Statement on the Southern California Grocery strike by Labors Militant Voice

Labor's Militant Voice Statement on Grocery Strike

On the day that the grocery contract was accepted by the rank and file, a striker left a calmly spoken message on the answering machine of a strike supporter in Oakland. He said:


Hey Richard,
This is B. I apologize, I'm so sorry for what this contract gave us. I didn't vote for it. I didn't like it. I've said my piece. But, uh, I guess a lot of people were broken down or whatever.
I feel that the company won. I feel that the union didn't fight hard enough. But I definitely voiced my opinion at the meeting. So I guess I got to go with the flow.
But I apologize for anybody else who is going to have their contract coming up. Thank you for the coffee. Thank you for the encouragement. And thank you for being on my side.
Take care, Rich.
'Bye.


This brother, and all the other strikers, have nothing to apologize for. They stayed out for nearly five months. Hundreds of them lost their homes. Others had to turn to such measures as pawning basic items like computers. One striker reported that he was sleeping in his car with his girlfriend. Another reported that his home had been repossessed and he and his wife and children were forced to move in with his mother. Despite these enormous hardships, very very few allowed themselves to be starved into returning to work.
It must be said at this point that their resolve and determination was not matched by the union leadership - both that of the UFCW as well as the rest of the AFL-CIO.


This strike was crucial for all workers. For the first time, a major employer was seeking to effectively deny affordable health care to employees covered by a major contract. This, in other words, was one of the main the opening salvos in the corporate drive to make workers pay for the escalating costs of health care in the United States.


Union “Fact Sheet”
The union leadership distributed a “Fact Sheet” on the new contract which paints everything in a rosy light. It claimed that “All seven California UFCW locals unanimously recommend a ‘YES’ vote on proposed contract.” This despite the fact that the locals had not had time to meet and consider it. What they probably meant was that the leadership of the locals supported it - something entirely different.


Nevertheless, it does appear from the “Fact Sheet” that the employers did not achieve everything that they had originally demanded. This is almost always the case; the employers make pie-in-the-sky demands, knowing that they will not win it all. Then they accept somewhat lesser cuts, which also serves to help the official leadership look better, as if their policies had helped save something.


New Contract
Some of the main points of the new contract that are clear. The main hit is taken by the new hires who will:
*accrue pension credits at 35% of the rate of present employees and will receive 65% less.
*work under a vastly reduced, second-tier wage- as low as $8.90 per hour starting pay for Food Clerk



In addition there are further concessions:
*The new contract will allow increased use of outside vendors to stock stores.
*The new contract changes some work from “grocery clerk” classification to “general merchandise” classification (which is at a lower pay rate).
*There are again no raises in this contract.
*Current employees receive 35% cut in pension benefits.


One side issue that those outside the industry should realize is that although the number of hours are supposed to be assigned by seniority, the work times are up to management. Thus, managers pets (as well as lower paid new hires) can be assigned the better hours while others will get late night hours, etc. In addition, management is free to train whomever they like; it is not done by seniority. Thus they can give training to lower paid new hires and then when work is required for this type of work, it will go to the new hire over the longer term worker who is paid more, but hasn’t had the “training” for this work. This will be a way of cutting the total wages paid also.


As one striker put it, this contract “sold out the new hires, which will screw the current part timers.”


Grocery workers in Southern California haven’t had a pay raise in close to ten years. All the money was supposedly going to pay for increased health care costs. Now, they are having to pay for those increased costs.


Outcome a Result of Failed Strategy
Why was this strike unable to ward of these concessions? Was it simply that the leadership crumbled, or were these concessions the inevitable result of a failed strike strategy?


It is true that the union leadership failed to do some of the most simple things. For instance, the leaflet they had pickets distribute in Northern California did not change over the course of the strike. This leaflet was not effective; it was just a reprint of a letter from a US congressman. It didn’t deal with the issues as they arose. The leadership also failed to act on a key opportunity. At a rally for striking workers, a speaker from ILWU Local 10 said that if the UFCW were to picket the ships bringing supplies to Safeway (and, by extension also Albertson), then the Union workers would honor those lines and would not unload those ships. This would have put a massive hit on the grocery chains’ supplies. But this offer went ignored for the duration of the strike.


In addition, there was the issue of financial support for strikers. As an example of what would have been possible, three people in the San Francisco Bay area organized a support meeting at which over $2000 was collected. If these three people could do this, it does not take much to imagine how much could have been raised on a weekly basis through regular appeals at union locals, work places, etc. In this way, the worst of the financial hardships could have been significantly eased.


It was not realistic to think that one individual, Steve Burd of Safeway, was responsible for this entire battle. The stores were all in this together, including sharing profits. Yet no strategy was put in place for seriously going after all of them.


From the outset the Union leadership used the same strategy as they used in other struggles, such as Greyhound, Staley, Hormel, Detroit newspaper strike, and others. This includes the ILWU longshore contract dispute of two years ago. This strategy amounts to limiting the struggle, ensuring that the Union will not confront the courts or any other arm of the government, and ensuring that at the end of the day the entire struggle can be controlled. In all these cases, the union leaderships relied on the “reasonableness” and “good will” of a wing of the employers as well as their representatives in the Democratic Party.


Workers Must “Compete”
Throughout the country, and in fact globally, the corporations cry that they must have help in competing. What this inevitably means is that workers in one country, or of one sector of employers, must compete with other workers for who will work cheapest. Inevitably, the union leadership has accepted this argument in principle.


In this particular case, the grocery chains said that they needed to be in a position to compete with WalMart. The southern California grocery chains are not in general in competition with WalMart because WalMart doesn’t generally carry groceries there. However, this factor cannot be totally ignored. Wherever a different sector of the same industry (retail in this case) gets vastly lower wages, it is a threat to all workers in the industry. In the last analysis, it is not possible to win and to keep first class wages and benefits in the unionized chains when the likes of WalMart remain non-union and at vastly lower wages. But the union leadership in general has yet to put forward a serious, militant campaign to organize the unorganized and help them raise their pay to the level of the organized workers. As a result, there is a strong trend to drive down the unionized workers’ wages to the lower levels instead.


How the Strike Could Have Won - Methods of the 1930s
It must be stressed that it is extremely difficult to defeat nation-wide companies like these major grocery chains on a regional basis. In other words, it would have been necessary to shut down these chains nation-wide. Instead of this, the union leadership instituted a consumer boycott against just one of these chains - Safeway.


A key weakness in this struggle was that the Union leadership expected shoppers to honor a picket line at Safeway while the union workers inside the stores continued working. Many customers commented on this in one way or another. The leadership claimed that this was because these workers would be fired if they honored the picket line.
Admittedly, this may have been a potential threat. However, if the union simply gives up every time a problem arises, then there is little reason to even have a union. Spreading the struggle and building mass support and mass pickets could have prevented workers from getting fired.
How could this have been done?

Healthcare for All
This goes to another issue: Many shoppers crossed the lines in Northern California saying that they, too, had to pay large amounts for their health care. Others said that they didn’t have any health care at all. The union leadership did not deal with this issue. What they should have done, together with the rest of the AFL-CIO, was to announce a nation-wide campaign for guaranteed, free health care for all. They should have announced that this strike was just the first blow in this battle. In this way, other workers (shoppers) could have seen how this strike was directly in their interests.


A massive publicity campaign could have been developed, with ads on tv and radio. Flyers could have been carried into every working class community, into every work place and union hall, into the high schools and junior colleges and colleges. They could have explained how this strike was part of a struggle to ensure decent, free health care for all. On this basis, mass pickets could have been organized at these chains nation-wide. These pickets could have been included the workers inside the stores and under these conditions the chains would not have dared consider firing them.


In fact, such mass pickets could have gone even further: They could have taken the protests inside the stores.


These were the methods of the 1930s - the mass pickets, the work place occupations, the refusal to bow down to court orders and the police. These were the methods that worked then and would work now.


Perspectives
It is most likely that many of the strikers will feel somewhat disheartened after this struggle. However, this will not last forever. At the same time, there is a new, increasingly anti-corporate mood sweeping the country. It is impossible to say when and where this mood will make itself felt next. Later this year workers at these same grocery chains in other parts of California will be facing new contracts. Who knows what sorts of battles will erupt there?
The other aspect to be considered is that there appears to be a new mood developing within the unions. This is a mood of increased impatience with the conservative, timid leadership and their policies. Up until now, that mood has been kept in check by a feeling that nothing can be done about the policies of the leadership. At some point, this will change into a determination to find something to do about it.


Where We Go From Here
It should be pointed out that the last time that a rebellion in the ranks of the unions took on a mass scale was in the 1930s. At that time, several large anti-capitalist forces had a mass base among US workers, including a sector of the union membership. These forces played the key role in helping the rank and file to organize to transform the unions, especially in the break from narrow, craft unionism and the building of the industrial unions. It is vital that today’s anti-capitalist movement come together to help a similar rebellion.


A first step would be holding public forums on the lessons of this strike. From there, the aim should be to build groups of anti-capitalists and union militants to start the difficult task of organizing from within - organizing to change the unions. An important start should be attempting to make contact with northern California grocery workers to help them organize and prepare for their upcoming contract. Although the focus would probably be primarily on fighting to transform the existing unions, actions outside the existing unions cannot be ruled out. This could include wildcat strikes.


A Fighting Program
The unions should be fighting for:


*A minimum pay in all contracts of $15 per hour.
*Fully paid health care for all workers and retirees.
*Full pension (including benefits) after a maximum 25 years.
*Minimum four weeks fully paid vacation.
*A 32 hour work week with no loss in pay.
*A crash campaign to organize the unorganized around these same demands.

With the massive increase in productivity of US workers, the massive increase in wealth of the richest ten percent of the population, the massive profits the corporations get, these demands are possible. The unions should produce fliers and advertisements with the facts and figures showing what workers should be fighting for.


In order to win these demands, it must be made clear that the unions will have to return to the methods of the ‘30s. This would necessitate a break with the Democratic Party. In order to do so effectively, workers will insist that there be an alternative - in other words, the building of a mass, radical party based on the working class and their unions.


Global Capitalism
A campaign to transform the unions must also take into account that we are living in the era of “global capitalism”. It is no longer possible to win and keep decent wages and conditions when workers around the world are suffering under starvation pay. The labor movement in this country must unite with workers internationally to raise wages and conditions around the world. This cannot be done as long as the labor movement here supports US corporate-controlled foreign policy. (The latest example of this is the events in Haiti.)


This cannot be done on the basis of accepting the dictatorship of capital and the “free market” - in other words, global capitalism. As long as we accept this, we must accept that we have to compete for jobs, which means the “race to the bottom.” A powerful, international working class movement would have to reject this and fight for an economic system in which capital and investment is socially controlled, under the democratic decision-making of the workers themselves.


In addition, there needs to be some fundamental changes in how the unions operate. This movement to transform the unions must insist that all officials be elected by those workers they represent and that they be paid the same average wage as those they represent. It should also make clear that it is not possible to fight for these changes from within the existing union establishment. In other words, those who want to be part of such a campaign cannot seek or accept staff positions in this establishment.


In this way we can learn the lessons of and build on the grocery strike. In this way, the suffering and the sacrifices of the striking grocery workers - and that of the tens of thousands and millions who came before them - will not have been in vain.