TYSON: Treating Beef & Chicken Better than Human Beings

"This place is a sweatshop. I want a better place to work--a harassment-free environment. I want to come to work without being harassed, leered at, followed, and screamed at. I won't cross that line without a contract--no matter what."
--Ashley Braaten

"When I started work here, I thought there was a union. In Sudan, every company has a union, because if there is no union, they use you like a slave. But there was no dignity, no respect. I started to talk about the union. We all did--white, black, all of us. I worked hard to bring the union here. One day they called me into the office. They told me, 'Monica, we know about you. We know you talk about the union'. They tried to make me take off my yellow hat where I wrote 'Local 401'. I think that’s when they decided they would find a reason to fire me."
--Monica Deng

These are comments made by workers of the Tyson Foods Plant in Alberta Canada who are currently on strike.

About 2,300 UFCW Canada Local 401 workers at the Lakeside Packers plant had no other choice but to strike on October 12, 2005, after the company rejected a provincial mediator’s contract agreement, which workers voted 90 percent to accept. Workers are asking for basic human rights and safety protection on the job, but have only been met with violence and racism on the picket line.

These workers, many of them refugees from Sudan and Somalia and immigrants from Nigeria, have been attacked on the picket line and subjected to racist jeers. Three were sent to the hospital after being beaten and left writhing in a ditch beside the road. The Local 401 president was also hospitalized when his car was run off the road by Tyson officials, who have since been charged with dangerous diving.

Tyson’s greed continues to come before the right of workers to have dignity, respect, and safe working conditions on the job.

Godwin Iwanegba, a Tyson employee, illustrates the fight for dignity when he says, “I begged to use the washroom and my boss said “No”, so I ended up wetting myself and standing in my own urine for the rest of the work shift. Later I was disciplined for filing a complaint about what happened.”

Workers are on picket lines, fighting for basic health and safety measures now in force at other Canadian plants, including:

The right to refuse processing suspect product which might be dangerous to the worker or the general public.

The right, without loss of pay, to refuse dangerous work that could injure you or a fellow worker.

The “whistle-blower” right to report an unsafe or unsanitary work environment to an outside authority without risk of losing your job.

The right to up-to-date and ongoing health and safety training.

The right to a full time Health and Safety Committee, including the right of a professional union representative to inspect the workplace for health, safety or contract violations as required.

The right, without loss of pay, to stay off work if sick.
Workers Need Safety Protections

For more than a decade, Tyson Foods has operated Lakeside Packers with some of the highest injury rates of any industrialized plant in North America. Many workers have been seriously injured and over the years, scores of workers have been left with permanent injuries and disabilities from working the Lakeside line. The company has refused to agree to a fair contract, leaving workers with the bleak choice of having to strike or return to work at a reprehensible workhouse that has chewed through 100,000 workers over the last 10 years.

Send a message to Tyson Foods Chairman and CEO John Tyson and tell him to start treating his workers like human beings.

"They fire some people if they see a doctor. Because if the doctor sends you to the [Workers Compensation Board], the company doesn't like that. They scare people. There are people who are sick, but too afraid to go and see a doctor. They use us just like animals, not humans. That is why we need a union at Lakeside. If we don't have a union, we will be slaves forever at Lakeside. Any worker at Lakeside will be a slave."
--Sabit Anok

"I have a relative whose hand was crushed [at Lakeside]. He had an operation, but he was back to work in 3 weeks. He was still hurting, and sore. They put him in light duty for a week, then right back on to the kill floor. They said he had to do it, but he could not and so he refused. The company says he quit, but they forced him to quit. If you hurt yourself, you become useless. The managers don't allow you to do a modified job, they don't even greet you any more. They get rid of you. This happens to a lot of people. I am surprised to see this in Canada. Even in Africa, in the third world, you are not suspended for getting hurt. If you have a doctor's note, you can go on short term disability."
--Ring Lual

Source: United Food and Commercial Workers, Oct. 31, 2005