By James Spinosa
ILWU International President

Capital, like water, flows downhill, seeking the path of least resistance. Investments flood into where labor costs are the lowest, where working conditions and environmental standards are the lowest. If it weren’t for the kinds of levees and protections workers joined together in unions provide, we would all drown in a sea of greed and poisons.

Outsourcing and runaway shops, the maquiladores of Mexico and the sweatshops of China, closed American factories and plummeting standards of living—these are the results of employers seeking the competitive edge of lower costs. This policy is encouraged and helped along by expanding free trade agreements and by anti-labor laws governments pass and courts and police enforce wherever workers are not organized strongly enough to resist them.

But unlike manufacturing plants that can be shifted from country to country, ports cannot be moved. So the international ship-owning and terminal operating corporations have to challenge union dockworkers head on, even in countries where they are well organized and have won laws protecting their jobs and rights. They have once again aimed their fire at the port workers of Europe.

On Jan. 16 the European Parliament, the legislative body overseeing the economic relations and regulations among the 25 countries of the European Union, considered legislation that would deregulate the port industry throughout the continent. In effect, the proposal would override national and local laws, regulations and labor contracts guaranteeing union dockworkers’ jobs, wages and conditions. It would allow shipowners to have sailors do longshore work and allow terminal operators to bypass registered union dockers and hire casual, temporary workers to load and unload ships. Its backers justify the change in the name of the free market and enhanced competition. Its opponents—union dockworkers in Europe and around the world—see it as a threat to their lives and livelihoods.

The proposal is known as "Port Package 2" because it is the second time in a little more than three years that employers have tried to get the European Parliament to impose their economic interests by passing this law. The first time, in late 2003, dockworkers across Europe united in one strong voice, closing down ports all over the continent and holding mass demonstrations in Rotterdam and Barcelona on Sept. 29.

The ILWU sent a delegation to Europe in solidarity then. In Rotterdam our members were asked to lead the march sponsored by the European Transport Workers Federation (a division of the International Transport Workers Federation) with their ILWU banner proclaiming "An injury to one is an injury to all." A few days later they went to Barcelona to extend our solidarity to our brothers and sisters in the International Dockworkers Council.

The European dockworkers were prepared to take further actions—and said so publicly—had the legislation passed. But their warnings were heeded and it was defeated, although only by a slim margin, on Nov. 20, 2003. They knew their victory wasn’t complete, that they hadn’t driven a stake through the heart of privatization and its proponents. Still, they were angered when the same people brought the same proposal back to the European Parliament less than a year later.

But their mobilization machinery had not had the time to get rusty, so the dockworkers quickly set it in gear and got moving again. They lobbied the members of the European Parliament and held a mass demonstration at its meeting in Brussels Nov. 21, 2004. And they organized for the final vote the following January.

The week before the vote, on Jan. 11, dockers in many European ports held two-hour work stoppages and informational actions. On Jan. 16, 10,000 dockers from throughout Europe and the world marched through Strasbourg to the meeting of the European Parliament. The ILWU and the Maritime Union of Australia sent delegations in solidarity (see story page 3). In the end the European Parliament voted down the privatization plan by a huge margin, 532 to 120, in a great victory for the dockers.

But several dockers were arrested during the demonstration and some are still in jail.

As part of the international dockworkers movement, we will be helping these brothers in any and every way they request of us.

The cost of our good jobs, of our good wages, conditions, health benefits and pensions, of our union that provides the collective strength to protect all of those, is not just constant vigilance. It is also the committed participation of our members. Your activity is what makes the ILWU proud and strong.

Sure, after a hard day working you’re tired and feel like going home to the comfort of your family. Going to meetings and doing more unpaid work seems a burden. But if we don’t do it, if we don’t help other workers protect their rights in solidarity actions, we may not keep the jobs that make us tired and bring so much to our families.

If you don’t think our employers, the same international corporations now attacking the rights of dockworkers in Europe, will come after us if they smell weakness, think again. They risked an economically damaging, nearly two-week long lockout against us in 2002. They have stonewalled us for three years now on implementing the final agreement, particularly on technology, still trying to find ways to outsource our work. And they will surely try again when negotiations on a new longshore contract begin in another two years.