IBEW-AT&T Bargaining News

May 8, 2012 - Contract Negotiations affecting over 7,000 IBEW members employed at AT&T are scheduled to begin on Tuesday, May 15, 2012. The current collective bargaining agreement (CBA) expires at midnight on Saturday, June 23, 2012.  

Opening talks are set to begin in Hoffman Estates, IL.  The CBA is by and between AT&T TELEHOLDINGS, INC., ILLINOIS BELL TELEPHONE COMPANY, INDIANA BELL TELEPHONE COMPANY, AT&T SERVICES, INC. (collectively referred to as “AT&T Midwest”); and AT&T CORP. and AT&T OPERATIONS, INC. (collectively referred to as “AT&T National”). AT&T Midwest and AT&T National and the System Council T-3 on behalf of Local Unions 21, 134, 827, 1269, 1944, 2222, 2324 and 2325 of the INTERNATIONAL BROTHERHOOD OF ELECTRICAL WORKERS, (I.B.E.W.) affiliated with the American Federation of Labor, Congress of Industrial Organizations.

More details about the 2012 IBEW-AT&T bargaining process and the results of the 2012 membership bargaining survey will be made available in the days ahead. This information, bargaining updates and mobilization news will all be available on the union hotline, the IBEW Local Union 21 website, on the IBEWLU21 Facebook and Twitter pages, and can be sent to you automatically by email and/or text. All members are strongly encouraged to sign up for text and email updates on our union’s website.

As you know, AT&T and the Communications Workers of America are already in negotiations, at separate tables in different CWA districts across the country. News and bargaining updates for their talks are available on the CWA's website.  A direct link to CWA @ AT&T is available on our website for those members staying informed on all talks. Don't forget the tense Verizon negotiations with the IBEW and CWA on the East Coast as well. It is critical that we provide as much information to you as possible. It is just as important that each and every member stay informed, organized and prepared, ready to act in the weeks and months ahead.

We will certainly be talking more, sharing facts from the bargaining table and will continue analyzing the overall state of our industry and the relations between our unions and our employers, as it relates to and drives the boldness and arrogance of a 2012 AT&T Corporation. The gravity and outcome of these contract negotiations will affect the families of thousands for decades to come. We all have obligation and carry responsibility.

Our good friend and inspirational labor leader and author Stewart Acuff, a 35 year veteran organizer and current Chief of Staff & Assistant to the President of the Utility Workers Union of America is known for his on target analysis of the problems we all face as workers today, and of the insurmountable power and greed running rampant throughout the world. Every day Acuff fights the good fight and he shares his brilliant insight on every occasion. This from a speech he gave while honoring the late Dr. Martin Luther King:

"You see, Dr. King understood that it is organizing that makes us most human. He knew that when we use our social nature to lift each other up, we express our full humanity. We don't realize our potential in life the way corporate America and their media tells us -- not by pushing others aside or crawling over anyone else's back or kissing somebody's a**, but by linking arms and lifting everyone, everyone's family, everyone's kids, everyone's standard of living. And so today, my brothers and sisters, we are confronted by his memory. We are called by his struggle. We are challenged by his sacrifice."

"They have waged class war on us. It is time for our class to fight back. It's time for us to reach out to one another to fight for the right to organize, to fight corporations that would fight us, to demand that trade agreements protect workers and workers' rights, children, our environment, and our quality of life, and to fight for human dignity."

In unity there is strength.

IBEW Local Union 21 Union Communications:

• Union Hotline is 630.415.2711 or at 866.423.9582 from certain area codes. Extension #1 is for AT&T News.
• IBEW Local Union 21 website is http://www.ibew21.org 
• Sign up to get the latest news from IBEW Local Union 21 sign up for text and email updates here:
• Text Message Shortcode - text IBEW21 to 69866.
• IBEWLU21 on Twitter here.
• IBEWLU21 on Facebook here
• CWA @ AT&T here.

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