Central Indiana Kroger workers: Vote “No” on the UFCW-Kroger sellout contract!

The Kroger Staff Rank-and-File Committee urges our co-workers in Central Indiana to vote down the second contract proposal introduced by the United Meals and Business Staff Native 700 over the subsequent three days!

Everybody who has learn the highlights that have been handed out to staff in shops Wednesday can see this isn’t a “new” contract, however a re-hash of the outdated one we rejected solely weeks in the past. Pay raises for staff on the prime pay charge will solely be $0.65 for the primary yr and $0.50 for the subsequent two years. For clerks within the Third Step, presently the best tier, pay will solely “rise” to the poverty degree of $17.60 an hour by the tip of the contract in Might 2024. For the decrease two tiers, clerks will make simply $15.75 within the First Step and $16.50 within the Second Step by the tip of the contract.

The Highlights should not even “highlights” however “lowlights.” They’re concessions via and thru. Who has the UFCW negotiating staff been negotiating for whereas we’ve been working beneath extensions via vacation weekends, making income for the corporate? Why are we instructed we will solely see the total contract after we ratify a deal we oppose?

The union is selling these raises as being an additional bump on prime of the lower than $2 will increase that the corporate gave out in 2021. The UFCW is enjoying straight into the arms of Kroger and its shareholders by portray this out to be a very good deal. In actuality, all it does is assist the corporate to proceed amassing billions in revenue off of our backs and pitting us in opposition to fellow Kroger staff throughout the US in a race to the underside for the bottom wages.

The UFCW is attempting to sweeten the rotten cope with signing bonuses that we all know will barely put a dent within the quickly rising prices of meals, fuel and housing. Full-time staff at prime pay, who should not leads or division heads, are being bribed with a pitiful $2,500 bonus. Half-time staff at prime pay will get simply $1,000, all of which can be topic to taxes and union dues deductions. So as to add insult to damage, non-top pay staff should not even eligible for these meager sums.

The union that supposedly represents us is negotiating for Kroger and never the working class. It’s time for us to take the initiative to arrange to struggle for our calls for independently of the union.

To start with, we should formulate our personal calls for, a “pink line” past which we is not going to settle for any contract. We suggest these embody the next:

1. Improve beginning pay to at the least $29 per hour, the calculated dwelling wage for an grownup with one dependent little one in Indiana;
2. Return to the precise to an eight-hour day with no penalties for staff who refuse time beyond regulation; and
3. Totally-funded well being care advantages for staff and their households, a defined-benefit pension plan (not 401K-based) for all staff.

Kroger and its main shareholders have greater than sufficient cash of their coffers that they’ve gained off of our labor to satisfy our calls for for larger wages, higher advantages and dealing situations. In 2021, the company raked in $30.3 billion in revenue, a slight drop from $30.9 billion in 2021 however considerably larger than $26.9 billion in gross income recorded in 2019. Its CEO W. Rodney McMullen took residence an $18 million compensation bundle in 2021, which was gained off of the backs of staff who barely survive on $13 per hour.

The UFCW is aware of this, but it’s plain to see that this “union” is extra considering defending the corporate’s aim of gaining extra income whereas we’re paid lower than they’re preventing for the pursuits of staff who pay dues each week.

Union reps are chronically unavailable when we now have questions and patronize us after we specific our want to strike and lift considerations about vote counting. The UFCW is doing the whole lot it may well to make sure that as many staff as doable will be unable to train their proper to vote by having voting be one hundred pc in-person, with solely a one-and-a-half hour window. This forces staff that aren’t working to return in on their days off or effectively earlier than or after their shifts, or journey to totally different shops to vote.

The UFCW’s technique is to persuade us that we must always vote “sure” to the contract, not as a result of it’s good however as a result of there’s nothing we will do about it. However that’s not true. We cannot solely vote the contract down, we will win substantial good points. However this requires that we manage a struggle not solely in opposition to the Kroger however in opposition to the corrupt UFCW paperwork.

To start this wrestle, we urge our co-workers to take the next concrete steps:

• Take measures in opposition to any potential ballot-stuffing by the UFCW. Manage teams of staff at every retailer to watch the balloting and alert co-workers after we discover inconsistencies. This can ship a robust message that the UFCW bureaucrats are on discover.
• Demand an finish to contract extensions. With each contract extension, the UFCW continues to place cash into Kroger’s pockets as we work beneath the pitiful hourly wages that have been negotiated years earlier than inflation hit file excessive ranges. With every extension of the contract, the UFCW willingly extends the no-strike clause in an try to create a authorized impediment to our capacity to unite as a category to withhold our labor energy to cease the income flowing into the coffers of the company.
• If the contract is voted down by lower than two-thirds, demand that the bogus clause requiring a supermajority rejection of a contract earlier than a strike takes place be waived. What does or doesn’t occurred needs to be decided by what staff need, not by some bogus provision which was solely put in as an impediment to a strike.

The fundamental drawback is that the UFCW is run as an unaccountable paperwork, not as a real democratic group. Staff in some locals report that prime officers should not even elected however appointed. However even in circumstances the place officers are elected, their loyalty is to their salaries and to hoarding the lots of of thousands and thousands in union belongings. Which means that the struggle of Kroger staff should start with the struggle to ascertain rank-and-file management.

We’re 8,000-strong throughout the area, and over 450,000-strong throughout the US. If we will unite our struggles, we will win. However this will solely occur if we break away from the isolation imposed by the UFCW and construct this committee, which has the facility to hyperlink up staff throughout industries, throughout the nation and the world in a united wrestle in opposition to company rule.

In case you are a Kroger employee and also you wish to struggle for these calls for outlined above, fill out the shape beneath and start discussions with co-workers in your retailer right now.