Workers at a Asea Brown Boveri (ABB) factory in Cordoba, Spain have been on indefinite strike since 28th November, camped out all day and night in front of the factory.
The strike was called in protest at plans to make workers redundant and replace them with non-union labour with no experience or qualifications, hired through EUROCEN - the logistics division of the ADECCO Group.
ADECCO is the largest employment agency in the world. Beside profiting on precarity and casualisation, ADECCO and other employment agencies are fast becoming the go-to source for scabs and strikebreakers. Case in point: At the Asea Brown Boveri factory in Cordoba, Spain workers have struck over pay and conditions.
Besides sacking nine of the twelve members of the strike committee, ABB has now begun hiring scab labour from ADECCO. This disgusting behaviour must stop. Employment agencies have exploited us long enough. It's time for us to fight back. A win for workers at ABB, a giant multinational that operates in over 100 countries, will not only improve working conditions for Spanish workers, it will let employment agencies like ADECCO know that workers are willing to fight back against their unscrupulous practices.
The following is a report by our Portuguese sister organisation about austerity measures and the recent general strike..
On the last 24th November a new general strike took place in Portugal, exactly one year after the previous one. This was the seventh general strike in Portugal in 37 years and the third convoked by the two main labor unions CGTP and UGT.
Joint statement by CNT, CGT and SO in Spain
The Confederación General del Trabajo (CGT), Confederación Nacional del Trabajo (CNT) and Solidaridad Obrera (SO) trade unions met on 17th October last with the aim of continuing along the path towards unity of action, mobilization and the General Strike.
On the evening of 29th September, a number of SolFed members trekked to the swanky West End of London to stand in solidarity with the Spanish working class.
We arrived, banners in hand, first to the Spanish Consulate and then to the Embassy. Our arrival coincided with a national day of action called by a coalition of radical Spanish unions, including SF's sister organisation, the CNT. With events planned all over Spain, these militant workers and militant workers' organisations are calling for a general strike to overcome the brutal austerity cuts the Spanish state is attempting to force on Spain's working class.
A successful international campaign took place on August 19th, in solidarity with the workers at the Ford Visteon plant in Cadiz (Spain). The workers are facing the threat of imminent closure of the factory, thus leaving more than 450 people unemployed. Meanwhile, once again, we are reminded how multinationals can do and undo at will and with full impunity, even if it means leaving many families without a livelihood, as well as greatly affecting both the region and the sector because of the direct and indirect jobs that will be lost.
A joint statement released by our Spanish sister section, the CNT, along with several other Spanish unions (leer en español).
The unions Confederación General del Trabajo (CGT), Confederación Nacional del Trabajo (CNT), Solidaridad Obrera (SO) and Coordinadora Sindical de Clase (CSC) met on June 24 in Madrid to discuss how we can respond to the attack we the workers are under, an attack without precedents, one that bushwhacks our acquired rights, one made a reality by the government and European institutions, the bosses and the markets. How we can coordinate a struggle, and a response, based on class unity and action.
On Monday 20th June, Solfed arrived once again at the steps of the Serbian embassy in Belgrave square. Following the successful campaign to free the Belgrade 6, we are somewhat familiar with Serbian state and it's repressive tendancies. This time the picket was called in solidarity with the International Anti-NATO Campaign. We hope that international solidarity will work as well as it did last time and lead to swift justice. Text of leaflet below:
On Friday the 3rd of June, four members of the North London Solidarity Federation were lucky enough to sit down with and engage in comradely discussion some twelve members of the Milan Local of the Italian USI – AIT.