CWA members and workers from T-Mobile USA showed their solidarity with striking workers at Deutsche Telekom in Germany. CWA President Larry Cohen sent a message to strike leaders in Germany who then read the message to Deutsche Telekom strikers – both on the picket lines and in meetings (English translation). Meanwhile, throughout the U.S. hundreds of workers gathered in front of T-Mobile stores holding signs reading “Solidarity with ver.di.”CWA members and workers from T-Mobile USA showed their solidarity with striking workers at Deutsche Telekom in Germany. CWA President Larry Cohen sent a message to strike leaders in Germany who then read the message to Deutsche Telekom strikers – both on the picket lines and in meetings. Meanwhile, throughout the U.S. hundreds of workers gathered in front of T-Mobile stores holding signs reading “Solidarity with ver.di.”

With 3,300 workers at risk of losing their jobs when T-Mobile USA closes seven call centers in June, the Communications Workers of America launched a national campaign today to protect those jobs at a rally in Bellevue, outside corporate headquarters.  Participants included CWA members and union and community supporters from the Seattle area. Also joining the rally were T-Mobile workers, including workers from the call centers that are slated to close.

CWA activists and T-Mobile USA workers are spotlighting the company's bad decision to close seven call centers, affecting the jobs of 3,300 workers. From Pennsylvania to Texas to Oregon, workers are meeting with community leaders, local elected officials and others to fight for their jobs. The seven centers slated to close are: Allentown, Pa.; Fort Lauderdale, Fla.; Frisco, Texas; Brownsville, Texas; Thornton, Colo.; Redmond, Ore.; and Lenexa, Kansas. 

CWA has been working with T-Mobile USA workers who want a union voice. The German union ver.di, which represents T-Mobile and Deutsche Telekom workers in Germany, has played a major role in this effort, standing up for the rights of workers to choose union representation without the atmosphere of fear and intimidation that T-Mobile USA has created.

In an open letter published today in the New York Times, 11 leading German legal scholars and politicians called on Deutsche Telekom and other German companies to ensure that workers at German subsidiaries in the U.S., particularly T-Mobile USA, are able to “exercise their unrestricted right to opt for organized representation in the company without fear. They must not be influenced, pressured, or intimidated by employers if they exercise their basic right for freedom of association. The human right of freedom of speech notably entails this right as well.”

In Germany, Deutsche Telekom respects unions and workers’ rights, and in fact boasts of its positive relationship with unions. But in the U.S., 23,000 workers face an atmosphere of intimidation from a company that hires union busting consultants and viciously fights workers’ efforts to join a union.

The signers, among them the former Federal Minister of Justice Herta Däubler Gmelin, former Vice Chancellor Franz Müntefering, and former Federal Minister of Defense Peter Struck are calling on Deutsche Telekom to “end all collaboration with U.S. consultants who advise employers how to fight employee representation.”

Click here to support the We Expect Better from Deutsche Telekom and T-Mobile Campaign.

They should bring back some of the 6000 that they've outsourced to the Philippines and Honduras! 

You've probably heard by now that T-Mobile USA plans to close 7 call centers on June 22, 2012, putting 3,300 people out of work. This comes on top of hundreds who've already been let go as they began to downsize a couple of years ago.  

This is a wake up call - the time to organize is NOW!

Consider these facts:

WITH A UNION

• the company could not make unilateral decisions like that, they would have to bargain over it
• the company would have to sit down and negotiate over the effects: severance, job training, health care etc.
• the workers could use the political might of the union to lobby elected officials to pressure the company to keep some call centers open.