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May 12, 2010 - No. 89 Vale Inco Oppose Vale's Call for the
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Sudbury |
Voisey Bay |
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|
% Change 1Q10/1Q09 |
% Change 1Q10/1Q09 |
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Nickel |
-98.5% |
-79.5% |
|
Copper |
-88.0% |
-84.6% |
|
Cobalt |
-100.0% |
-83.0% |
|
Platinum |
-97.1% |
n.a. |
|
Palladium |
-93.6% |
n.a. |
|
Gold |
-81.3% |
n.a. |
|
Silver |
-80.3% |
n.a. |
In its accompanying financial report, Vale reported that "Given the effect of the labour strike in Sudbury and Voisey's Bay in our production and the lack of inventories, we continued to increase the purchase of both intermediate and finished nickel products to meet contractual obligations with clients." These purchases reached U.S.$91 million in 1Q10. Vale also reported that expenses related to idle capacity and stoppage of Canadian nickel operations totalled U.S.$205 million for the quarter.
Reviewing the results of its non-ferrous minerals division, Vale reported that "The performance of the non-ferrous minerals business continued to be negatively affected by the strike at the Sudbury and Voisey's Bay operations. Total revenues from non-ferrous minerals reached U.S.$1.635 billion in 1Q10, decreasing US$212 million relatively to 4Q09. The effect of higher prices -- U.S.$117 million -- was more than offset by the decline in sales volumes, U.S.$329 million. [...] Nickel sales produced revenues of U.S.$687 million in 1Q10, against U.S.$741 million in 4Q09. Lower volumes were responsible for a reduction of U.S.$141 million, while higher sales prices caused an increase of U.S.$87 million."
As to its overall results, Vale reported that net earnings increased from US$1,363 million in the first quarter of 2009 to US$1,604 million for 1Q10. Total assets were reported to have increased to US$104,340 million from US$81,730 million a year earlier.
Enough Is Enough! Oppose Vale Inco's
Anti-Worker Hysteria and Attacks!
Value Inco workers have
rights by virtue of the fact
that they produce the material wealth the company expropriates. Despite
this, Vale Inco claims that the workers are interfering with its
business and wants whatever they do declared illegal. This is not only
self-serving; it is absurd. Those who wield the law
as a weapon against the workers
increasingly lose any moral authority
because unless what is legal is just and seen to be just, then the law
is
merely an instrument of the powerful to get their own way.
Vale Inco is ratcheting up the hysteria against the workers precisely because so far it has failed to get its own way on the basis of its strength. Despite its strength, nothing it does changes the basic fact that the cause of the workers is just and everyone knows it. Rather than deal with the legitimate demands of the workers, including that the fired workers be reinstated in the back to work protocol, Vale Inco is intent on creating as much hysteria as it can so nobody can think or see what is taking place before their very eyes.
However, contrary to what
Vale Inco seems to think, the
workforce in Sudbury was not born yesterday. For 10 months, it has
opposed all attempts by the company to get the workers to settle on the
basis of a contract which does not meet the requirements of the workers
and their union. Striking USW 6500 workers,
their families, friends and allies have the full support of Canadian
workers from coast to coast in their struggle to force Vale Inco back
to the bargaining table and negotiate a Fair Deal Now!
Community Expresses Opposition
to Use of Scab Labour
USW Local 6500 declared May an anti-scab month. Anti-scab activities sponsored by USW Local 6500 include a Northern Ontario Rally in Sault Ste. Marie called "Save Northern Jobs and Northern Communities" on Wednesday, May 19 and a rally outside MPP Rick Bartolucci's Sudbury office on Thursday, May 20. Workers are called on to meet at the union hall at 66 Brady Street at 12:00 noon after the General Membership meeting and march over to Bartolucci's office to deliver a message regarding the use of scabs in the community and the lack of Government involvement. The march will be followed by a BBQ at 66 Brady St. at 2:00 pm.
On Wednesday, May 26, the
workers take their protest to
Ottawa where they will camp on Parliament Hill. The purpose of the
rally is to attract national attention to the sale of Canadian
resources, infrastructure, manufacturing plants and businesses, the
union says.
Contact John Landry at 507-4581 for details and to reserve a seat on a bus to the Sault Ste. Marie and Ottawa rallies.
In the lead-up to anti-scab month, on April 28, the City of Greater Sudbury Council Condemned the use of replacement workers by Vale Inco in the ten month strike by 3,000 Sudbury mine, mill, smelter and refinery workers. Council chambers were packed to overflow with more than 200 USW Local 6500 members and their family members, friends and supporters. After a lively debate, Council unanimously passed the following resolution:
City of Greater Sudbury Resolution 2010-153
Moved by Councillor Claude Berthiaume; Seconded by Councillor Ron Dupuis:
Labour Dispute -- Vale Inco & United Steelworkers Local 6500
WHEREAS the citizens of the City of Greater Sudbury have grave concerns respecting the ongoing strike at Vale Inco and the hardships that the strike is causing for workers, their families, and the community at large;
AND WHEREAS Vale Inco has retained replacement workers for the first time since certification in 1944;
AND WHEREAS the employment of replacement workers only escalated the dispute causing the parties to become more and more entrenched in their respective positions, thereby minimizing the opportunity for a negotiated settlement;
AND WHEREAS Vale Inco has a responsibility to both its own workforce and the community at large to minimize the potential for conflict and to show leadership and good faith to make every reasonable effort to end this strike;
AND WHEREAS the employment of replacement workers by Vale Inco creates a climate of conflict, mistrust, and uncertainty, which is counterproductive to the negotiating process;
AND WHEREAS the tax dollars the community spends on policing the strike could go to more important tasks in this community;
THEREFORE BE IT RESOLVED that the City of Greater Sudbury encourages Vale Inco to show good faith and leadership by terminating its usage of replacement workers;
AND BE IT FURTHER RESOLVED that the City of Greater Sudbury encourages Vale Inco and the United Steelworkers Local 6500 to return to the bargaining table and, in good faith, resolve their differences putting an end to this unnecessary strike that has and will continue to damage the economy of our community, and that, if necessary, to request again third party mediation assistance from the Ministry of Labour;
AND BE IT FURTHER RESOLVED that the City of Greater Sudbury hereby encourages the Province of Ontario to enact legislation that would limit the ability of companies to hire replacement workers during a strike;
AND THAT this resolution be
forwarded to the Honourable Dalton McGuinty, Premier of Ontario, the
Honourable Peter Fonseca, Minister of Labour, local MPs and MPPs, the
Association of Municipalities of Ontario (AMO), and the Federation of
Northern Ontario Municipalities (FONOM).
Laurentian University
In related news, the Laurentian University Staff Union (LUSA) has brought to light and condemned the fact that Vale Inco is using university facilities to train scabs. FAIR DEAL NOW posters were hung in the hallways outside the classroom in protest of the training of scabs on campus.
In a letter to University President Dominic Giroux, LUSA president Tracy Oost said the presence of scabs-in-training on campus is very upsetting to Laurentian University staff and called on the university to put a stop to it. Oost said that if the university would not take a stand in support of the strike, it should, at the very least remain neutral. "This is a union town and a unionized campus. It is an insult to all unionized employees to come to work and be confronted with these scabs on a daily basis," Oost said.
Laurentian University responded that providing the classroom space for Vale Inco was in keeping with its rental policy. Vale Inco rented the space and the University had fulfilled its contractual obligation.
Vale Inco spokesman Steve Ball was more boorish. He reminded the university that it is "a recipient of very large donations" from Vale Inco. He accused LUSA of Vale Inco's "right" to run its business as it sees fit in the city of Sudbury. Steve Ball went on to say the appropriate course of action for the University would have been to prohibit anyone from putting up the FAIR DEAL NOW posters in support of the strikers.
Vale's 'Other Side' -- Global Impacts and Violations
On May 4, the United Steelworkers released a dossier which documents the global impacts of the violations carried out by Vale.
"The purpose of this dossier is to enhance the visibility of the 'other side' of Vale's projects, which greatly differs from the image of success, sustainable development, community support and social redistribution of dividends that the company so actively publicizes," a news release informs. The following is merely a sample of Vale's violations and the harm they cause.
Human Tragedies
A serious accident occurred on April 19, 2010 at Port of Ponta da Madeira, São Luis, Maranhâo Brazil, taking the lives of 2 Vale workers, and injuring 5 others. Both were hit by an ore bin (which fell from 30 metres high when a conveyer belt broke). This is one more in a series of accidents that have been occurring since 2007, without significant improvements in working conditions.
In 2008, there were 2,860 workplace accidents; 9 workers died.
Vale's railways caused accidents leading to the death or serious injury of 23 people in 2007.
There were 140 world-wide cases of corruption registered against Vale in 2008.
In Peru, Vale's subsidiary was found using an armed militia within the mining site.
Displaced Indigenous Peoples
Some 14,400 people from 11 rural communities in state of Maranhão, Brazil are being displaced for large steel industry projects.
The Paraupebas communities in Brazil are being driven out of their homes for infrastructure works on the Salobo project for the extraction and processing of copper ore.
Iron ore transports and the pig iron produced by 16 factories located in Brazil are linked to a rise in child prostitution.
The Moatize Coal Project in Mozambique will displace approximately 1,100 families. Their traditional culture has undergone dramatic change, such as the exhumation of corpses.
The traditional Karonsi'e Dongi community in Indonesia decided to return to their homeland. Instead of their fields, homes and cemetery, they found mines, a golf course and dormitories for Vale workers. Currently, 30 families are struggling to get their land back.
Air and Water Pollution
In New Caledonia, Vale Inco wants to build a mining residue spill-duct into the ocean, affecting the fragile UNESCO World Heritage coral reef that surrounds the island. Initial reports state that on April 21, 2010 670,000 litres of an acidic solution spilled from the tailing pond originating from the nickel extraction process. In April 2009, the New Caledonian government charged Vale Inco following a massive acid spill at Vale's sulphuric acid plant during a test run. The spill killed thousands of fish in the local river.
The expansion of the port of Ponta da Madeira in the municipality of São Luís, Brazil will likely lead to a strong increase in pollution and to severe social and environmental impacts along the Carajás corridor.
The intended production for the São Luís Steel Industry Hub in Brazil is estimated to produce a yearly emission of 35.6 million tons of carbon dioxide (CO2), which is the single major cause of the greenhouse effect.
The exploration of ore deposits in the Urucum hills in Brazil dried up the main supply of water in the region -- the Urucum stream. Since 2002, Vale has been facing two lawsuits for burying the spring of the Urucum stream, after an explosion that occurred during mining activities for the extraction of manganese.
Vale Inco wants to spill 400,000 tons of waste yearly in Sandy Pond as part of a proposed nickel operation in Voisey's Bay, Long Harbour, Canada. It prefers to use the existing pond, rather than invest in a tailings dam.
Vale has petitioned the Ontario, Canada government for "an alternative standard for nickel" at the Sudbury smelting facility since its operations "would not meet the compliance requirements for nickel dust emissions."
In news related to the acid spill in New Caledonia, Mariana Variety News, Micronesia reports that local associations and the Southern province of New Caledonia condemned Vale last week after thousands of litres of sulphuric acid were accidentally spilled into the environment, at the Vale-Goro nickel mine site, creating a major environmental disaster.
The acid spill occurred in mid-April at the construction site of the huge nickel mining project under development by Vale, in the south of the main island, near Goro. The spill, estimated at up to five thousand litres of sulphuric acid, was only made public later in the week. Vale's Goro nickel mining site is scheduled to be commissioned later this year. The spill resulted from Vale's recklessly pushing ahead with the commissioning, the newspaper said.
President Philippe Gomès, President of the Southern province expressed anger at the spill and at being kept in the dark. He said it was violation of Vale-Goro obligations.
Gomès said one violation was that Vale-Goro had manufactured thousands of litres of acid used in the nickel extraction process, even before a containment pond necessary to protect against such spills was completed. As a result, the acid, which leaked from a faulty pipe connection, went straight into the environment, which is globally recognized for its biodiversity. Last year, New Caledonia's lagoons received world recognition from the United Nations Educational Scientific and Cultural organization and this site had been added to the list of Natural World Heritage sites.
Vale-Goro technicians later managed to neutralize high acidity levels, but the damage had already been done. World Wildlife Fund local representative Hubert Géraux said "It's like bringing back the water temperature from 100 degrees Celsius to 20 degrees Celsius. You can do that, but it's too late." He said this was tantamount to an "environment disaster."
President Gomès also denounced the fact that Southern province authorities were only notified of the spill by Vale-Goro officials nearly thirty hours after the disaster occurred.
Environment
"Get Out Migration" Action to Curb the Norwegian
Fish Farm Monopolies on BC's West Coast
Alexandra Morton is a marine biologist who has lived and studied marine life in a small town in the Broughton archipelago near northern Vancouver Island. For many years she has studied the impact of open-sea salmon farms owned by three Norwegian fish farm monopolies. These monopolies, including one owned by Statoil, the Norwegian state-owned oil monopoly, have been given the right to override the protection provided salmon and other species in the Fisheries Act. The Canadian federal and provincial governments have also subsidized these fish monopolies claiming they are creating jobs on the economically deprived west coast.
Morton has demonstrated that the salmon farms infest the waters where they're located with sea lice and other pathogens. The farms straddle the crucial waters where wild salmon fry migrate from rivers and lakes out into the Pacific. She has logged the number of fry (year-old adolescent fish) infested with sea lice, common to adult salmon, but fatal to fry. She provided strong evidence that the nine million "missing" sockeye salmon due to reach the Fraser River last summer, were probably wiped out by such infestations on their journey north past the fish farms in 2007. Other runs in 2009 on the west coast where there are no farms, returned in record numbers, as they did in Alaska where fish farms are banned.
Morton launched two legal cases as she reached out to the British Columbia public to take up the demand to curb the fish farm monopolies and force them to take their operations into tanks on land where they would have to control the diseases, lice and remove their waste. The first case which she won in Supreme Court forces the federal government to take over the regulation of fish farms from provincial government authority. The second case, made directly against a fish farm for entrapping wild salmon and herring in their nets, has now been taken over from her privately launched action, by the crown prosecutor which it failed to undertake earlier.
In addition, the work of Morton, other fish scientists who have joined her together with Native people in their fishing communities and many thousands of settlers has forced the Harper government to establish a public judicial inquiry into the disappearance of the sockeye salmon in 2009. Supreme Court Justice Bruce Cohen who is heading the Inquiry is set to open hearings in the near future.
 (www.salmonaresacred.org) |
To raise awareness of the damage to the environment caused by open-sea salmon farms, from April 23 to May 8, Morton walked from her town near Alert Bay to Victoria, speaking in various towns on her way south. Her trek culminated in a large public rally at Centennial Park in Victoria followed by a second demonstration in front of the legislature buildings to demand the provincial government shut down the Norwegian monopoly fish farms, or force them to farm fish in tanks on land, an entirely feasible operation. The cost for not doing so will be the destruction of the wild fish runs.
Many people, including Alexandra Morton, are concerned that if the wild salmon are destroyed, nothing will stop the oil monopolies, including Statoil, which is heavily invested in the tar sands in Alberta, from deep sea off shore drilling on BC's west coast which is presently illegal. Others fear if the Fraser sockeye are destroyed, U.S. monopolies like General Electric, will set about damming the Fraser for export of hydro-electricity.
Morton has pointed out that the struggle to curb the Norwegian fish monopolies and protect the wild salmon is part of a larger fight for democracy and the right of the communities and people to decide such important issues of public policy.
The following is an account by Alexandra Morton on her trek to save the wild salmon, crucial to the survival of Indigenous communities throughout BC and to thousands of settlers who have made their livelihood from the salmon for generations.
Report on "Get Out Migration" Trek to Victoria
to Close the Open Net Fish Farms
Walking through the communities of Vancouver Island on the Get Out Migration has been a powerfully emotional experience. We are walking to tell people that if they simply stand up and make themselves visible to government, there is no reason we have to lose our wild salmon. But as we walk into towns with our flags flying, brilliant salmon signs, singing "we are walking to Victoria to save our fish," an entirely unexpected thing is happening. People are coming up to me and holding me -- crying. They are speaking about schools without children, independent livelihoods lost, communities dying. This is about much more than fish.
 The Get Out Migration in motion; centre: Alexandra Morton. (Teresa Bird) |
This is about the independent way of life that built these communities going extinct. As we walk I see a land of beautiful clear streams, fertile soil green with life, air sweet with flowers and then I enter towns so burdened by global corporate markets that they can no longer thrive on the richness of this land. There is something very wrong here, it is painful to witness and people are sad.
Somehow we have become blind to our public resource - millions of salmon flowing annually to our doorstep, feeding people and our economy province wide. We have somehow been convinced that Atlantic salmon, dyed pink, vaccinated, fed Chilean fish, in pens where we cannot catch them, infesting our fish with lice -- are better. We believe there are jobs even as the Norwegian companies are mechanizing as fast as they can to reduce the number of jobs. When people see us they know we have been duped and they don't know how to turn this around. The Get Out Migration has been protected, blessed, gifted and honored by the First Nations who know best what has been lost. Everyday more people are joining our trek -- weathering storms in tents, waving at thousand honking motorists on the road to Victoria. Our ranks swell as we enter the towns, white doves have been released, First Nation canoes parallel us, songs have been written, feasts laid out, flotillas surround us, people are awakening.
Do we still live in a democracy? Our essential rights and freedoms are being lost as foreign shareholders decide our fate, what happens on our land, dividing our communities, in an equation where they get more as we get less. As our salmon go so we go, they are a lifeline to the powerful natural world that gave birth to us. We must lead our governments back to where we can survive. Walk with us. Be there for our salmon, our towns, our children for yourself. If you want to be represented you must represent yourself.
Mining
Demonstrators Demand Social Accountability
at New
Gold Mining Company Annual Meeting
Toronto, May 6, 2010
Representatives of victims of the New Gold mining company, hailing from Cerro San Pedro Potosí, Mexico and El Morro, Chile, demonstrated on May 6 in Toronto on the occasion of the company's first annual shareholders' meeting. Through their banners and leaflets, the demonstrators informed the people about the human and environmental rights violations of New Gold in both Mexico and Chile. The banners read: "New Gold Criminal and Irresponsible Company," and "Mexico's Supreme Court Has Ordered the Immediate Closure of New Gold."
At the beginning and end of
the meeting, several
shareholders were questioned by demonstrators about the violations
committed by New Gold. These shareholders replied that, no matter what
the cost to Mexico or Chile, their mining operations would continue.
One shareholder, when stopped by a member of
the Broad Opposition Front (Frente Amplio Opositor -- FAO), Montreal
section, who reminded him about the reasons for New Gold losing all its
work permits since 2004 in Cerro San Pedro, Mexico, simply stated: "we
have invested millions of dollars and we're not going to fall behind
just because certain people
don't like it."
New Gold is currently continuing its mining activities in Cerro San Pedro Potos Potosí, despite the fact that all its permits are being withdrawn. With utmost impunity the company is not only continuing to violate the injunctions that ordered it to stop all dynamiting and mineral extraction, but is continuing to intimidate the people who accuse it of issuing death threats and stirring up divisions in the surrounding communities. It is able to act this way due to the systemic corruption and influence-peddling in the region. Government bodies ranging from the municipal to the federal levels use their elected positions as a basis for organized crime that goes against all legality. New Gold also benefits from the active support of the Canadian Ambassador to Mexico Guillermo E. Rishchynski who hypocritically acts as a propagandist for the so-called human, social and environmental concern of the Canadian mining companies established in Mexico. The company also benefits from the support of the Canadian government which refuses to pass legislation to permit the criminal prosecution of Canadian mining companies whether operating at home or abroad for the crimes they commit against the peoples and the workers.
Delegation of Canadian Union Leaders Visits
Striking
Mexican Copper Mine Workers
 Striking workers from the Cananea copper mine demonstrating in April 2009 (El Justo Reclamo) |
A delegation of Canadian union leaders visited the Cananea Copper Mine in Sonora, Mexico on May 3. The delegation went to Sonora after attending a meeting of the workers' union Los Mineros (with a membership of 280,000) in Mexico City and meeting with the Canadian Ambassador to Mexico Guillermo E. Rishchynski regarding the imprisonment of union leader Juan Linares.
Linares has been held since 2008 in the horrid conditions of the Reclusorio del Norte prison despite an order to be released by a criminal court judge, the union informs. He was arrested after attending a union convention in Vancouver, Canada in 2008. The trip was also in support of Los Mineros President Napoleon Gomez Urrutia, who has been living in exile in Vancouver since 2007 after criticizing the Mexican Government and Grupo Mexico following a devastating mine disaster that killed 65 mine workers. Gomez called the incident "industrial homicide," leading to trumped-up charges and death threats driving him into exile in the U.S., and now Canada.
Cananea is the largest copper mine in Mexico where the workers have been on strike for nearly three years and have faced increased aggression, threats, and violence from the Mexican Government and the mine owner, Grupo Mexico. Recently, striking miners threatened to destroy the mine if the government tries to evict them, the union news release informs.
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