USW Leadership Statement Urges Rejection of TPP
December 10, 2015
Executive Board Resolution applies to U.S. & Canada action
Pittsburgh (Dec. 10) – The International Executive Board of the United Steelworkers (USW) today adopted a formal resolution urging rejection of the proposed 12-nation Trans Pacific Partnership (TPP) trade deal by both the U.S. Congress and the Canadian federal government.
USW President Leo W. Gerard said the resolution is intended for wide distribution to the union membership in both the U.S. and Canada, setting forth the basis of a fully-engaged TPP rejection campaign in each country.
“The USW is the largest industrial union in North America representing 1.2 million active and retired members who would all be impacted by TPP,” Gerard said. “These workers with family-supportive jobs are employed in virtually every tradable sector: mining, metals, glass, rubber, paper and forestry, automotive and aerospace products.”
Upon release of the USW policy statement, he said it exposes the TPP as bad trade policy with no real enforcement, misplaced priorities and that working families had already suffered far too long from previous free trade deals.
The USW resolution highlighted the union had an earnest expectation workers’ needs in any trade deal would be met. “When negotiations on the Trans Pacific Partnership began, our union engaged with the negotiators and policymakers with the hope of forging a new approach.”
The statement said the USW sought a trade agreement for the U.S. and Canada “that would lift wages up, rather than pushing them down, one that would reduce our nations’ accumulated trade deficits that continue to mount, one that would promote domestic manufacturing and employment rather than more outsourcing and offshoring, one that would begin to reverse the widening gap of income inequality.”
