Labor & Employment Law

AFL-CIO, UAW Back Honda Strikers in China

By James Parks

America?s workers today called on Honda to accept the demands of striking workers at its factories in China to improve wages and job promotion through ?genuine and continuous collective bargaining with representatives of its front-line workers.”

In a joint statement, AFL-CIO President Richard Trumka and UAW President Bob King said:

The workers and consumers of America and the world will be watching Honda and other employers to ensure that Honda and other Chinese employers comply with core international labor rights, obey Chinese and international labor laws and bargain in good faith.

In the past few weeks, young auto workers have struck at various Honda system plants in China, protesting the low-wage system imposed by Honda and many employers in China. 

Trumka and King praised the workers at a Honda parts plant in Foshan City, Guangdong Province, the first such strike. The line workers elected representatives to negotiate with the employer for wage increases. In the words of those elected representatives,

[our] fundamental demands are?salary raises?for the whole workforce including interns; improvements in the wage structure and job promotion mechanism; and last but not least, restructuring the branch trade union at Honda Auto Parts Manufacturing Co.’ Ltd. Another fundamental demand… [is]?non-retaliation and no dismissal of workers participating in the strike.

Honda management at Foshan first tried to bully the workers with threats of reprisals, firings and even violence. Eventually, though, Honda was forced to negotiate directly with workers’ representatives at Foshan to get production back up.

As Trumka and King said:

Honda should immediately cease bullying workers, firing worker leaders, using interns and contract workers to degrade wage levels, and breaking strikes with scabs.  All workers fired in the recent strikes should be reinstated immediately to their former positions.

Full post as published by AFL-CIO NOW BLOG on June 28, 2010 (boomark / email).