7-10-67
URW Locals Deny Rumor Of Breach
Local 45 (Footwear division), Local 218 (Chemical Division) and Local 308 (Synthetic Division), United Rubber Workers Union, issued a joint statement today to emphatically deny the rumors that the three locals were considering pulling out their respective policy committee members from the master contract negotiations with UniRoyal, Inc.
“At no time was any such action considered by any of the three locals executive boards or memberships,” Cy Blanchard, vice-president of Local 218, said this morning as spokesman for the three Locals.
“All locals give their full support to their policy committee members in Cincinnati. We have the utmost confidence in the policy committees’ ability to reach an equitable and satisfactory settlement for all URW members.
“There is no breach between the tire and non-tire workers of the UniRoyal policy committee section as they are solidified in their intent to reach a settlement with the company with the common interest of all the URW membership at heart,” Blanchard said.
Drawing up the statement were Blanchard, Raymond Mengacci, vice-president of Local 45, and Joseph Arbachauskas, vice-president of Local 308.
Blanchard said the vice-presidents searched today for the source of the rumor but could not pin it down.
A negotiating session between UniRoyal and the United Rubber workers unions representatives was held Saturday in Cincinnati. Additional meetings are scheduled for today in an effort to narrow the differences separating the two sides.
UniRoyal president, George Vila, issued a letter July 7th, mailed to the company’s stockholders, describing the issues in the strike of 22,000 employes and its impact on the company’s second-quarter earnings.
The letter notes that negotiations with the union are continuing, and there has been some progress; however, it is very slow.
When the strike was called, the company had sizable inventories in many product lines which helped to cushion the impact of the strike sales. However, the impact on earnings is severe because necessary fixed costs in the striking plants continue without the production necessary to absorb them. As a consequence, net income for the second quarter will sharply lower than the $1.06 a common share in 1966.
The strike has closed 19 plants and idled 22,000 workers. These plants represent 50 per cent of the employes and over 70 per cent of the sales.
The letter states that four days of negotiations by the major rubber companies and the union with Federal Mediation and Conciliation Service took place in Pittsburgh late in June. Federal mediators, not finding it possible to conclude agreements, discontinued these talks after an extensive exploration of the issues.
Vila spelled out to the stockholders the company’s latest wage, pension and insurance offer to the union and explained the differential between tire workers and non-tire workers pay is because competitors in the non-tire segment of the company’s business do not pay the same high wages and benefits and do not provide the same increases as UniRoyal does.
“Strong Possibility”
Rubber Walkout Might Include Goodyear Tire
AKRON, Ohio (UPI) — Negotiations were to resume today in the 80-day old rubber industry strike with a warning from a union official here that the walkout could spread.
John Nardella, president of Local 2, United Rubber Workers, said “a strong possibility” existed a strike deadline would be called in negotiations with the Goodyear Tire & Rubber Co.
Other union sources indicated the deadline might be midnight Wednesday.
Nardella said Goodyear negotiators had indicated the company was ready to make a move on its offer, but had not yet done so.
Nardella gave a detailed report Sunday to the Local 2 membership on progress in contract negotiations. He said union policy committee “would initiate a new course of action” if no settlement was reached soon.
As of Friday, all contractual issues with Goodyear had been resolved except economic questions, including wages, pensions and vacations, Nardella said.
Work at Goodyear has continued on a day to day basis since April 20 when the Firestone Tire & Rubber Co., UniRoyal Inc., and the B. F. Goodrich Co. were struck. General Tire & Rubber was struck June 21.
A strike against Goodyear would idle some 21,000 men at 11 plants in addition to the 54,000 men already on strike across the nation.
The union has rejected as “inadequate” the latest offers from the five firms.
General has offered 43 cents an hour in wage increases over three years and an 80 per cent supplemental unemployment plan.
The other four firms have offered wage increases of 38 cents an hour to tire workers, 31 cents to non-tire workers and a 75 per cent unemployment plan.