'The Whole World Is Watching' German Telecom Strike

by James Parks, AFL-CIO (reposted)

Mon, Jun 11, 2007 6:15PM

Monday, June 11, 2007 : More than 70 workers spent their lunch hour sending a message to one of the world's biggest telecom companies and the German government: injustice to German workers is an injustice to all of us. The workers marched in the hot Washington, D.C., summer sun at the German Embassy in support of striking workers at the German telecom giant Deutsche Telekom (DT).

Members of the German union Ver.di went on strike at DT on May 11 in a series of rolling walkouts. The union says that DT has lost 350,000 employee-days since the strike began. DT’s management announced in October that it will transfer 20 percent of its global workforce (some 50,000 workers) to a new service unit called T-Service. Among other things, the company wants to cut these workers’ pay by 9 percent and increase their work hours from 34 to 38 hours per week.

Labour Start reports the company is planning to make a revised offer to workers that would include a one-time payment for each worker in 2011 if financial and customer-service goals are met in 2010. Blomberg News reports the union’s wage council will meet tomorrow to discuss Deutsche Telekom’s revised offer and determine whether to resume negotiations

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For more information: http://blog.aflcio.org/2007/06/11/the-whol...

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