Germany: 2.7 million German metalworkers hit the bricks

by Hy Clymber

Sixty thousand German autoworkers stayed home May 6 as IG Metall, the 
country's largest and most powerful union, with 2.7 million members, 
launched the first wave of a series of "flexible" strikes that will move 
from company to company through the country's industrial heartland in 
coming days. Twenty thousand strikers closed 20 other plants on May 7, 
while IG Metall staged demonstrations of thousands of members in major 
manufacturing centres across the country.

Among the first day's targets in the Stuttgart area of southwestern Germany 
were DaimlerChrysler and Porsche, with US-owned John Deere targeted for 
later in the week. Union leaders select day-to-day targets during an 
afternoon telephone conference discussion.

"We've adopted this hit-and-run strategy for two reasons", Klaus Eilrich, a 
union spokesperson told the People's Weekly World during a telephone 
interview from his office in Frankfurt.

"First we want to keep the employers off balance and prevent them from 
instituting a lockout. Second, we want to involve as many workers as 
possible while, at the same time, reducing hardship and a drain on the 
union's finances."

Eilrich said the union is demanding a one-year 6.5 percent wage increase 
and considers the employer offer of 3.3 percent over 15 months, sweetened 
by a one-time payment of 190 euros, "a provocation.

Official figures show the average real wage for a German worker has 
declined from nearly 2,400 marks in 1993 to a little over 2,200 marks now."

Gary Hubbard, public affairs director of the United Steelworkers of America 
(USWA), said the USWA is in "almost daily" touch with IG Metall.

"We have contracts with a number of German firms in the United States and 
Canada", he said, "and know what our brothers and sisters in IG Metall are 
up against. We stand ready to provide any help necessary."

Three US unions -- the Steelworkers, the Autoworkers and the Machinists -- 
as well as IG Metall, are affiliates of the International Metal Workers' 
Federation.

Hubbard said the Federation was an example of the kind of global solidarity 
movement that the USWA is helping to build to counter corporate 
globalisation under the World Trade Organisation.

The present strike is the first industry-wide strike since 1995 and is only 
the fourth in the last 30 years.

Eilrich said union members have gotten nothing from the neoliberal policies 
of the German Government that have "meant nothing more" than a 
redistribution of wealth in favour of industry.

"Now they are saying they want a fairer share and have gone on strike to 
back up their demand."

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People's Weekly World paper of Communist Party, USA, 
http://pww.org/