All right, thank you to everyone who's at the picket here in the rain.
Thank you for coming.
My name's Maddie Olson.
I'm a grocery worker at PCC at the store in Green Lake Village, and I'm a rank and file member of UFCW Local 3000. I'm also an organizer with Worker Strike Back, a national organization fighting alongside union and non-union workers.
I'm going to be emceeing for you all today.
So today's picket is going to be kicking off our rank and file organizing for a fair contract for PCC workers in 2024. I'm proud to be here along with my fellow workers and UFCW members.
Today we're spilling the beans on the way PCC management treats their workers and what happens under this community co-op surface.
As a lot of you may know, in August last year, the Democrats in Seattle City Council shamefully ended the $4 hazard pay that our grocery workers had won.
This was an incredibly shocking betrayal by elected officials who love to say that they are progressive, but it was only Socialist City Council member Shama Sawant who fought with us and voted against ending hazard pay.
But even before hazard pay ended, at a workers' caucus meeting with worker representatives from nearly every store and a couple of PCC board members, a lot of people asked and mentioned low pay is a major factor in our low morale and low retention of workers.
And that's why one of the main demands that we're fighting for is a living wage for all PCC stores in the whole region.
PCC Markets annual revenue is well over, excuse me, was well over $250 million last year.
And the revenue every employee makes for them is over $92K.
My coworkers and I see nothing close to that in our paychecks.
And at that meeting, I mentioned, we were informed, you know, we knew that the stores outside of Seattle City Limits, you know, they're suffering from a huge pay differential, not only with a lower minimum wage, but they had no hazard pay, no $4.
And when the board was asked, are you going to make up for that?
Are you going to make that balance?
You know what their answer was?
They said no, of course not.
Hazard pay, the $4 hazard pay was too expensive.
They can't afford to give a raise to workers at Kirkland, at Redmond, Bellevue, and Issaquah stores.
Pitting the Seattle workers and their essential $4 raise against other workers is classic divide and rule tactic used by the bosses under capitalism.
And unfortunately in this system, their non-profit, community-oriented business, they exploit the workers just like us with such blatant tactics.
And when our $4 was snatched away from us, did any of that go to the workers outside of Seattle?
Of course not!
It all went right back to their pockets.
PCC workers, we're fed up and we will not take any more of this divide and conquer.
We are united in demanding an equal pay scale for all SOARs.
We're also demanding for full staffing, no more cuts to hours and no more skeleton crews on our shifts.
Just yesterday, a woman asked me, what's it like to work at PCC?
She thought she wanted to work there.
I had to honestly tell her, I'm making practically minimum wage.
And while the health care is good, it's really hard to take advantage of that when your wages can't pay for food and rent.
One of my coworkers needs a serious surgery, a tonsillectomy.
Their doctor told them, you're breathing through a straw, and that their tonsils are so swollen, if they get a cold or COVID, their throat would close up.
And when I've asked, when are you going to get that done?
They've said, I can't afford that medical bill.
And that's why we're here.
That's why we're fighting for basics like a living wage.
We need a real raise now.
Solidarity.
So up next, I've got Marlon Hathaway, a Green Lake Village worker and shop steward.
Hey there, everybody.
Thank you for coming out and witnessing PCC workers standing up.
for what they deserve, which is a living wage.
This is a letter that we put together.
It's a process that we've been in since last summer.
It's a collective process, and I'm really proud to be part of it.
PCC workers need your help.
We're being treated unfairly by PCC co-op leadership.
Since the beginning of the pandemic, the cost of living has risen around Puget Sound dramatically.
Inflation now makes these rising costs even harder to meet.
These increased burdens are severely hurting us.
However, in this period, PCC leadership has chosen to eliminate our hazard pay end quarantine pay, and continue to leave grocery workers inside and outside of Seattle behind by paying them as low wages as possible in every municipality.
Minimum wages vary from city to city, but PCC pays the lowest possible in each municipality.
Most of us in PCC stores make minimum wage or just cents over.
We struggle to pay rent, to buy groceries, and to live without financial stress.
Additionally, our stores are understaffed, and we are facing vastly increased workloads.
These pressures damage worker morale, worker retention, and customer experience.
PCC's image of being mission-driven is just for show if they continue not to pay the workers what they deserve.
COVID-19 infections are still incapacitating large numbers of workers every day in every department and repeat infections are not uncommon.
The elimination of quarantine pay depletes any worker's sick leave.
At this point, workers are facing an unacceptable choice between staying home and or going to work in uncertain conditions and uncertain health.
We should never have to choose between our job and our health.
Paid quarantine leave for COVID-19 infections must be reinstated.
It is for our safety and for yours.
We began to organize around living wages and our health and safety at the beginning of August, raising our concerns in town halls to start.
PCC's leadership's response has been to dig in their heels, claiming they don't have the money, yet they refuse to disclose CEO and headquarter salaries.
They claim not to have money for higher wages, yet they build new stores in the middle of the pandemic, spent millions of dollars on armed security, and continue to maintain a massive waterfront head office downtown.
This does not add up.
And so we delivered a letter to PCC leadership on September 26, 2022, signed by over 600 PCC workers demanding immediate change.
We demanded reinstatement of quarantine pay for the full 10-day period if you get sick.
We want continued PPE for customers and staff and an immediate raise for every PCC worker of $4 per hour to mitigate recent inflation.
They refused.
They told us any gains would have to come through negotiations with our union.
So our union, UFCW3000, approached PCC leadership to ask to open our contract early.
PCC refused to open the contract early.
Our current union contract expires on 12-31-2023, another 10 months from now.
But we need help today, not 10 months away.
We are calling on you, our community, our fellow PCC members, to act on our behalf.
We love our co-op, the members, customers, vendors, and communities.
We are proud to be working here.
We just cannot afford to.
And we need your help to put pressure on PCC leadership to respond to our demands by writing, emailing, and calling the corporate office.
They need to see that paying PCC workers a livable wage is important to you.
Without that, They are living up to their mission.
Thank you.
All right, up next I've got Kylie.
Hi, my name is Kylie Kennes.
I started working at the PCC that we were standing right in front of downtown in the deli last July.
I got the $4 hazard pay for exactly one month before it went away.
So these are the facts.
Cost of living in Seattle is 54% higher than the national average, according to PayScale.com.
Cost of housing is 118% higher than the national average.
Cost of groceries is 25% higher than the national average.
The earnings needed to maintain the current standard of living in Seattle is $50,000 a year.
That adds up to about $24 an hour.
The Seattle minimum wage is $18.69 an hour.
Many at PCC are getting paid minimum wage.
Some aren't even getting paid that minimum wage.
Personally, my rent is 50% of my income in a rent-controlled apartment.
As a grocery store worker, I cannot afford to buy groceries at the store where I work.
Many of the PCC employees are food insecure.
PCC knows this.
They instated a free pantry program to address this issue.
What we really need is higher wages.
We need to be able to decide where and what we spend our money on.
We need a living wage to spend on food and rent and our other expenses.
Many are facing demand store Carter with less employees or even skeleton crews.
When our leadership at my store was told, hey, if you make one worker do the work of two, people are going to leave.
And we already have half our department have left already.
They said, let them leave.
You know what I say to that?
You can't have a company without workers.
The pay and conditions at PCC are not acceptable, period.
We've asked PCC to come to the contract bargaining table early and they've refused.
They are not acting in good faith.
So we're asking you, the public, to help us put pressure on them to do the right thing by their workers.
to come to the table so that we can negotiate better pay and conditions.
We need relief, not in 2024, now.
We need change, not in 2024, now.
We need justice, not in 2024, now.
Give it up for Kylie again, Kylie.
All right, up next I've got Arlo reading a statement from Sina from View Ridge.
Hi, my name's Arlo.
I've been a union shop steward at this store since the day it opened.
The only thing I'll say for myself is if you are a shopper at this store, the biggest impact you can have on each of our shifts is just to say thank you and slow down.
It'll go a long way.
So I'm going to read a statement from a worker at View Ridge.
My name is Sina Ebrahimi.
I am a PCC employee at the View Ridge location.
I have been working there since August 2021. In my time here, I have experienced, as many others have, how PCC consistently bombards us with the message of demonstrating kindness.
Recently, our CEO, Krish Srinivasan, told us that we are all on the same team in response to an employee circulated petition to reinstate our hazard pay and quarantine pay after City Council voted to end it.
Yet, in February 2022, I was fired for an off-the-job injury.
If I hadn't been for our union filing a grievance for wrongful termination, I would never have gotten my job back.
How can we all be on the same side if rank-and-file workers like myself have to work with our union any time we are mistreated?
Similarly, how can we be on the same side when so many of us are struggling to keep up with our expenses when this company that claims to be a co-op is making record profits?
Things have only gotten worse.
My store, and perhaps other ones as well, are experiencing labor budget shortages.
As such, we are having to do the jobs of at least one to two other people due to being constantly understaffed.
Many of us, including myself, are being paid minimum wage, but are told to perform maximum effort.
And if things don't get done to the constant piling on of tasks due to understaffing, we're verbally reprimanded for it the next day with no acknowledgement of said understaffing.
Even if we do 10 things right, we're raked over the coals for the one thing we might have done incorrectly.
And this is all in addition to the unfair treatment many of us face from our supervisors and store management, such as being scolded for doing things other people do in open view without issue.
We are asking for PCC to live up to what it says it is rather than just use them as talking points for a marketing gimmick.
Stand up, fight back.
Stand up, fight back.
Stand up, fight back.
Stand up, fight back.
All right, I've got Jared up.
All right, thank you.
Hi, my name's Jared Houston.
I work at the deli in the Columbia City PCC, and I'm a union shop steward.
I've worked for PCC for five years, so I know a little bit about how it tries to appear favorable to workers.
This is one of the reasons people shop there, and like many, it was something that drew me to apply for a job in the first place.
In this same manner, PCC recently unveiled its core values to all staff members.
This is a list of characteristics that PCC workers should have.
Things like collaborates with others, values diversity, instills trust, and demonstrates kindness.
The problem is that what sounds progressive on the surface is used by management as a weapon against workers.
As a shop steward, I've had to represent numerous workers who are disciplined for not demonstrating kindness, because they spoke up about bullying and poor management to their coworkers.
Workers tell me they were accused of not being collaborative because they voiced their frustrations over having repeatedly to close three separate stations in the deli by themselves.
I've been told myself that I don't instill trust in management.
And to be honest, I take this with a with stride.
Because I know it's due to the fact that I stand up for my co workers on the job.
The problem is PCC thinks these core values are a one-way street, that somehow these models of behavior don't apply to them.
Well, why don't we give them an evaluation?
That's right, that's right, they love to give us evaluations, we're gonna give them an evaluation.
Okay, PCC management doesn't collaborate with others when it expects more production from understaffed workers who are exhausted from the bullshit we've faced over the past three years.
PCC does not instill trust when managers closely monitor our rest and lunch breaks and even track how much time we spend in the bathroom.
PCC does not value diversity when it gives the hardest and lowest paid work to immigrant and workers of color, or when it cuts hours to working parents who rightfully have limited schedules, which makes it all but impossible for them to pay for their child care.
And PCC certainly does not demonstrate kindness by paying workers barely enough to cover the rent while at the same time gouging customers by raising its already ridiculously high prices.
According to its own values, I would say PCC scores well below expectations.
The good news is that workers are standing up.
They are pissed off at the treatment they are receiving from management, and they want the respect they are deserved and the money that they are owed.
Since the pandemic began, I have seen so much solidarity and tenacity from my coworkers.
They are strong fighters and they inspire me every single day.
I'm looking forward to growing this solidarity with you in the coming months so we can win a better contract and a better way of life for all PCC workers.
Apart from being a grocery worker and a union member, I'm also a proud socialist feminist and a member of Freedom Socialist Party.
That's right.
I know, like many of my co-workers do, that the profit system is crooked and stacked against working people.
I also know that bosses like the ones at PCC dig their own graves by creating the very conditions for workers to rise up and take control of their lives.
And I'll tell you something, we don't need the bosses.
We only need each other.
So if you're a PCC worker and you're watching this, please reach out to PCCGroceryWorkers at gmail.com or talk to any of us on the floor when you see us.
We need your voices and ideas so we can grow this fight and so that workers can decide what's the best way forward.
Because that's what it's going to take to win.
Thank you.
Thank you, Jared.
Tiffany.
Yeah, I'm short.
Got it.
Hi, my name is Tiffany, and I work at the PCC store in Redmond.
And I've been with PCC for 16 years, going on 17 years.
And the first thing I'd like to say is that no one should have to justify a livable wage anywhere, especially in this state.
Everyone deserves one.
The shame and the blame game in this country is over.
Everyone deserves a livable wage, period.
I've worked two and three jobs as a single mother, two kids, a mortgage for 16 years, no merit raised, not one.
I've made this company hand over fist money with my already established equity in my community and recipes and sales.
I didn't get fairly compensated for my contributions at all other than a thank you, maybe.
And then when I left, somebody decided to take my recipes and use them, which are great.
They're there for my customers, but didn't ask.
No takeaways for this next contribution or this next contract.
We've had enough takeaways.
We are a million dollar company in a trillion dollar industry with 70 years behind in stagnant wages.
That's a fact.
We are the wealthiest country in the planet, at least, and the least healthy with chronic toxic stress.
We need our benefits because of all the chronic stress that we are under on the daily.
I am here to show that.
And I won't step on someone else's back to get a better view.
My hope is that helpful action will transpire in the next union contract and that PCC will honor what we deserve to have, which is a livable wage.
Period.
That's it.
No more than that.
Thank you so much, Tiffany.
I got Varun up next.
Hey, everyone.
working people everywhere deserve a real raise there's a there's a huge cost of living crisis in the city right now inflation it's over six percent uh...
the cost of a carton of eggs that's even gone up by over seventy percent and and everyone in a everyone who lives in the city knows that you can find an apartment anywhere for less than a for less than two thousand dollars if you if you're looking for one bedroom uh...
it's clear that the system is broken and that we need to get organized to demand our fair share.
PCC workers are fighting for a living wage, full staffing, and an end to hour cuts.
Workers at all the PCC stores in the region have to bear the same outrageous cost of living no matter what PCC store they're in.
And that's why PCC workers are united in demanding that all be paid on the same pay scale regardless of their store location.
In the light of the dire situation facing grocery workers and all workers, these demands, they're not just reasonable, but extremely necessary.
My name is Varun Balor, and I'm an activist with Workers Strike Back.
Workers Strike Back is an independent movement that was recently launched by Seattle City Council member Shama Sawant and Socialist Alternative.
We're organizing in our workplaces and communities for good wages, union jobs for all workers, and for quality affordable housing and free health care for all.
Workers Strike Back is also fighting against discrimination and oppression because only the boss is gained by dividing the working class.
And we can't rely on the Democratic and Republican parties to win these for us because they both only answer to the billionaire class.
We need to fight them ourselves, for which we, the workers, need a party of our own.
Grocery workers in Seattle unfortunately learned this lesson the hard way last August when they were betrayed by Democrats on the city council who shamefully repealed hazard pay and cut wages by $4 an hour.
Yeah, the same Democrats, they tried and failed six times to put hazard pay, to put the hazard pay repeal on the city council's agenda, but were forced to back down because of strong public opposition.
And the bill to end grocery worker hazard pay was originally brought forward by self-described Labor Democrat Councilmember Teresa Mosqueda.
Remotely, that's right.
One thing, one thing is clear.
Cutting the wages of hard-working grocery workers has not brought down the cost of food.
Seven months after hazard pay was scrapped, inflation in Seattle is at a 40-year high, and food prices are through the roof.
Food stamp applications have surged in the past few weeks too, the past few months.
Workers Strike Back believes that PCC workers and all grocery workers in Seattle, both union and non-union, need to build a united struggle for a living wage.
Yeah, that's right.
And we need working people as a whole to have their backs.
That's why I urge all community members to sign the petition launched by PCC workers and Council Member Shama Sawant's office.
And also with the help of Workers Strike Back.
We need to build a fight back that's independent of the parties of big business.
And that means organizing grassroots rank and file actions like this with a plan to escalate.
And we need to call out anyone, anyone that stands in the way of workers fighting for better wages and working conditions as the political servants of big business and the elite.
Right now, Workers Strike Back is involved in a union organizing drive at Amazon's KCVG facility in northern Kentucky, their largest air hub and the most important link in their delivery network.
We're building a national campaign against union busting and fighting to win back the jobs of workers who were fired for supporting the union.
PCC workers fighting for a living wage and Amazon workers fighting for a union are part of the same exact struggle.
That's why Workers Strike Back is going to be at every single action that's called by PCC workers in their fight for a living wage, no matter how long it takes, no matter what it takes.
And in closing I want to say that in solidarity with unionizing Amazon workers, Workers Strike Back is organizing a nationwide week of action starting on the 18th and ending on the 25th with a march on the Amazon spheres.
I want to invite any worker who wants to get involved in the fight to unionize Amazon or win a strong contract in their own workplace to show up.
Unions were built through powerful working class movements that forced billionaires to make concessions.
That's the kind of approach we're going to need to force PCC bosses to grant workers a living wage.
Talk to me or visit workersstrikeback.org if you want to get involved.
Solidarity.
Alright, thank you so much Varun.
Up next I've got Shirley, a local small business owner.
All right.
Hello, everybody.
I am honored to be here and stand in solidarity with PCC workers as a member of the community and also as an owner of Squirrel Chops, which is actually located right across the street from the PCC in the Central District.
As an owner of a small business, I understand the difficulty of making business work, especially in the current system where the most ruthless set the rules.
I also know that we cannot accept this race to the bottom mentality.
You can't run a coffee shop when ordinary people can't afford to live in their community.
I'll tell you, executives can't drink that much coffee.
But seriously, what kind of a community is that?
I'm saddened but not surprised by the conditions faced by our sisters, brothers, and siblings working at PCC.
Many PCC workers are also Squirrel Chop's regulars, and we have watched firsthand their sacrifice and dedication over the past three years.
Now that we're in a period where the pandemic is deemed over, the bills for the crisis are coming due.
And those bills are not landing at the feet of the ruthless mega-rich who, by the way, not only caused the economic crisis we're facing, but also profited in record amounts from it.
No, the bills are being foisted on workers, many of whom we aptly called essential at the start of the pandemic.
Eviction moratoriums have ended, while rents and groceries have only increased.
And on the job, hazard pay has been scandalously cut off by Democrats on City Council, all while workers are overworked and workplaces are understaffed, as is the case with the stories from our PCC workers today.
This is all in the context of decades of unions being dismantled and destroyed, and the lack of a fighting labor movement.
That's why I'm here today, and why I'm excited to see PCC workers fighting for living wages now, full staffing for every shift, no more cutting hours, and one wage scale for every store.
And as others have said, winning these demands will take a fight.
It'll take organizing co-workers like you've done today and community members like myself.
And I pledge the strongest support from our coffee shop and I can't wait for the pickets outside the Central District Store.
We will be there.
We will be there together with PCC workers, Councilmember Sawant's office, Workers Strike Back organizers, and I urge other community members to be there as well.
We need to stand shoulder to shoulder because in this oppressive system of capitalism, our fights are connected.
That's the way forward for workers.
That's the meaning of solidarity.
Winning a strong contract at PCC will benefit all workers.
It'll benefit our community and will benefit small businesses like ours.
Because when we fight, we can win.
Solidarity.
We win!
We win!
Thank you, Shirley.
And last but not least, I will introduce Shama Sawant.
I'm so honored to be here as a socialist, as a rank and file member of the Teachers Union AFT Local 1789, and as an elected representative of working people in the city of Seattle alongside Maddie, Tiffany, and so many other PCC workers who are here to demand a fair contract.
And I urge that everybody sign their petition.
recognize their demands, which are entirely reasonable.
Demand for a living wage, for full staffing, an end to cuts in employee hours, and a demand that all the workers in the PCC stores in the region, including cities like Kirkland and Bellevue, have the same pay scale across the region.
This is the very definition of unity.
You know what's not unity is when the president and CEO of PCC, Krishnan Srinivasan, says that we are all on the same side.
Well, look at how spectacularly we are not on the same side.
Roughly a year ago, I mean roughly the same time, nine years ago in 2014, some of you were there with us when we were fighting for the $15 an hour minimum wage in Seattle.
I believe it was on March 15th that we did a major rally outside the Seattle Central College where we understood and we saw evidently very clearly that big business was not on our side.
When we were fighting for $15 an hour as the minimum wage for Seattle, big business and many corporations, including non-profits unfortunately, were either overtly or behind the scenes maneuvering against our movement to fight for 15, against the 15 Now movement.
We won that and we made Seattle the first major city to win the $15 an hour minimum wage.
It is a matter of pride for our workers that we won, that our minimum wage right now is $18.69.
But you know, at the same time, this is capitalism.
And we understand that every reform we win will be undercut by the entire system.
And that's why we are facing this unprecedented cost of living, where even though we fought so courageously for our rights nine years ago, again, we are in a terrible situation.
Who's not in a terrible situation?
The bosses, the billionaire class.
So we are not on the same side.
As Shirley said, the pandemic revealed, unfortunately, how the burden of the crisis was placed on the shoulders of working people, the most oppressed people, and low-income and poor members of our community.
At the same time, the bosses became trillions of dollars richer.
So no, we are not on the same side.
Just this morning, we are hearing of more and more banks collapsing, eerily reminiscent of the very first days of what later became the Great Recession.
At that time, the Obama administration and other people in the U.S. regime were saying, we are on the same side, this is a shared sacrifice.
What happened?
The entire burden of the Great Recession was placed on the shoulders of working people, including public sector workers who took mandatory furloughs.
In fact, in some cases, voluntarily took furloughs because they wanted to sacrifice.
And millions of middle class and working class homeowners were impoverished because of the foreclosure crisis.
So we are not on the same side.
And under capitalism, the ruling class, the capitalist class, is not only not on the side of the working class, their objectives to maximize their own profits and maintain this unequal society is diametrically opposed to the needs of working people.
And what stands out from the stories that the workers have shared is how little the working conditions are different, whether you talk about a non-profit or a profit-making corporation under capitalism.
We're seeing workers being asked to do the jobs of two people with a task list that never reaches its end, makes no account for workers getting sick or for family emergencies, or God forbid, taking a little bit of vacation time with your children.
The workers are making the bare minimum wages, literally the lowest wage the company can legally get away with paying, as the workers have shared.
And we're standing outside the downtown PCC, where workers say this PCC has just cut its deli staff down to one worker per shift, in spite of it reportedly being a big moneymaker, given the downtown lunchtime business.
It's not good.
And on top of all this, we hear of a workplace regimen where workers are being constantly hounded by management, including when they use the restroom, written up, or at times even fired for not meeting expectations, which no worker can meet day in and day out over the course of a year.
much less through an entire career.
You know what this reminds me of?
This is very familiar to me because it reminds me of the conditions that Amazon warehouse workers face in the warehouses.
And at the same time, as workers have said, nobody knows exactly what PCC president and CEO Krishnan Srinivasan makes, but I guarantee you it is many, many times more than any of the highest paid workers make under PCC.
And yet the executives have the gall to blame workers for a reduction in member dividends and publicly campaigned against hazard pay, as the CEO at the time did.
All of this is outrageous, yet it's unfortunately par for the course for grocery corporations including non-profits, so-called non-profits.
What has been extraordinary is the response from these courageous rank-and-file workers at PCC.
Last year, after the City Council Democrats shamefully repealed the hazard pay with Labor Democrat Teresa Mosqueda leading the way, 600 PCC workers signed a petition demanding a permanent raise equivalent to what was being taken away from them by the hazard pay repeal.
My office supported that organizing effort, though I must say the workers got the signatures so quickly that they had already had more than 400 signatures by the time my office even heard about it.
Alongside PCC workers, we should also commend the workers at Trader Joe's, which is also a grocery store, where they don't have a union, and yet they were getting organized and fighting back.
So it's very important for us to understand the need for unity, not only among the rank and file of PCC members, and who are also rank and file members of the USCW Local 3000, but we also need wider unity across all grocery stores, bringing all the grocery workers together, whether they're unionized members at PCC, whether they're unionized members at Kroger and Safeway and QFC, or non-unionized members at Trader Joe's.
And this rank and file effort, this grassroots effort, needs to continue.
And that is why community organizers from my office and Workers Strike Back, that Socialist Alternative and I have recently launched, will be with the workers.
We will be picketing, leafleting, and gathering signatures from workers and community members alike.
So if you're watching this on the news and you support PCC workers, please reach out to my office or to workersstrikeback.org and make sure that you sign the petition.
We will be there on April 2nd outside the Redmond PCC and again on April 17th outside the Columbia City PCC to organize the workers and I have little doubt that if we keep building this campaign that we can win as others have said.
And as Warren mentioned, the struggle that workers strike back is involved in alongside Amazon warehouse workers at Northern Kentucky has so much in common with the workers at PCC here because we're facing oppressive working conditions and we're fighting for a living wage.
And that is why it's important that on March 25th, when we do the rally at the spheres, from workers strike back and from other organizations and left wing, left unions, progressive unions.
It's important that we have a big turnout of PCC workers, a big turnout of union members and non-unionized workers because we're going to have the workers from Northern Kentucky, the workers who are leading the union drive here with us.
So imagine what a brilliant example of unity that will be.
Last but not least, we also need to clarify amongst ourselves, amongst workers, especially inside the union, that it's important that PCC workers are in a union, UFCW 3000, and that has the potential to be a major source of strength when they fight for the new contract.
But we also know, as Varun said, the cold hard experience is that simply having a union cannot be the last word.
As a matter of fact, if we want to harness the power of the union to actually win victories, then we need rank and file militancy, we need rank and file organizing in order to stand up against the bosses.
We need to keep We need to keep in mind the overall strategy that most of the union leadership has used in the last decades, which I would call business unionism, hasn't worked for workers.
Business unionism is the idea that yes, we should represent workers, but we should not mobilize or activate the rank and file, not organize protest actions, much less the strike action.
We should try to make agreements with the bosses in order to win on the margins.
This hasn't worked.
Their strategy hasn't worked.
We need unions, but we need fighting unions.
As a union member myself, I have to say it was unfortunate that the union leadership did not fight against the repeal of the hazard pay.
And we need to make sure that rank and file continue to get organized so that we can win the demands that the workers have in the contract.
And we also need to keep in mind that as long as union leadership remains tied at the hip to the democratic establishment, workers are not going to win.
Workers will lose as long as we keep our faith in a political establishment that has sold us out again and again and again.
We saw the sellout of the railroad workers, the railroad unions in December last year, when not only the corporate Democrats, but also the progressive Democrats ended up breaking their strike.
So let's keep organizing the rank and file in the union.
Let's make sure we make our union strong.
And let's make sure we reach out in solidarity to the non-union workers as well.
Because an injury to one is an injury to all.
And if we stand united, then we won't be defeated.
Solidarity.