NEWS & LETTERS, October - November 2009
SK Hand Tools strike over healthcare
Chicago--I work for SK Hand Tools, employed by this company almost 23 years. We're on strike now over unfair labor practices. Our employer unilaterally and without notice took our insurance away as of May 1. Maybe three weeks later, we started finding out we were no longer covered by Blue Cross/Blue Shield, when people started going to the doctor or filling their prescriptions.
Instead of paying the co-payment, they were asked to pay the full amount. One guy had to have emergency surgery for a hernia, and it cost around $20,000, so he still owes a big portion of that. There's a guy that, maybe a year and a half ago, had a kidney transplant. He needs dialysis. Once you have surgery, especially a kidney transplant, you have to have continuous care like dialysis and medications.
We're out here 24/7. We're learning as we go--99% of us here have never been involved in a strike before. It's amazing how much support we are getting. There is also a great unity between all of us--we are Mexican, Polish, Vietnamese, everything. It's like a little UN and everybody gets along. We feel very close. Everybody brings food some days; we take turns.
We are with Teamsters Local 743, and we've gotten a lot of support from other locals. Gov. Quinn was here and gave us a lot of support. A few weeks ago Dan Hynes (the Illinois Comptroller running against Gov. Quinn) was here. We've had so much support. Jobs with Justice is here, and so many locals I can't even name them all. A lot of restaurants have come and donated food. We need a lot of support, a lot of people to come up here and strike with us.
We might be having a rally soon in front of Sears because we manufacture Craftsman tools for Sears. We manufacture tools, hand tools. Most of the people are setup and operators. We set up and operate our own machinery. I work on the stamp machine, putting the part number on all the parts.
These machines are very difficult to run. We always say that we have to hold them together with rubber bands and band-aids because that's how old they are. We know how to set them up because we've been working on them for so many years. We have to put little shims in.
Scabs are working in there now. If they make a ratchet wrong, if it's not assembled properly, somebody could get hurt. I know of six scabs who came in there yesterday. I heard today they're interviewing for jobs. We're hoping that it will be very difficult for them to set up.
We used to have a crew that cleaned the offices and bathrooms. They got rid of the cleaning people. We used to have security. They don't have any more security. They say, If you want a clean bathroom you clean your own.
We're in the middle of negotiations. The reason we're out here is unfair labor practices. SK also has a plant in McCook, Ill. Between that plant and here on 47th we have 70 or 75 workers. The boss is asking for $4 an hour from us for six months to help them move McCook over here. I moved a couple of years ago from one apartment to another and I didn't ask him for any help.
On top of that, he wants 20% of our wages. A lot of us have four weeks vacation because we've been here so long. He wants to cut that down so everybody gets two weeks. This guy wants an arm and a leg and then some. Anytime he wants to he can fly back and have free healthcare--he's French.
We're not going to give up. Everybody is supporting us. And we support them too. Everybody needs healthcare. Not just the people here at SK. I want to ask people, if it happened to you, what would you do? Everybody needs to stand up for their rights and not just say, I have no choice, because I need my job. Stand up for your rights. Demand what you're entitled to.
--Woman worker
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