An example of why Recession and Globalization are good for 'Union Busting.'

[formercia]

http://www.wsws.org/articles/2009/oct2009/inco-o31.shtml

Canada: Vale Inco continues provocations against Steelworkers
By Carl Bronski
31 October 2009

Management at Vale Inco’s strikebound mine, mill and smelting complex in Sudbury, Ontario admitted last week that they have been training some non-striking employees to restart the company’s Copper Cliff smelting operation. This latest provocation follows on the heels of the company’s restarting last month of minimal mine and mill operations in an attempt to undermine the now 110 day-old strike.

Vale Inco is using managers, as well as office workers who are organized in non-striking United Steelworkers (USW) Local 2020, to perform mine and mill duties normally done by the strikers. The moves to restart production during an industrial dispute are unprecedented in the more than century old history of mining operations in the Sudbury Basin.

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Locked in cutthroat competition with its global rivals, Vale is insisting that if its operations are to be “sustainable in all pricing cycles” it must impose a “unified approach to compensation” across the globe. This requires, contends Vale, that “Canadian workers become more competitive with workers in less developed countries.”

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