NW Grain handlers to implement rejected ILWU labor contract-Union Tops Tell Members to Work Without Contract-Bosses Want EGT Conrtract

NW Grain handlers to implement rejected ILWU labor contract-Union Tops Tell Members to Work Without Contract-Bosses Want EGT Contract

Portland Business Journal by Erik Siemers , Business Journal staff writer

http://www.bizjournals.com/portland/news/2012/12/26/grain-handlers-to-im...
Date: Wednesday, December 26, 2012, 2:55pm PST

Erik Siemers

Business Journal staff writer-Portland Business Journal

Operators of four Pacific Northwest grain terminals on Wednesday said they plan to implement a labor contract rejected overwhelmingly last weekend by longshore workers.

In a statement Wednesday afternoon, United Grain Corp., Columbia Grain and Louis Dreyfus Commodities — which operate terminals in Portland, Seattle and Vancouver, Wash. —said their latest contract offer will take effect at 6 a.m. Thursday.

Despite the move, the International Longshore and Warehouse Union has no immediate plans to strike. Instead, the union said longshore workers will return to work under the terms of the rejected contract until notified otherwise.

"The men and women of the ILWU have been exporting grain from these Northwest elevators since 1934 and intend to continue working despite the substandard provisions of the employer's last offer," Jennifer Sargent, a spokeswoman for the ILWU Coast Longshore Division, said in a prepared statement.

Around 3,000 workers at ILWU locals in Portland, Seattle and Tacoma cast ballots last weekend on the grain handlers' "last, best and final" contract offer. The union said 94 percent of rank-and-file voted down the proposal.

The grain handlers contend that the bargaining has been about work rules and not wages and benefits.

The companies are seeking terms similar to those the ILWU agreed to earlier this year in talks with two rival terminals, EGT in Longview, Wash., and Kalama Export in Kalama, Wash. That includes items such as having fewer employees to load ships, the ability to use elevator employees to help in ship loading, greater management discretion in hiring decisions, and eliminating the practice of paying half-hour wages for as little as six minutes of work.

"The employers entered bargaining with the goal of leveling the playing field with their competitors," the grain handlers said in a statement issued Wednesday. "Implementing the offer will help that goal while the companies continue to provide excellent jobs to ILWU’s membership, as they have done for decades."

A letter sent to the ILWU Wednesday from an attorney representing the grain handlers said the employers "remain hopeful that a mutually agreeable contract will be reached at some future date."

But the letter also said that the employers could revise their last contract proposal if the union engages in "economic activity against the employers" or any other action that hurts their operations or cost structure. In that case, the grain handlers would revise the offer with additional costs caused by that activity.

The grain handlers cautioned that the contract enforcement is different from a lockout.

The National Labor Relations Act allows employers to unilaterally enforce a contract when talks reach an impasse. The unions can typically either accept the new terms and enter into a new collective bargaining agreement, strike, or have employees return to work under the new offer while seeking continued bargaining.

It appears that the ILWU has chosen the latter route.

"We are reviewing the multinational employer's letter and we're disappointed that they haven't accepted the union's invitation to continue negotiating to reach a fair agreement with local workers," the ILWU's Sargent wrote.