[Video] Visteon Factory Worker Occupations

Original article, by Will Roche, via Socialist Appeal (UK):

Hundreds of workers occupy three Visteon car manufacturing factories in Britain after the management closed them down, laying off the entire workforce with no notice, violating their contracts. This is reminiscent of the factory occupations of the 1970s.

Here's the vid:



So, what does Visteon in the UK have to do with the US? To begin with, it's a spinoff of...Ford. The workers who moved over to Visteon from Ford were promised that they would stay under the working agreement they had with Ford. Needless to say, Visteon decided otherwise. Hence, occupied factories.

There's more here: Visteon Workers Occupy!

Visteon workers in Enfield and Basildon have joined with Belfast workers in occupying their plants.

Management have put the firm into administration. Belfast workers have been defending their occupation by staying in overnight. The workers are taking action because they have to. They were just brutally kicked off the premises without any notice. If management get away with this, 600 workers at the three plants will be sacked and left on the minimum statutory redundancy pay. Statutory redundancy pay is paltry. Even workers with 30 years’ service are only entitled to £9,000 and most will get far less.

9000 Pounds Sterling? That's more than we get here in the US (for the most part). What're they complaining about?

One, they fought to get their wages and redundancy rules. Apparently they did better than we have here in the US. Perhaps we have something to learn from British unions.

The background to the dispute is that Visteon was spun off from Ford as a scam to attack workers’ pay and conditions. Before incorporation in 2000 the plants were part of the Ford combine, making parts for the cars. The workers were on the normal Ford wages and conditions. The bosses’ idea was to uncouple workers’ pay at the component suppliers from those in the main plant. Visteon workers have consistently fought attempts to downgrade their labour since 2000, but now management says the firm is losing money.

Going into administration will also put the workers’ pensions in peril. The money will end up in the Pension Protection Fund, where it will in effect become a zombie fund, with no top-ups and guarantees to the workers and pensioners not honoured, as they would have to do if Visteon were a going concern.

No flies on Visteon management. They have setup a separate outfit called Visteon Engineering Services, which is in effect a life raft to carry their own pensions to safety away from the wreckage of Visteon that they have created.

Keep in mind roughly the same thing has gone on here in the US (Visteon is similar to Delphi). Should either GM or Chrysler (or both) go into administration, you can bet that the workers are going to be left out to dry.

Will our workers have the same idea as the Visteon workers? Can there be unity and solidarity against the collapse of the auto industry here in the US? Will we see the factories occupied should GM and/or Chrysler go into bankruptcy? How would the Obama administration react?

Interesting times are afoot!

Behind the surge on Wall Street

Original article, by Tom Eley, via World Socialist Web Site:

Over the past month the major US stock exchanges have risen sharply. On Friday, the Dow Jones Industrial Average closed at over 8,000 for the first time since February 9. It has risen more than 20 percent since it plumbed a twelve-year low on March 9. The Nasdaq Composite Index and the S&P 500 have also risen more than 20 percent since early March.

Let's hear it for the Obama rally! Onward stock prices! Feel the zoom!

Amazingly enough, it was usually the rightists who like to talk up the stock market despite the underlying flaws which many of us saw. Now, of course, you have increasing numbers of the centrists cheering on Wall Street along with the rightists. After all, a strong showing in the market is proof the President is doing well.

Except, of course, that the underlying flaws in the economy are still there.

There is undoubtedly a technical correction at play in the rally. There had been indications that the market was heavily oversold and many investors and economists felt that a rebound was probable within the context of the bear market.

However, this by itself cannot explain the rally, especially since it has occurred in the absence of any significant economic indicators of recovery either in the US or internationally. On the contrary, figures on joblessness, industrial production, exports, world trade and overall growth have been almost uniformly grim and worse than anticipated. On Friday, the stock market rose in spite of a new US jobs report showing the highest level of unemployment since 1983.

The basic reasons must, therefore, be political.

I wonder how long it will be until the Democratic machine decides to start the mantra that the economy is actually strong? Now, part of it is psychological. If people think the economy is strong, they're more likely to splash out cash on various items. The problem is that if the economy's underlying flaws are not fixed then the economy may look good, but it's rotting at it's core.

The surge in the stock market shows that the American ruling elite is confident that the Obama administration will do everything in its power to protect the interests of the banks and finance capital.

Which shows that Obama is a shrewd politician. If you get the bankster frauds and bosses behind you, you can forget about the other 90% of the population they don't represent. And if you win them over to your party...jackpot! Rivers of campaign funding for as far as the eye can see. Who'll be worried about the underlying flaws in the economy then?

Eley then points out that the rally is being built on the back of three actions taken by the Obama administration. The first was the plan for the government to buy the toxic debt of the banksters. The second was the restructuring plan for GM and Chrysler (aka Contracts are sacrosanct when it comes to us getting our share, but mean nothing for workers).

Finally, there was the announcement Thursday by the Financial Accounting Standards Board (FASB) weakening "mark-to-market" accounting rules and allowing banks to value their toxic assets at inflated prices. This was not only an immediate boost to banks' balance sheets and reported profits, it also showed that the government will give Wall Street a green light to continue the same methods of fraud and double bookkeeping that triggered the breakdown of the financial system in the first place.

Keep in mind, this is coming from a Democratic Administration! This is the party that portrays itself as the home of the working class. In the months and years to come, when the Democrats try to portray themselves as such, we'll have an answer: "Yeah, right!"

Read the rest of the article. It's good and helps to point in what direction the political class has decided to take us in. Let your blood boil for just a bit as you read it if you're a traditional Democrat. Then realize that what Kos wrote is correct: It's not more and better Democrats, it's better Democrats (hopefully Kucitizens all!). Will there be a sea change in 2010? Probably not, but the tide could start to turn then.

Venezuela: Urgent appeal for solidarity with workers at occupied Vivex factory

Original article via In Defence of Marxism:

El Militante: What is the situation of the Vivex workers?

Yeant Sabino: The union is taking part in talks organised by the Presidency of the Republic which are taking place in the Palacio Blanco and led by captain Nelson Pereira Ibarra. Today, Tuesday March 31, he threatened the workers saying that unless we accept certain conditions which were never agreed at the negotiations that he would withdraw with his team and would allow the tribunals to come in. We cannot allow the installation of a tribunal, particularly since this was never agreed at the high level negotiations.

The occupation of the Vivex plant began on November 21, 2008. Vivex makes windscreens for the automobile industry. This is interesting in that workers who's jobs were threatened took matters into their own hands. One of the grand truths of life is that in most cases it's the workers who produce the goods that help to make the bosses rich. Of course, the bosses don't always play fair:

EM: Is the media spreading the rumour that the workers are taking away assets from the factory?

YS: Yes, the owner and a really small group around him are saying that the workers of Vivex, who have been occupying the factory since November, are taking away assets and tools. In order to refute this slander and so that the people can see the truth we agreed to an inspection to check all the machines and tools, but we rejected the idea that the owner would bring his financial advisers because, right now, we do not have anyone who can deal with those matters. We gave a list of workers who would join the high level negotiations and the tribunal as already agreed. This was last night at about 9pm when we handed over this list of 8 people. This morning we received a phone call saying that the owner wanted to include a series of people that we disagree with. The reason for this is that amongst those proposed there were workers who have sabotaged machine tools, like at oven number 8, and in other sections. These workers, Afredo Barroso and Carlos Cova, were in fact agents of the boss. They participated in the occupation for several days with the aim of sabotaging the machines and blaming the workers for it.

The rest of the article describes how the negotiation process is going, and how the workers are reacting to as far as the actions of both the government and the bosses go.

If, after you've read the article, you feel the urge to send a note of solidarity, do so by contacting the Venezuelan government and explaining why you think they should support the Vivex workers. Here are some mail links:

Send them to

Dirección General de Gestión Comunicacional
dggcomunicacional@presidencia.gob.ve

Dirección de Redes Sociales
drsociales@presidencia.gob.ve

Dirección de Asistencia Social
dasociales@presidencia.gob.ve

With copies to:

Frentecontrolobrero@gmail.com

corrientemarxista@gmail.com

You can use this model letter in Spanish.

Why might this be important for us here in the States? We have been seeing, and reading about, various factories which have been shut down or are about to be so. So far, except in the case of the Chicago window company which was occupied, occupation of factories has not been a major action by the workers. This is an option for workers to consider should things get much worse than they already are. Take, for example, Chrysler. If the deal with Fiat (or some other white knight) doesn't go through, then it looks like the end of the company. If Chrysler were to go under, occupation of the factories by the workers could conceivably buy time for some other arrangement to keep the company afloat. It's something to keep in mind as time goes on.

Wall Street celebrates accounting rule changes designed to hide losses

Original article, by Andre Damon, via World Socialist Web Site:

The Financial Accounting Standards Board (FASB) voted Thursday to let US banks set their own prices for assets in earnings reports, regardless of current prices.

I'm not sure about you, but it seems to me that this is stupid. Letting the bankster frauds set their own prices for their assets? How are we to know and believe that their guesses are correct? After all, the bankster frauds didn't see the economic collapse coming. It's hard to imagine that they're any better at prediction than they were leading up to the current crisis.

The move, which was heavily lobbied for by Wall Street, is expected to increase bank earnings by 20 percent in the next quarter. Richard Dietrich, an accounting professor at Ohio State University, told Bloomberg News that the decision would allow Citigroup to reduce its reported losses by 50 to 70 percent.

Banks are currently required to calculate their earnings, under so-called "mark to market" accounting rules, according to the current market value of the securities they hold, but the new measure would allow them to value assets using their own internal models where the assets would otherwise be sold into a "distressed" market. Banks have argued that markets are not pricing financial assets fairly, causing credit to dry up and exacerbating the crisis.

Bankster frauds blaming the market? For shame! So what do they get? Free reign!

This is, in fact, an argument for allowing them to conceal their losses and cook their financial books. It stands in flagrant contradiction to the financial elite's supposed commitment to "free market" principles. Such principles are, in practice, raised when expedient—to justify corporate downsizing and wage-cutting, for example—and discarded when they undermine profits.

I'll let you read the rest. Understand that this is another win for the bankster frauds and bosses that has been racked up under the Obama Administration. They choice, should they choose to make it, is to go to Congress to overturn this ruling by law. I'll be waiting.

Detroit auto workers denounce Obama's concession demands

Original article, by Tim Tower, via World Socialist Web Site:

Auto workers responded angrily on Tuesday to the concessions demanded by President Barack Obama in exchange for providing loans to the auto industry. The open contempt for the working class and unflinching subordination to finance capital that permeated Obama's remarks caught many by surprise.

The cards are on the table. The financiers hold the best hand. But, then again, the deck was marked. We now know who the Obama administration is backing, and it's not the working class.

The World Socialist Web Site spoke to workers at Chrysler's truck assembly plant in Warren, Michigan. Some admitted that they had put stock in Obama's campaign promises before he was elected, but promise and reality ended up being opposites.

This is unfortunate. We're in a period where our economic system is having to be reworked and reset. It will probably be the system we'll have for the next 30-40 years unless a collapse happens before then. Instead of fighting against casino capitalism, Obama's gone all in to save the current system. Instead of standing up for workers, he's decided that they're the ones who will bear the burden of trying to restart the economy. Contracts for the rich are sacrosanct, while contracts for the workers are made to be broken.

"I feel betrayed," said one worker. "That's the best way to sum it up," she concluded.

Read the rest of the article and weep or get angry. The head of what has been the workers' party here in the US (at least superficially) has thrown workers from the bus, while inviting the bankster frauds and bosses on board. The question for Democrats is if this is the party they envision, or a party which must be reformed? Are power and increased campaign financing worth the soul of the party? The time to answer these and similar question is now. What the answer is will set forth the identity of the Democratic Party for the foreseeable future.