Ad blitz, conference put focus on attacks on worker rights

The Change to Win labor federation has launched a print and web advertising blitz against the \”September stampede\” of 61 anti-worker rulings by the Bush-named majority of the National Labor Relations Board. The blitz includes full-page ads in newspapers in Washington, D.C., the Twin Cities and Cincinnati, CTW spokeswoman Noreen Nielsen said. CTW also bought advertising on blogs.

The ads are part of the federation\’s evolving campaign against the agency\’s rulings and are timed to remind Congress of the Bush-named board\’s actions just before a two-day conference, Dec. 10-11, of union organizers from around the world. The conference includes a Congressional hearing on Tuesday.

The conference, hosted by the AFL-CIO at the George Meany Center/National Labor College in Silver Spring, Md., will feature organizers from 63 nations talking about rampant labor law-breaking by U.S. firms, aided and abetted by the Bush administration, and how those conditions affect workers\’ rights not just here but abroad.

\”This is not just an assault on American workers, it\’s an assault on the American Dream,\” said Change to Win chair Anna Burger in a statement. \”The tragic result of fewer and fewer workers being able to exercise their right to have a union is unprecedented income and wealth inequality\” and other ills. \”Americans are tired of the Bush labor board…serving greedy corporations at the expense of working families.\”

At the conference, sponsored by the Council of Global Unions, \”trade union leaders from around the world will discuss why respect for freedom of association and collective bargaining is crucial to the survival of human rights and democracy around the world,\” organizers said.

This article was written by Press Associates, Inc., news service. Used by permission.