Convention
Update
8/14/08 - Thursday
- Today's session of the Convention floor started with an invocation by Edwin Worthy of Local 310.
- We were treated to an inspired address by Neil Anderson of Union Network International (UNI). Neil gave us the facts about what is happening to Postal Workers around the world. He spoke about what is happening to Postal workers in Sweden, New Zealand, The United Kingdom, Argentina, Germany and Europe. What this amounts to is the privatization or deregulation of the Postal Service in these countries. The result has been that private companies are being allowed by these governments to take over the Postal Service at not only the expense of the Postal Workers but to the detriment of the public. In other words; Service is suffering and wages are being greatly reduced. This to only benefit the private companies taking over these services and without respect to the sanctity of the mail service. One example Neil gave was that in Germany wages went from 16.50 euros to 6.30 euros for Postal Workers in that country. In other countries such as Argentina, Unions are not even being allowed to be formed in these new Postal companies and the wages and conditions of the workers are greatly reduced. He encouraged the National Postal Mail Handlers to continue our fight to derail efforts by our elected officials from out sourcing to private companies the work accomplished by Mail Handlers in the United States. For a more detailed account of Neil's comments please refer to the link found on www.npmhu.org for www.uniglobalunion.org/unipostal.nsf.
- Immediately following Neil Andersen National President Hegarty received word that our new cola will be $1,477 or 71 cents per hour. We will be receiving this increase in our wages in mid-September of this year.
- The Delegates were shown a video presentation from Congresswoman Debbie Wasserman (D-FL).
- The remaining proposals of amendments recommended by the Constitution Committee (The articles pertaining to Local Unions) were presented to the Delegates. As I said in yesterday's update, each and every change made to the Constitution is put to the vote on the convention floor and a majority vote is required to change or amend it.
- At the close of the day, those delegates whose proposals had been properly submitted to the National Office prior to the convention but not recommended by the Committee were given the opportunity to present those proposals to the delegates. An example of this was that the delegate from Local 310 proposed to change Article 5 section 7 of the National Constitution. He wanted to add "When a new member has had his or her dues deducted for a period of 120 days or more he or she should be allowed to receive a ballot to vote in National or Local elections". There was debate on the floor from the delegates on both sides of this issue and the initial vote sounded very close. So a roll call vote was taken. The delegates were given ten minutes to caucus and then each Local was obliged to send a Delegate to the microphone to say how the voted on the question.
Local 320 voted 6 no or 31 weighted votes no on the question. The roll call vote resulted in roughly 615 yes votes and 1305 no votes. The delegates overwhelmingly felt the 120 days was more restrictive to the Locals during elections and in many cases would hinder the ability of the judges of election to make determinations due to when dues check off lists are called for. In other words, the delegates decided the current language allowed for on site situations to be handled by the duly appointed judges of election in each Local. As usual for a more comprehensive summary of the day's activities on the convention floor go to www.npmhu.org.
Ace Balderrama
State Executive Board Member
Mail Handlers, Local 320