Except in the German and French press, I hadn't seen news stories about the strong union rejection noted by WM in this press release:
BENTONVILLE, Ark., Feb. 11, 2004, -- Wal-Mart associates have once again voted against union representation in a democratic election that took place today in New Castle, Penn. Seventeen associates who work in the Tire and Lube Express department cast their votes in a secret-ballot election conducted by the National Labor Relations Board.Well, that's really overdoing it. I don't think WM should pretend to know what is going on inside it's employees' heads. However, via Q and O, we find the Pittsburgh Post-Gazette noting the union doing the same exact thing:Today's results came more than four years after the UFCW first began its attempts to organize the Tire and Lube associates in the New Castle store. The final vote was 17-0 in favor of Wal-Mart.
"We are please that our associates finally had a chance to vote and send a strong message to the union," said Terry Srsen, vice president of labor relations for Wal-Mart. "In past elections, the UFCW has been rejected over and over by our associates because they do not feel that a third party would add anything to Wal-Mart's culture or environment."
The UFCW, however, blamed the outcome on Wal-Mart's decision two days earlier to close a newly unionized Canadian store after failing to reach a contract and on turnover at the New Castle outlet. The planned shutdown of the store in Jonquiere, Quebec -- the first unionized Wal-Mart in North America -- is expected to mean the loss of 190 jobs, according to Bloomberg News.You know, somebody ought to take the 17 voters to lunch and ask them if they were even at Wal-Mart in 2000, when all this started. The UFCW is rather disingenuous in blaming WM solely for the delay.
Wal-Mart forced workers to wait four and a half years for an election in their Tire & Lube Express Department of the Wal-Mart Supercenter in New Castle, Pennsylvania. Meanwhile, Wal-Mart�s high turnover rate pushed out the union supporters who began organizing with the United Food and Commercial Workers (UFCW) Local 880 in June, 2000, because they felt Wal-Mart ignored their complaints about safety hazards.Btw, the UFCW needs somebody to write better press releases. Plainly, they currently suck, because no media organization will reprint their caustic sentences.
Posted by Kevin on February, 12 2005 at 02:43 PM
