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12 June 2009
Fedex is setting up a multi-million dollar public relations campaign to challenge legislation that makes it easier for its ground workers to organise and puts the company on an even footing with arch competitor, UPS.
The company’s public relations campaign, which refers to the legislation as a UPS “bailout”, seeks to preserve the status quo, which has allowed the company to stifle union organising for more than a decade.
The Federal Aviation Administration Reauthorization bill would see Fedex ground delivery workers covered under the National Labor Relations Act (NLRA), making it easier for them to choose union representation on a location-by-location basis, rather than the Railway Labor Act, which allows them organise on a system-wide basis. UPS delivery workers have always been covered by the NLRA.
“Fedex has taken corporate arrogance to a new level with their latest campaign,” declared Rich Michalski, general vice-president of the International Association of Machinists and Aerospace Workers' headquarters. “With a legion of lobbyists and millions in campaign contributions, Fedex expects to maintain the unfair advantage they slipped into a bill more than a decade ago, giving them a huge advantage over their competitors, while keeping a chokehold on their employees.”
“It is just the height of hypocrisy for them to allege that there is a bailout of their competitor, when in fact, it’s the company, it’s Fedex, who has benefited from this misclassification of their workers,” said Ken Hall, international vice president and director of the package division at the Teamsters union. “It’s laughable to think that they would portray this as some bailout. This is simply levelling the playing field.”
Last month the US House of Representatives voted overwhelmingly in favour of the bill.
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