Global Union Leaders Demand Fair Treatment for T-Mobile
Teresa Casertano in the AFL-CIO Organizing Department’s Global Campaigns section sends us this report.
Some 50 leaders from communications and information and technology unions around the world took time out from a global conference to sign a letter to Deustche Telecom CEO Rene Obermann, demanding that Deutsche Telecom end its assault on workers’ rights at T-Mobile USA. T-Mobile USA, the largest Deutsche Telekom subsidiary, is waging a vicious anti-union campaign against workers who have chosen to join the Communications Workers of America (CWA).
Strongly objecting to DT’s behavior in the United States, the leaders stated:
Today we demand that Deutsche Telekom end its systematic messaging assault against T-Mobile workers who choose to participate in union organizing. We also demand that DT take concrete steps to demonstrate respect for workers’ rights by implementing a policy in which management agrees not to oppose the organizing efforts of T-Mobile USA workers and to allow the workers the freedom to participate in union activities without fear of reprisals or job loss.
Participants at last week’s UNI Global Union ICTS global conference in Mexico City also pledged Read the rest of this entry »
Global Unions File Complaint Against T-Mobile’s Parent
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A complaint filed today with the Organization for Economic Co-operation and Development (OECD) describes how Deutsche Telekom has engaged in anti-union activity in the United States that violates the organization’s guidelines for multinational enterprises.
The complaint, filed by the Communications Workers of America (CWA), the German union ver.di and the global union federation UNI Global Union, details the union-busting activity of Deutsche Telekom’s wholly owned subsidiary T-Mobile USA, which “has engaged in a pattern of conduct designed to undermine and frustrate employees’ efforts to choose union representation freely and to deny employees their rights to collective bargaining.”
German Workers Rally For T-Mobile USA Employees’ Rights
More than 500 workers from ver.di, the German telecommunications workers union, today descended on Deutsche Telekom’s global annual shareholders’ meeting in Cologne to demand the company ensure its American employees at T-Mobile USA the same rights enjoyed by its German workforce.
The workers formed a human chain around the meeting venue and released black balloons as a sign of mourning for their U.S. co-workers’ rights.
In Germany, Deutsche Telecom recognizes the union and has a collective bargaining agreement with workers. But at its American subsidiary, T-Mobile USA, management harasses workers who try to join the union, and has implemented a company-wide strategy of refusing to recognize the workers’ choice of a union and collective bargaining rights.
Global Unions Launch Campaign for Workers’ Rights at T-Mobile
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The global union movement has launched a major worldwide campaign to convince Deutsche Telekom to end its anti-union actions and allow employees at its T-Mobile USA subsidiary to join a union if they choose.
While Deutsche Telekom respects workers’ rights in its home country of Germany, T-Mobile workers in the United States and other countries face management campaigns of intimidation and harassment when they indicate they want to form a union and gain collective bargaining rights. Deutsche Telekom has repeatedly refused to stop the anti-union campaign being waged by T-Mobile USA.
“We expect better from Deutsche Telekom,” said International Trade Union Confederation (ITUC) General Secretary Sharan Burrow.
Global Unions Call on T-Mobile to Respect Workers’ Rights
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In many countries around the world, T-Mobile USA’s parent Deutsche Telekom (DT) follows internationally recognized labor and human rights, including the freedom of association and the freedom to join a union. But not in this country. Instead, the German company allows management to harass and intimidate workers who want to join a union.
In a joint press conference last week, the Communications Workers of America (CWA), ver.di, the German telecommunications workers union, and UNI Global Union, said this double standard must end now. UNI, CWA and ver.di are pressing DT for a global agreement that would protect the fundamental labor rights of the company’s workers worldwide.
CWA President Larry Cohen told reporters:
T-Mobile USA…chooses to ally with the worst of U.S. managers who fight collective bargaining for employees in every imaginable way. These companies use the loopholes in current U.S. labor law that support and permit anti-union campaigning by management.
Report: T-Mobile Mistreats U.S. Employees
T-Mobile USA and its parent company, German telecommunications giant Deutsche Telekom (DT), have waged a systematic campaign to prevent employees from forming a union, according to a new report.
“Lowering the Bar or Setting the Standard? Deutsche Telekom’s U.S. Labor Practices,” released today by the American Rights at Work Education Fund, shows that although DT respects workers’ rights and cooperates closely with unions in Germany, it routinely mistreats workers in the United States and tries to thwart their freedom to form unions.
Says Kimberly Freeman Brown, executive director of American Rights at Work:
Respecting workers’ rights and needs benefits employees, their families, and a company’s bottom line. T-Mobile’s parent company became a leader in the telecom industry in Europe by working with their employees and proving that there is a better way to do business. It is inexcusable that our dysfunctional labor law system allowed T-Mobile USA to disregard its employees’ rights here in the United States.
