Unions?

[DanaC]

My experience of unions is rather mixed.

True story:

Mum went into nursing in her mid-30s. She went through nursing college and was about a month away from her final exams when she was posted to a 'medium dependency' recovery ward. Whilst there she was instructed by the ward Sister to help a patient out of her bed. Mum asked for help in lifting the patient, who was very overweight and required a lot of lifting. The Sister told her she didn't need a second person for lifting, as the patient was not high dependency and theregfore should be able to do some of the moving herself, with some assistance.

Unfortunately, as became clear later on, this woman was only on the medium dependency recovery ward because the high dependency ward was full. The woman needed full on lifting. Mum tried asking the sister a second time for assistance and was basically told she was making a big deal out of nothing, stop making a fuss and go do her job.

In trying to lift the patient, mum injured her back very badly. She spent several moths in hospital, and a good deal of that in traction. She has suffered back pains ever since and for a long time her movement was restricted.

She was unable to complete her nursing training, and for many years was only able to manage part-time work. Though she continued to work in a hospital setting (as a phlebotomist) her nursing career was over and her earnings never amounted to what they would have had she been able to pursue the career she loved and had worked damned hard to enter.

She was advised by her union that she should try for compensation. Since the accident was to a large extent a result of mismanagement on the part of her immediate superior, she had a strong case. She could not have afforded the legal fees involved in taking such action without the union's assistance. They provided the solicitor.

Unfortunately, her case dragged on for years. Every so often a new solicitor wuold be put on her case and it would all start up again. The hospital conveniently mislaid records and reassigned the Sister. Each time the case moved forward the hospital would insist on further medicals to try and show that she was no longer suffering. Each set of medicals would show that she had permamently damaged her back.

The union mismanaged her case. It took 13 years before it was finally heard. he hospital engaged in underhand tactics. We are fairly sure that those of her colleagues who'd been nearby and overheard the Sister had been persuaded not to talk.

Eventually she was awarded £27,000 compensation, for her lost career after 13 years.

Now, on the one hand, i see here a failing of the union. It shouldn't have taken 13 years. They shouldn't have kept pushing her from one solicitor to another. They shouldn't have been so lax.

On the other hand, Mum would never have had any compensation had there been no union solicitor working on her behalf.

[DanaC]

Any large organisation that has been around long enough to become an institution is going to have problems of that nature.

I actually think that unions are most necessary for the more fragmented workforces, as opposed to the larger factory workforces. It is precisely the kinds of workers who aren't all lumped together, such as hotel workers and shop assistants who need that protection most. In a factory with hundreds ior thousands of workers, a strike or withdrawal of labour is possible and might be effective in swaying management. Hard to replace a workforce of that size.

If it's just you and three others, then you have no weight at all.

[Fair&Balanced]

Unions have become a recent self-inflicted casualty of their own early success.

They were instrumental in the passage of most workplace safety and employment discrimination laws and played a large role in creating the middle class. But then they got greedy and overreached, particularly in the area of non-wage benefits.

I dont think they are the only way to protect working people, but they still remain the best first line of defense against employer abuses and violations of employment law.

[DanaC]

Yep. Well said Bruce.

[Fair&Balanced]

Big Business, a Tea Partier and Organized Labor are sitting around a table. A dozen cookies arrive on a plate. Big Business takes 11 of them and says to the Tea Partier, "Pssst! That union guy is trying to steal your cookie!"

[DanaC]

Oh that's fucking brilliant! I love it.

[be-bop]

I have been a trade unionist all my working life, I have also been a local and branch rep although these days I'm only an active member.
I've worked in jobs that have had no union representation and jobs that have, and have been a member of three unions and can say any employment without there being union involvement has always been worse for terms and conditions and mangement attitude towards it's workforce.
A union is only as good as it's members, people talk about the union this and the union that but forget that it's not a seperate entity, it's a collective of members and to get the most out of any union you must participate to an extent.
It's no good paying your subs and then moaning "What has the Union done for me".
If you're not happy about something attend meetings,speak up get involved
People that say unions are dead are talking crap, there's more need now for unions than at any time in the last 30 years the way the powers that be have fucked up and governments and employers are looking to strip working people of gained rights in search of bigger and bigger profits.

[be-bop]

"Goodbye unions. Goodbye democracy. Welcome your new money-class overlords".

Now that's a quote
__________________

[TheMercenary]

Goodbye Unions! you should have died a long time ago.

Such a small percent of the work force should not get benefits that the rest of the country has to pay out the ass for... sorry. Pay up.

[be-bop]

[DanaC]

Oh that brought a tear to my eye. Love the Internationale.


Can't have a discussion on unions and not throw in a little Bragg though right?

Between the Wars a mid-80s song that seems truly prophetic now.



And of course: There is Power in a Union:

[monster]

I was leary of the unions in the UK. I grew up with strikes left, right, and center that affected my everyday life when I had done nothing wrong. I never needed one, I felt they had too much power and made the mine situation worse. But they had made sure there was a minimum wage law which was easily enforced with no fear of reprisal from employees. Here in the US, I cannot believe the shit bosses get away with and the crap workers put up with in fear of losing their livelihood. There are laws, but because employment is at will, employers can fire anyone making a formal complaint for no reason and hope that they're too busy looking for another job and too broke to take it further. Which they usually are.

I would not be afraid to make a complaint. I would not be afraid because of my belief in basic worker's rights. That belief was indirectly put there by the unions. They certainly had a place and there was a need for them, I think maybe the day of the old style union is passed, but I think something is needed. Especially here in the US. In the UK, it's is so crowded, it's hard to break the rules without being reported. Here, if a worker is abused in BFE, do they make a noise?

[classicman]

Blame the R's start a thread and whine, but when the D's do a similar thing ...
nary a peep.

Pop quiz: What political party, in what state, this week passed a bill in the dead of night stripping public-sector unions of their collective- bargaining powers? Republicans in Wisconsin? The GOP in Ohio or Indiana?

Try Democrats in Massachusetts. Maybe the debate over public-sector benefits isn't all that ideological after all.

That would be the view of Massachusetts Democratic Speaker Robert A. DeLeo, who late Tuesday led an overwhelming majority of his House in passing a bill divesting policemen, firefighters, teachers and other municipal employees of the power to collectively bargain most health-care benefits. The 111-42 vote took place at 11:30 at night, so as to avoid a mass of protesting union workers set to descend on the State House the next day. The cheek.

The unions, in short, have walked Massachusetts so far into a hole that even Democrats can no longer ignore the problem

Link

Where is your outrage?

[Fair&Balanced]

Originally Posted by classicman

Blame the R's start a thread and whine, but when the D's do a similar thing ...
nary a peep.


Link

Where is your outrage?

Just to be clear, as I understand it, the MA law is limited to bargaining rights for health care benefits unlike WI, which limits bargaining rights for health care, pensions, wages and also requires annual recertification as opposed to recertification each time the contract is renewed (3-5 years).

Given that it does it does not gut the unions to the same extent as WI, I'm disappointed but not outraged. I think I said earlier that unions have overreached and needed to reform and accept some benefit reductions.

[classicman]

Originally Posted by Fair&Balanced

Just to be clear, as I understand it, the MA law is limited to bargaining rights for health care benefits unlike WI, which limits bargaining rights for health care, pensions, wages and also requires annual recertification as opposed to recertification each time the contract is renewed (3-5 years).

Given that it does it does not gut the unions to the same extent as WI, I'm disappointed but not outraged.

No it isn't EXACTLY like the one in WI, but it is another affront on unions that was perpetrated by a D legislature. If there was an R after their name all hell would have broken loose. They would have bussed people in from out of state much like WI.... and so on.

It was also passed in the middle of the night (11:30pm) to pre-empt the planned protests for the next day. (another thing the R's in WI got attacked for) This got basically buried in the press. A few articles here and there. There was nothing, but a brief mention of it on TV that I saw.

I think I said earlier that unions have overreached and needed to reform and accept some benefit reductions.

I must have missed that post. My apologies, if so.