Justice for Janitors in Houston www.houstonjanitors.org
Thousands of migrant cleaners are on strike in Houston, the 4th most important city in the US - and Bush territory. The cleaners, many of whom are migrants from Mexico, clean the majority of Houston's office buildings. They receive the lowest wages and benefits of any major city in the U.S -- only 4,16€ per hour and no health insurance coverage while cleaning the most important oil companies' headquarters in the world and the most important global real-estate corporations.
Cleaning companies recently threatened to deport undocumented cleaners who support the strike to break union efforts (Texas has one of the harshest political climates, i.e. anti-labour and anti-migrant).
Why are the cleaners on strike? After voting to form a union last year, 5,300 cleaners have been negotiating their first labor contract with Houston's large cleaning companies. Cleaners seek 6,69€ per hour, health insurance, and more full-time jobs (many companies give cleaners only 3-4 hours of work a day, meaning they earn only 15,70€ per day). Despite months of negotiations, the big cleaning companies have refused to offer even modest improvements to cleaners. And the companies have intimidated and fired cleaners who are struggling for desperately needed improvements, prompting SEIU to formally charge the companies with 23 violations of U.S. labor laws.
In response to the companies' actions, cleaners began a strike on October 23. Roughly 1,700 cleaners have walked off their jobs so far, with more set to join them as part of a phased-in, escalating strike plan. Many migrant rights organizations, local politicians and churches have joined with cleaners to support them but it's not enough.
This week cleaners in many of the US's largest cities began walking off their jobs to support the Houston janitors. Cleaners in New York, Washington DC, Chicago, Los Angeles and Sacramento will strike the same national cleaning companies and corporate clients that have refused to provide fair wages and benefits to cleaners in Houston.
This labor dispute needs global support!
We cannot emphasize enough the importance and urgency of the cleaners winning this struggle. This campaign is considered a "breakthrough" fight, a test, because for the fist time migrant service workers are organizing into a militant "social justice" union (community and union as one) in the south of the US. - the most hostile anti-labor environment in the country. The Bush administration and Republican machinery do not want unions in the south - they know this would be a threat to their conservative political base. They will rally their forces to stop unionization.They will try to capitalize on the vulnerability of the precarious migrant labour. They will use their profits to wait out and break the workers' strike fund. Locally thousands of strikers are putting their future on the line, facing deportation, but they are supported by a strong community and national migrant rights movement.
But how can we support this fight at a global level... in real time, against common global corporate players in favor of precarious migrant workers fighting for justice, building collective power, in the belly of the beast? -- this is our challenge and opportunity.
This is what you can do now:
(1) Take direct action in Europe: Two of the biggest property owners in Houston's real-estate industry are global corporations Hines and Chevron, that own huge portions of Houston's office buildings and have failed to ensure that their cleaning companies do the right thing.
We are planning direct actions on these companies in Europe on the November 8 & 10, and beyond until victory. If you live in a large European city and you can organize something let us know at val@kein.org - we will send you the sites in your city and materials.
(2) Take action on the internet: Go to the campaign website and participate in the online actions against these greedy companies. Go to "Take Action" at http://www.houstonjanitors.org/get-involved/ On the
website, you can also access podcasts that allow you to hear directly from cleaners about why they're striking.
for more info see:
http://www.chevronwontyoujoinus.org/home/
Hines (www.hines.com) is one of the world's largest real-estate companies,
owning more than 10 billion euros of properties in 85 countries. It has
operations throughout Europe, with premier office buildings in London,
Paris, Madrid, Berlin, Milan, Warsaw, etc. The second company is Chevron,
one of the most important oil corporations in the U.S. ... No need to say
anything more.
