul Pederson

Steelworkers in Delaware
resist company lockout
YORKLYN, Delaware—Members of United Steelworkers Local 4-770 have been picketing the National Vulcanized Fibre plant here since they were locked out October 19. The company shut down production at the plant without giving the required 90-day notice and stopped paying into the state workers compensation fund, workers say. According to the Delaware News Journal, the company—which manufactures rubber-coated fiber used in electronics, helmets, and many other products—shrank from a workforce of 1,800 in the 1960s to several dozen workers today.

—K.B. Inglee  
 
 
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