construction
News and articles about work, policy and workers' struggles in building, construction and materials around the world.
Sweden: European Court sets precedent on foreign workers
The European Advocate General, Paolo Mengozzi advised the European Court of Justice that companies should respect local pay and conditions when hiring foreign workers.
The case began in 2004 when a Lithuanian company, Laval, entered the building trade, winning a string of contracts in Sweden. The company, then best known for producing cake, based its strategy on the importation of cheap Latvian labour. Laval argued that as Sweden does not have a legal minimum wage this was entirely legal.
Sweden: Migrant workers "used as slaves"
Young British men are being used as 'slave labourers' in Stockholm, police have said. The men are being used in building work, and according to reports they are paid only sporadically and live in squalor.
thelocal.se reported:
Cambodia: Garment workers threaten strikes
Garment workers are trying to prevent large pay cuts. At the same time building workers have gone on strike in support of sacked colleagues.
The garment workers are threatening strikes in reaction to governement proposals to change the law that compels employers to pay double wages for night work. By cutting this premium by 70% the Prime Minister, Hun Sen, claims he will be able to create tens of thousands of new jobs. The industry is currently responsible for US$2.3bn worth of exports yearly, almost 80% of the total.
Egyptian cement workers refuse buy-out and propose self-management
The Cement workers in Tora, Helwan and Suez are refusing an early buyout scheme their Italian management is currently drafting, with the aim of cutting down the labor force.
Instead the workers want to buy the shares of the foreign management, and are proposing they (the workers) run the company themselves, promising to bring down the cement market price from LE400 per ton (expected to rise soon to LE600) to LE200.
Strikes in Egypt spread from centre of gravity
The longest and strongest wave of worker protest since the end of World War II is rolling through Egypt. In March, the liberal daily al-Masri al-Yawm estimated that no fewer than 222 sit-in strikes, work stoppages, hunger strikes and demonstrations had occurred during 2006.
Take from Middle East Report Online
In the first five months of 2007, the paper has reported a new labour action nearly every day. The citizen group Egyptian Workers and Trade Union Watch documented 56 incidents during the month of April, and another 15 during the first week of May alone.[1]
Narita Airport riots (video clip)
A video of the riots against the construction of Narita Airport in Tokyo, Japan during the 1970s.
The video is hosted on YouTube and has English subtitles. The riots included students and farmers protesting against the airport's construction, and involved pitched battles against the police with molotov cocktails and explosives.
Freemasonry - its historic role
A brief history of the development of freemasonry, its relationship to politics, its mythology and its practice.
Freemasonry has long had a relationship to the politics of both left and right. Bourgeois revolutionaries in France and America and modern mainstream politicians have all been members, as were some founding members of the 1st International.
From; "The Wordworth Dictionary of the Occult"; Andre Nataf, Wordworth, 1991.
Trade guilds: Initiation through work - Andre Nataf
The origins of the guilds, their beliefs and practices. An informative brief survey, despite its conservative conclusion.
"The secret of the guilds is, then, a skill, but this only comes through practice. As he worked to fashion a stone, the guild member was working on a fragment of the universe to fit it into the designs of God; art, according to the alchemists, was the way of perfecting Nature.
Ricky Tomlinson - imprisoned building union organiser
Born into a working class family in Liverpool in 1939, Ricky Tomlinson was an active building union member and served time in prison for his part in the 1972 strike.
The son of a baker born one month after the start of WW2, life was hard, his family sleeping six people in two rooms.
Tahiti: Strikes underway with more to come
Employees at Tikiphone, the polynesian mobile phone provider went on indefinite strike last Tuesday.
The strike action is in support of a claim by workers for increased salaries and for their benefits to be brought into line with those of other workers at the Officeof post and telecommunications (OPT). An inter-union grouping of CSIP, CSTP/FO, Otahi, A Tia I Mua called the strike and 60% of workers are observing it.Tikiphone shops are either closed or picketed.
