January 10, 2008: The power is in the hands of freight Teamsters, who will vote on the tentative agreement and all supplements. Voting will include all freight Teamsters, including ABF, except DHL. ABF and other freight Teamsters will vote because the Freight Division intends to hold ABF to the same standard contract.

Freight Teamsters will get two ballots: one for the master, and one for the regional supplement. If you are opposed to the agreement, it makes sense to vote No on both. (On the recent UPS agreement, three supplements were rejected in Pennsylvania and New York. In all three cases, members quickly won gains there).

Ballots are mailed on Jan. 14 and must be received in Washington by Feb. 8. Majority rule will prevail. Your vote is secret.

Teamsters for a Democratic Union members have gone to court several times to win the right to fair contract votes. We won the right to obtain all supplements and the NMFA on the date they are given to officials at the “two-person” meeting. Because we post them on the web, now even the IBT posts them!

TDU fought for and won the right to majority rule in contracts (previously it took two-thirds to reject) in 1988, and won the right to a separate vote on the supplements in 1991. Leaders in the Hoffa administration fought against both of these reforms.

We urge all freight Teamsters to use their right to vote.

The tentative NMFA contains the dangerous concessions that we have outlined here over the past month.

Click here to read the full contract and download a leaflet to distribute from Freight2008.org.

January 7, 2008: Today, the Bush administration spat in the public’s face by allowing full access to U.S. roads to yet another Mexico-based carrier — despite Congress’ clear intent that the reckless NAFTA trucking pilot program be brought to an end.

The Federal Motor Carrier Safety Administration (FMCSA) announced today that the Baja-based carrier Madereria Las Lomitas is now authorized to send a truck throughout U.S. roads. That means 12 Mexico-based carriers are now sending 57 trucks across the U.S. and are no longer restricted to the border zone. This announcement comes on the heels of the administration’s shocking statement that it would continue with the NAFTA trucks pilot program even though President Bush last month signed into law an omnibus appropriations bill that cut all funds for the program.

FMCSA’s purposeful defiance blatantly disregards the newly passed federal law. The appropriations provision prohibits using any funds to “establish” a pilot program. The dictionary’s definition of “establish” includes “to introduce and cause to grow and multiply.” FMCSA has told reporters that the law bars only the “establishment” of new pilot programs and that its current pilot program — the exact same one that prompted Congress to cut off funding — was “established” in September 2007. Yet FMCSA continues to authorize new carriers, further “establishing” the program in any meaning of the term.

Click here to read more.

January 7, 2008: Teamster local officers will meet on January 8 in Washington to get a copy of the proposed tentative NMFA, and will then vote Yes or No to recommend approval to the membership.

The changes to the NMFA and all supplements will be available at the meeting, and then should then be available to all freight Teamsters.

Every Teamster has a right to get the proposed master and supplements. You may also want to ask your local officers just what they think of the proposed contract.

Read more about the tentative freight agreement at Freight2008.org.

Sign up for email updates from Freight2008.org.

January 5, 2007: The Teamsters Union is about to launch an organizing drive at UPS Freight, which all Teamsters should support and help as much as we can.

Just as important, all Teamsters should support negotiating an industry-leading contract.

The question is will the UPS Freight contract set the same standards as the National Master Freight Agreement, or will it be substandard?

Although it will be a freight contract, and for the most part freight locals will do the organizing, Ken Hall of the Parcel Division will head the bargaining. On a conference call with local unions, Hall stated that the UPS Freight contract at the Indianapolis terminal will be the “template” for the national contract he wants to negotiate.

Many officers and members want to aim higher. On that same call a number of officers said they wanted to bargain to get Teamster pensions and benefits into the contract. Many in the Freight Division are concerned about any contract that could undercut the NMFA.

We believe that with a strong organizing drive, our union can have solid bargaining strength at UPS Freight, and certainly enough clout to win a better contract. Teamster locals and members should support the organizing drive, and also unite behind winning a contract that is up to Teamster standards.

January 3, 2008: DHL bargaining is moving on to wages and is expected to wrap up soon. Disastrous concessions have already been agreed to in the tentative deal, so members need to prepare now to defeat these givebacks.

Officers involved in the negotiations report that the proposed tentative deal will include the greatly increased use of part-timers on docks and for air pick-ups. It will contain language to red circle existing full-time Teamsters, by name, and offer them protection for 40 hours work.

A red circle is more like a red noose. Under this arrangement, as Teamsters leave, DHL could utilize more and more part-timers. This would destroy good Teamster jobs and also eliminate the overtime that many Teamsters rely on. And it will tighten that noose.

The company may try to buy some votes with a slightly larger wage increase. Even if they do, DHL Teamsters will still be over $6 behind UPS drivers. And no wage boost is worth giving away the future in massive concessions.

This Deal Can Be Stopped

This deal can be stopped, and very likely will, if we start now to organize to Vote No on the national agreement and the so-called Pick Up and Delivery Supplement—where the dirty concessions will be located.

We stopped this deal once, last summer, and we can kill it for good this time. The bigger the No vote, the more change we’ll win.

We have to wait until we see it in writing, but Teamsters should prepare now. Talk to your fellow Teamsters. Don’t let anyone tell you “it’s a done deal” because it is not, unless we vote for it. We should study the deal, inform our fellow Teamsters, and determine our own future as Teamsters.

What do you think members should do to prepare to fight givebacks? Click here to send a message to TDU.

Stay in the loop. Click here to get email updates from TDU's DHL Network.

December 26, 2007: The trucking industry association is bragging about new concessions in the tentative deal at Yellow/Roadway.

The proposed deal would give YRC more “flexibility,” according to Transport Topics, a publication of the American Trucking Associations.

The magazine also reports that ABF will soon release a proposal to withdraw from all Teamster multi-employer pension plans.

“The second act of the LTL talks could offer more fireworks,” according to the magazine.

Click here to read the full article at Freight2008.org.

Click here to download a new freight bulletin with information on the tentative deal with YRC.

The new freight deal includes $1 an hour to protect our pensions and benefits, but it also contains concessions that severely weaken our contract.

Click here to read the full story and download the bulletin at Freight2008.org.

December 19, 2007: Public Citizen filed a motion asking the U.S. Court of Appeals to reinstate the 10-hour driving limit and end the 34-hour restart. The motion blasts the Federal Motor Carrier Safety Administration (FMCSA) for ignoring driver health and safety, and the orders of the court in two previous rulings.

The Teamsters Union is supporting the Public Citizen motion. Hopefully the court, which has twice ruled against the FMCSA on this issue, will soon order them to comply with the law as passed by Congress.

Click here to read the Motion to Enforce the Court’s Order.

Click here to read Public Citizen’s Senate Testimony.

December 19, 2007: The omnibus spending bill (H.R. 2764) passed by the House Dec. 17 contains language denying funds for the Transportation Department's pilot program under which 100 Mexican trucks would be able to travel freely within the United States to make cargo deliveries.

Mexico-domiciled trucks have been limited to the commercial zones along the borders of California, Arizona, New Mexico, and Texas. The pilot program was developed to comply with the North American Free Trade Agreement's trucking provisions that have been delayed.

President Bush has threatened to veto the spending measure if its passes in its present form.

The House approved the measure by a 253-154 vote. The Senate could vote on it as early as the evening of Dec. 18.

Under NAFTA, which entered into force on Jan. 1, 1994, Mexican trucks were to have been given complete access to four U.S. border states in 1995 and access throughout the United States in 2000. But the Clinton administration, citing safety concerns, failed to implement the trade agreement's trucking provisions.

In February 2007, the Department of Transportation announced a one-year pilot program that would allow a limited number of Mexican trucks to deliver goods within the continental United States (37 DLR A-8, 2/26/07 ).

DOT began operation of the cross-border trucking program Sept. 6 after a court challenge brought by the International Brotherhood of Teamsters was preliminarily denied (174 DLR A-11 ).

By Rossella Brevetti