Be Safe and Be Active in Union,
Politics, Yokich Tells Skilled-Trades

President Stephen P. Yokich told delegates to remind skilled-trades workers to support candidates who stand up for working families and to vote against those who do not.

Photos by Lee Zaichick

Being a skilled-trades worker requires more than just carrying a journeyman’s card, delegates were told at the UAW 2002 Skilled Trades Conference on Collective Bargaining in February in Las Vegas.

It means paying attention to workplace safety, keeping abreast of technology, getting involved in the political process, and helping to keep the UAW strong through organizing.

Those points and more were emphasized at the conference attended by skilled-trades delegates and UAW President Stephen P. Yokich, Secretary-Treasurer Ruben Burks and Vice Presidents Ron Gettelfinger, Elizabeth Bunn, Richard Shoemaker and Vice President Bob King.(Vice President Nate Gooden was at a negotiating session and could not attend.) Representing the skilled trades were Richard Karas, director of the UAW’s Skilled Trades Department, and William J. Peterson, assistant director.

Delegates from 255 UAW local unions representing 73,220 skilled-trades workers adopted 20 resolutions on bargaining positions such as the protection of the trades, advancing technology, trade policy, occupational health and safety, apprenticeship, political action and organizing. Those resolutions will be considered on June 9 at the UAW Special Convention on Collective Bargaining, also in Las Vegas.

UAW President Stephen P. Yokich knows that skilled-trades workers sometimes take shortcuts to get the job done. He took some shortcuts himself as a third-generation skilled-trades worker.

Maybe it’s because skilled-trades workers, whom he calls the UAW’s “elite” because of their education and training, are pressed for time and want to quickly move on to the next job.

But such shortcuts, he told delegates, can prove catastrophic.

Skilled-trades workers make up 15 percent of the UAW’s membership, but suffer 50 percent of the serious injuries, a record he said he is not proud of.

“We should stop and understand that in most cases injuries really come when one of our brothers or sisters has taken a shortcut to do the job,” he added. “We have to understand that shortcuts cost lives. As skilled-trades leaders, you must stand up and remind your brothers and sisters of their obligation to protect themselves because they have families.

“Shortcuts fail every basic skilled-trades safety requirement and we have to stop that. We have to stop being 50 percent of the injuries in this great union of ours.

“It has got to stop. We’ve got to quit losing brothers and sisters for taking shortcuts, for trying to get the job done the easy way,” Yokich said.

The president also reminded delegates that the skilled trades must keep on top of technological advances in their fields. He noted that unlike many labor unions, the UAW welcomes and embraces technology, but UAW members must continually train.

“We can’t blink for a minute, because the time you blink, that’s the time you lose a job,” he said.

Yokich also told delegates that political activism goes hand in hand with union activism. Political action, he said, is our survival.

The negotiated Election Day holiday had the desired impact of getting more UAW members involved in grassroots political activity.

“Workers went out and voted,” he said. “UAW members who probably would have never voted went out and voted for our candidates. Michigan had the highest percentage of union families vote in the United States, something like 72 percent.”

And as union members cast ballots, they should remember the candidates who support working families, regardless of their party affiliation. UAW members should be blunt about it, he said.

NAFTA, the last major fast-track trade agreement, cost the UAW 100,000 jobs and failed to raise the standard of living in Mexico, he said. Now, the president wants similar fast-track authority to cut future trade deals — deals that ignore the rights of workers and do not protect the environment. UAW members should tell their congressional representatives “if they vote for fast track, you can kiss the UAW endorsement goodbye. We should not endorse anybody who is for fast track and they should learn a lesson from us.

“We’re telling the congressional people one thing: You don’t vote for us and we ain’t voting for you or sending you any money. You might as well get that straight. You think fast track is so good, go on to China and let them vote for you.”

From 1995 to 2000, the U.S. economy lost 1.3 million manufacturing jobs, while the trade deficit exploded from $160 billion to $435 billion. That not only hurts working families, but places the country’s national defense at risk.

“If we had to fight another war, how the hell are we going to fight it without a manufacturing base? Where are we going to buy our weapons from? China? Are we going to buy them from Mexico? Are we going to buy them from Latin America? Because [Bush] is talking about fast track for Latin America now.” The Bush administration wants to expand NAFTA to cover the Western Hemisphere.

Yokich debunked the notion that the UAW is against trade. The key words, he said, are “fair trade.”

“It’s got to be fair trade. What’s wrong with fair trade? It’s our jobs. It is our living, our hope and our nation. Our president does not understand this.”

Any trade deal that is signed should ensure that the rights and economic futures of workers in this country and abroad are enhanced, he said.

President Bush was right to focus attention on national security immediately after the September 11 terrorist attacks, but Bush cannot let that battle distract him from the serious domestic problems affecting Americans at home, Yokich said. Nor should terrorism be used as an excuse to push an agenda that hurts working families in favor of multinational corporations.

“We can’t let this agenda slip away from us,” he said, while thousands of children still go to bed hungry, and health care for retirees is lacking.

Yokich told a story about standing in line at a drugstore to get a prescription filled. As he readied his $2 copay, he noticed an older person paying hundreds of dollars for medicine and wondered if that man spent his entire pension check on a prescription.

“Have you ever been to a drugstore and watched a retiree pay $300 for a prescription? Well, I watched it the other day and it made me sick.

“The greatest, richest nation in the world and we still don’t have health care for our retirees. We still cannot guarantee education for all our children, no matter where they live.”