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In Washington this week, U.S.A. and German union leaders announced their trans-continental alliance to promote organising rights for workers at Deutsche Telekom subsidiary, T-Mobile USA.



TU is the union alliance that the Communication Workers of America (CWA) and ver.di - Germany's largest trade union, with 2.5 million members - have established. TU was established a few years ago as a way of bringing workers together across the Atlantic to conduct joint organising and campaigning activities, to build a sense of camaraderie and solidarity amongst people who work for the same company but who experience vastly different working conditions.



In Germany, Ver.di represents 70% of workers employed by Deutsche Telekom and its European subsidiaries. The union recently waged a 12-week strike against the telecommunications giant over issues of job security and working conditions. Ver.di members and Deutsche Telekom employees in Germany enjoy fair wages and entitlements, experience high union membership and are able to bargaining collectively for their conditions of employment. Ver.di members sit on the board of the company's directors and so ensure that workers are directly involved in running the company they work for.



In the United States, T-Mobile USA has shown time and again its opposition to union organising. The company has issued anti-union memoranda to its managers and provided them with training on keeping the union out, as well as harassing and intimidating staff who demonstrated an interest in union membership. T-Mobile USA refuses its workers a free choice as to whether or not they join a trade union.



TU will aim to increase pressure on T-Mobile USA to allow its workers to organise, by using the union's influence in Germany and the position of ver.di representatives on the Deutsche Telekom board of directors. Ver.di will represent T-Mobile USA workers and the Communications Workers of America in talks with Deutsche Telekom managers in Bonn to encourage collective bargaining in the USA.



"We're really here to say to multinational companies, in this case Deutsche Telekom, we're tired of the face of cooperation in Germany ... and then the stick in the United States, the club of intolerance," said CWA President Larry Cohen. "We expect Deutsche Telekom to operate far above the minimum in the United States."



"Our role as Ver.di is to use our relationships and our contacts on every level in the company ... to support CWA's efforts here in the United States," said Ver.di official Ado Wilhelm, who was as part of a five-member Ver.di delegation to the United States.



T-Mobile USA accounts for nearly 25% of Deutsche Telekom's total annual revenues.