A strike by more than 70 000 supermarket staff in California is intensifying, with a policy of civil disobedience and the intervention of everyone from religious leaders and Hollywood stars to right-wing think tanks. The outcome of the strike is seen as crucial to the future of the union movement, many of whose members have rallied in support in the Los Angeles area.
The workers, from 852 shops, have now been on strike for 110 days in a dispute over plans by supermarket chains in the south of the state to end provisions for health insurance and other benefits.
Christian, Jewish and Muslim clerics supporting the strikers descended on the home of the CEO of Safeway, Steve Burd, in Alamo, northern California, to urge him to reopen negotiations. At the same time, 20 strikers and supporters were arrested outside a supermarket in Long Beach for refusing to move in what was the latest in a series of acts of civil disobedience.
The strikes and lockouts, which involve the Vons and Pavilions shops, both owned by Safeway, as well as the chains Albertsons and Ralphs, were prompted by the supermarkets’ decision to cut health benefits.
The chains say they were forced to make the reduction after being undercut by non-union firms, most notably Wal-Mart, which pay minimal wages and benefits and can thus charge less for goods.
Unionised workers are paid higher than their non-unionised counterparts. As a result, according to the investment bank UBS Warburg, groceries at non-union stores are 17% to 39% cheaper.
The dispute also has huge significance for the union movement, with organisers saying that a defeat for the strikers could embolden many other employers. For this reason, big unions such as the Teamsters and the Longshoremen have thrown their weight behind the industrial action, with the latter donating more than $1-million to the strike fund.
”We are on the the frontline of a war,” said Ellen Anreder, spokesperson for the United Food and Commercial Workers. She added that the supermarkets had seen a 91% increase in profit over the past three years and could well afford to continue to pay health insurance.
The last negotiations took place on December 19 and there are no plans for talks. A few strikers have returned to work under different names but the picket lines have largely held firm, with the supermarkets losing hundreds of millions of dollars in sales.
Actors including Martin Sheen, Danny Glover and Janeane Garofalo have lent support, and talk show host Ellen DeGeneres said she would not cross picketlines. Dennis Kucinich, a candidate for the Democratic presidential nomination, has also backed the campaign.
On the picketline outside a Vons store in Ojai, Karen Hattrup said most shoppers were sympathetic and only one staff member had returned to work. There was occasional hostility, she added. ”One man in Ventura threatened me with a .38 [handgun] so I called 911 [the United States emergency number] and the cops came and searched his car and told him not to come back,” Hattrup said. ”But we have people bringing us banana cakes and cookies and wishing us luck. We’re here for as long as it takes.”
Kent Wong, director of the Centre for Labour Research and Education at the University of California, Los Angeles, said the strike ”is a major assault on unions and healthcare benefits,” he said. About 44-million people in the US have no health insurance, so such benefits were seen as crucial.
”It would be naive to believe that the supermarket owners are acting without the support of many other sectors of corporate power and leadership,” said David Koff, a research analyst with the Hotel Employees and Restaurant Employees union .
Conservative commentators have also noted the significance of the strike. They called for the repeal of the National Labour Relations Act, which prevents employers from sacking striking workers. Union membership in the private sector in the US now stands at less than 10%, and in the public sector at 14%. — Â