CWA Looks Ahead at Labor Relations 2009
 
Tuesday, 27 January 2009

After reading AT&T’s email message to CWA Members regarding our upcoming labor negotiations, we find this is early even for the company to start singing the blues. I guess we are going to hear more about challenges that face the company (that they still haven’t resolved for the last 100 years) before we even start negotiations. We’ve heard their mantra before, but at least they got one thing right, CEO Randall Stevenson has been talking about our healthcare and how he’d like to chop it up. AT&T Vice President Mark Royce doesn’t mention that he,  along with Mr. Stevenson and the rest of  AT&T Executives have contracts that protect their healthcare whether they are employed or retired, but our healthcare and contract protections are not as important as theirs are. He goes on to say that they provide good salaries and benefits, which I agree they do. What Mr. Royce does not mention is that these wages and benefits were not handed to us; they are due to our years of collective bargaining. Over the years we have fought and sacrificed for decent wages and benefits, we have never received some paternalistic handout from the company. (When was the last time you had an impulse to call Mr. Royce or Mr. Stevenson "Dad"?) Make no mistake about it; this is not a family run business where they are looking out for our best interests. We have our healthcare benefits because we are prepared to fight for them and we are not going to accept crumbs that are swept off the table. If you are still outraged about the voice mail sent to us from AT&T Vice President Mark Royce in August, 2008, like many of the bargaining units still are, you might want to make this point to them: If AT&T is so concerned with the fact that they do not have a "level playing field" with their cable competitors like Comcast, there is a better solution than trying to make CWA members pay in our next Contract – AT&T should take the lead in supporting the Employee Free Choice Act and a plan for health care for all. Do you remember what CEO Stevenson said last year at a club meeting in Texas when he told them his vision of healthcare for employees was…no healthcare for new employees for their first fifteen (15) years of service and then they would receive the same pay for premium healthcare coverage as low level managers. Now AT&T is saying they have to cut back healthcare due to the economic crisis, well they said the same thing last year without an economic crisis. Vice President Royce’s email even advises our members to not be distracted from our work as your Union negotiates a new contract. He goes on to say AT&T will communicate to you about pending labor issues. I believe our CWA Members from across the country will be communicating with AT&T what OUR pending labor issues are and how We are going to obtain them. Don’t buy into the company’s attempt to divide us and use the “pay no attention to the man behind the curtain” tactic, like this is OZ and Mr Royce and Stevenson know what’s best for us. But we don’t think this is this news to anyone.  Let us be clear:  CWA isn't interested in bargaining through one sided emails.  We'll be bringing our members' critical issues to the bargaining table this year and we'll focus on the need for quality, permanent jobs, opportunity in the jobs of the future, and all our other goals --health care and retirement security and all the issues that matter to working families. CWA members are determined to gain a fair contract when negotiations
get underway this year, a contract that reflects AT&T's profitability as the number one telecom company in local phone and long distance, broadband and wireless services and the value that we bring to AT&T. We recognize the fact that AT&T doesn't deny employees their bargaining rights; we know that many companies do.  But that also
means that AT&T reaps the benefit of union members who are committed to providing the quality service that has made AT&T one of the most successful companies in the world. We know that competition exists in our industry, whether from cable companies or other telecom companies.  AT&T isn't alone in that. Communications Workers of America members are looking forward to bargaining new contracts this year and will not be intimidated or frightened by company propaganda in emails.  Mobilization is gearing up in all our districts.  Members are wearing red on Thursdays with renewed determination and participating in our mobilization programs. We are 170,000 CWA-strong and together we will win the contract we deserve. One Union, One Fight, One Future.

In Unity There Is Strength,
Roy Hegenbart
President
CWA Local 3250