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“This is the single most important change taking place in UNI global since our formation in 2000,” said UNI General Secretary Philip Jennings said at the opening of the conference. “I consider this a real breakthrough for UNI and the entire global trade union movement. How can we organize in this global and digital economy? It’s important for us to work together and stand together and have a common platform.”



Jennings also recognized the work of the conference host union the Sindicato de Telefonistas de la República Mexicana (STRM), which he called the “shining that light of a free and democratic union in [Mexico].”



The STRM General Secretary Francisco Hernandez Juarez, welcomed the support of the IT and Telecom unions and their solidarity.



“Telephone workers understand your presence in Mexico as an act of solidarity with Mexican unions,” Hernandez Juarez said. He also called on the global union movement to help fight the practice of “protection unions” in Mexico, which are organisations that do not support workers rights but in fact are used by company management to keep their workers from joining real democratic unions like the STRM.



On Thursday afternoon, the conference delegates will join over 1000 Mexican trade unionists and workers to march to Atento Mexico to protest against the company’s use of a protection union to stop workers from joining the STRM. Workers are fighting to get a fair election to vote in STRM as their union at an Atento call center in Mexico City.



UNI Telecoms President Bo Larsen said the new UNI ICTS sector must focus on organising to build power in the sector and to fight the outsourcing and offshoring that are eroding union ranks.



UNI Americas Regional Secretary Adriana Rosenzvaig said that the fight for union rights must continue.



“There is no social justice if we do not have respect for trade unions. There is no decent work if we don’t have respect for trade unions. There is no democracy if we don’t have respect for trade unions,” she said.



On Friday the unions will formally vote to create the new UNI ICTS sector and elect a new president.