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UNI Americas’ “Breaking Through” agenda focuses on growth





UNI Property Services campaigns were a prominent component of the program at the UNI Americas Conference in Montevideo on December 6-7, 2012. Nearly 400 delegates and guests from 33 countries and 94 unions were present at this conference that is held once every four years.



Delegates heard from Rocio Saenz, SEIU, about organising thousands of security guards in the US with the assistance of organising provisions under the Securitas and G4S global agreements which helped the union reach an industry-wide organising agreement covering 22 cities and over 50,000 workers who will be able to organise under a neutrality agreement.



Rocio also spoke about the successful SEIU Houston Janitors’ strike this year which took on all the major industry players in the market. Key issues in this contract dispute were workers’ wages, picking up on the “We’re the 99%” Wall Street movement in the US, and issues of worker dignity. The union’s bargaining push was to move workers out of the shadows of working life and to push wages up so that these janitors can move toward earning a middle class income. The UNI-ISS global agreement helped establish relationships which were important as SEIU pushed toward a settlement. UNI affiliates, part of the UNI Property Services Alliance, had visited Houston in June to witness first-hand the poor working conditions of these cleaners and the need for significant improvement. The UNI affiliates that formed this delegation were from Denmark, The Netherlands and Spain where ISS is a major industry player in cleaning services. A key activity of UNI affiliates from Latin America was to contact the Greater Houston Partnership which helped shore up the political support for the janitors in the City of Houston.



Delegates also heard from Jose Boaventura, from CNTV-CUT in Brazil, Luis Veloso Vazques from Prosegur Union 1 in Chile and Roberto Florentina from SITEPROPASA in Paraguay. All three colleagues spoke about the UNI Property Services effort to improve workers’ wages, hours and working conditions in Prosegur. Roberto discussed the retaliatory firing of 327 security guards in Paraguay by Prosegur when these workers stood up by striking to improve safety on the job and to increase their pay. They discussed the importance of the UNI Property Services Prosegur Alliance which brings trade unionists together from across the company’s global network.



Prosegur now employs approximately 150,000 workers in 14 countries, largely in Europe and S. America. The largest number of workers is in Brazil, now numbering over 50,000. While Prosegur holds itself as having strong corporate social responsibility commitments, its actions tell a different story when the workers lack a strong union or the political environment allows companies to trample workers’ rights. Roberto cited the filing of an ILO complaint in Paraguay based on the actions of Prosegur and the failure of the Paraguayan government, installed through a coup in June, to enforce workers’ rights.



Delegates also heard from Robinson Becerra from Colombia, whose union represents workers at Brinks Security. Colombia is still the most dangerous country in the world for trade union activity, based on the number of deaths each year as a direct result of organising and union representation. Robinson shared the important steps forward in strengthening the union movement in Colombia and the coordination of unions in the security industry in particular, to build a stronger movement for workers.



Conference delegates, from all sectors, underscored the importance of reaching global agreements with multinational companies as a critical vehicle to allow workers to improve wages and working conditions across the globe by being able to organise free of employer intimidation and retaliation.