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At Delta Airlines' Philadelphia refinery, the local chapter of the United Steelworkers Union (USW) and Monroe Energy (a Delta subsidiary) have called in a federal mediator to resuscitate talks between the two parties in the hopes of averting the spread of the largest US oil worker strike in 35 years to the US east coast. National negotiations between Shell (on behalf of the oil companies) and the USW are set to resume Wednesday. In April 2012, Delta acquired the Trainer refinery (located near Philadelphia in Delaware County, PA) from Phillips 66 through subsidiary Monroe Energy for $180 million . The...

LyondellBasell announced Tuesday that it has filed an unfair labor practice charge against the United Steelworkers union, alleging that union representatives have made threats against employees who have returned to work and have used abusive language in social media. The company also contends it has witnessed threatening behavior at the gates of its Houston refinery as employees arrive to work, according to a letter to employees from Kevin Brown, executive vice president of global manufacturing, refining, global engineering services and global projects. The company filed the charge with the National Labor Relations Board. “This action by the USW is extremely...

On February 18, an explosion and fire occurred at ExxonMobil's refinery in Torrance, California. The Torrance refinery, the third-largest refinery in Southern California, has about 20% of the region's fluid catalytic cracking capacity and is an important source of gasoline and distillate fuel oil supply for Southern California. Unplanned refinery outages can have noticeable effects on liquid fuel markets, disrupting supplies of gasoline and distillate, particularly in regions that are tightly balanced, such as the West Coast (defined as Petroleum Administration for Defense District (PADD) 5). When refineries undergo planned maintenance, they make arrangements for alternative sources of supply to...

More than one month ago, Shell Oil Company sat down at the bargaining table with a negotiating team representing national leaders of the United Steelworkers International Union (USW). Shell’s goals were – and still are – to reach an agreement that respects the needs and interests of our employees and ensures the ongoing safety as well as economic health of Shell refineries and chemical plants. To that end, to date Shell has put seven offers on the negotiating table. The USW International Union leaders have rejected all seven of them. In addition, they have ordered their members to strike at...

The building trades unions have taken exception to disparaging comments the United Steelworkers union have made during contract talks that contractor labor is neither high quality or safe. Many contractors use union-represented skilled crafts workers including electricians, plumbers, welders, iron workers and pipefitters. To resolve the simmering, and growing dispute, the leaders of the United Steelworkers union and the North America’s Building Trades Unions issued a joint statement Wednesday to clarify the scope of contractor responsibilities at the nation’s refineries and chemical plants. “We are issuing this statement to make clear that the scope of work USW is seeking in...

With the West Coast ports labor dispute involving 13,600 unionized dockworkers inflicting pain on 318 million Americans by causing billions of dollars a day in losses to the U.S. economy settling yesterday, now 30,000 unionized refinery workers across America intend to play the same leverage game by cutting off two-thirds of all U.S. diesel and gasoline supplies. Just after US Labor Secretary Tom Perez took to the television circuit to tout how the Obama Administration believes the US economy can “recover quickly” from the nine months-long port turmoil, the United Steel Workers (USW) launched the first nationwide oil refinery strike...

The largest U.S. refinery strike in 35 years entered its fourth week as workers at 12 refineries accounting for one-fifth of national production capacity were walking picket lines as of 12 a.m. CST on Sunday, according to union officials. A total of 6,550 members of the United Steelworkers union at 15 plants, including the 12 refineries, are involved in the work stoppage that began on Feb. 1 when talks for a new three-year contract between the USW and lead oil company negotiator Shell Oil Co stopped.... After the latest breakdown between the two sides, Steelworkers leaders targeted Shell, which is...

The first nationwide oil refinery strike in more than 30 years was expected to grow by four more plants over the weekend, including the largest refinery in the U.S., the Motiva Enterprises refinery in Port Arthur, Texas. The United Steelworkers union said Saturday workers at the Motiva Enterprises refinery started their strike at midnight Friday. Employees at two other refineries and a chemical plant in Louisiana planned to strike at the end of Saturday. The union said in a statement that it expanded the strike that started Feb. 1 at refineries largely in Texas and California because the industry has...

In an open letter to employees, the manager of LyondellBasell’s Houston Refinery is asking its striking employees to come back to work. The workers, who walked out of the refinery on Feb. 1 as part of a nationwide strike after national oil bargaining talks broke down, have left the refinery scrambling to operate with supervisors. The United Steelworkers union is on strike against 11 refineries and chemical plants nationwide, including five in the Houston area. The letter outlined the negotiating efforts both sides made before the strike began and how the company had requested a rolling 24-hour extension to keep...

Tensions escalated Friday in the nearly two-week strike after picketers were told to get off the Shell Deer Park Refining property. The order puts the strikers in danger because the refinery fronts the feeder road on Texas 225 and there is no sidewalk on which to stand, said Lee Medley, president of the United Steelworkers Local 13-1. He said Shell gave the strikers walking the picket line 30 minutes to get themselves, their chairs, ice chests and other equipment off the property. Shell issued its order in response to unsafe behaviors by the picketers including blocking entrances with picketers and...

The United Steelworkers union is broadening its nationwide walkout to include two more refineries. Early Sunday, the union is planning to go on strike against two BP facilities in the Midwest, union spokeswoman Lynne Hancock confirmed. That will bring the total number of plants on strike to 11, after union members walked out of nine facilities, including five in the Houston area, a week ago. The latest work stoppages are scheduled to begin 12:01 a.m. Sunday at BP’s refineries in Toledo, Ohio and Whiting, Ind., Hancock said. BP issued a statement saying it is disappointed the union is launching a...

The Pacific Maritime Association (PMA) announced that loading and unloading operations at all 29 West Coast ports would temporarily be suspended this weekend in response to union slowdowns that brought freight movements at the ports to a near standstill. PMA members stated that they cannot afford the almost $1,200 per day cost to employ International Longshore and Warehouse Union members to do little work. After Breitbart broke the story on Thursday that union members of the ILWU planned to “walk out within the week,” the PMA employer group announced they can no longer continue to pay workers the premium pay...

Reflections on the days when a labor leader led our nation, on the great man's birthday... As the author writes this column, dozens of ships, each one laden with tens of thousands of truckloads of cargo, are sitting in the Pacific, parked for weeks at a time in a line, waiting for the longshoremen to stop their slowdown and get back to work. Modern containerships are measured in TEUs, a unit of measure specific to the transportation industry. The standard intermodal container (so-called because it can be transported by truck, rail, or ship, easily transferred from one to the next...

Belgium risks coming to a virtual standstill Monday as the biggest national strike for years grounds all flights, halts public transport and severs international train links in protest at the new government's austerity policies. The strike, which is the climax of a union movement that began last month with a huge march and violent protests in Brussels, will also likely close schools, businesses, factories and government offices. Unions say there is "no choice" but to go ahead with the strike after the right-of-centre government of Prime Minister Charles Michel pushed ahead with plans to save 11 billion euros ($13.7 billion)...

Organizers of a post-Thanksgiving protest on behalf of workers at a Walmart in downtown Washington, D.C. identified only one of the participants as actually working at that store. The admission underscores the fact that few Walmart workers have been involved in the protests. "Thirty striking workers from Washington, D.C., Virginia and Maryland took part in today’s protest, and Melinda Gaino, one of the striking workers, works at the H Street Store," said Julie Anderson, a spokeswoman for the 1.3 million member United Food and Commercial Workers union, which organized the event. Walmart spokesman Kory Lundberg claimed the number was far...

But remember, voters… there’s nothing to worry about. We’ve got the entire situation under control. Nurses across the United States will stage protest rallies and strikes on Wednesday over what they say is insufficient protection for health workers dealing with patients possibly stricken with the deadly Ebola virus.The California-based nurses’ union, National Nurses United, says hospitals still lack enough hazardous materials suits which leave no skin exposed and sufficient powered air-purifying respirators to properly protect nurses from exposure.“Inadequate preparedness for Ebola symbolizes the erosion of patient care standards generally,” National Nurses United spokesman Charles Idelson said on Tuesday. So...

The country's largest nursing union is considering the possibility of picketing hospitals if they do not offer more extensive training on how to treat Ebola patient. Nurses United executive director RoseAnn DeMoro said in a conference call Wednesday that her group may take "pretty dramatic action for nurses across the country" that could "escalate into possible pickets at hospitals." "We have heard consistently across the country that there are no protocols in place," she said.

Thousands of Liberian healthcare workers are set to begin an indefinite strike at midnight on Monday which could undermine the country's effort to stop the spread of the deadly Ebola virus and leave several hundred patients without care. Health workers in the West African nation threatened to abandon hundreds of patients in Ebola treatment units, clinics and hospitals if demands for better incentives, working conditions and protective equipment were not met.

Plane Cleaners Strike At NY Terminal Over Ebola Fears. FoxNews 10/09/2014 Plane cleaners strike at New York airport terminal over Ebola fears Published October 09, 2014Associated Press NEW YORK – Airplane cabin cleaners have set up pickets outside a LaGuardia Airport terminal over health and safety issues.

Burial teams in Sierra Leone reportedly went on strike over lack of hazard pay this week, leaving the bodies of victims of the Ebola outbreak in the country's streets.