ITF and UNI sponsored bringing Union leadership and rank and file members together on May 23-25 in Frankfurt Germany for a global delivery conference.
Mario Santos L. 114, President of the CAW DHL Corporate Council along with Nat. Rep. Len Poirier attended on behalf of the CAW and the CAW Road Transport Council. 80 participants from 30 countries representing workers from DHL, TNT, Fed-EX and UPS attended the three day conference. All attendees gave an update to the status of these multi-national employers in their region of the world, sharing information on the organized and strategized on how the un-organized workers in these companies can be represented in the future. Mario and Len were asked to give presentation on how the DHL corporate council was established and what they have been doing collectively together across Canada to support workers from all over the world. The report also included an update on the recent DHL sale of domestic business to the TransForce Group to be operated as Loomis Express and DHL remains in the Canadian market as the International courier.
Much discussion and debate was held on further actions of organizing DHL workers globally and how they have different standards of treatment and labour relations in different countries. It was unanimously agreed that the global campaign will have to take a more aggressive approach this year as the company is still failing to recognize the significance of signing a word frame agreement. Research was shared on these companies and the global customers of these large logistic couriers, and demanding that these customers share in the responsibility of treating workers with respect in the whole supply chain.
The last day included participants going to the DHL Corporate Shareholders meeting dressed in DHL yellow colored shirts handing out leaflets to all attendees “we demand respect”. This leaflet included reports from around the world showing workplace action from last year’s united campaign.
