Dear colleagues,

The last negotiation for collective agreement with AMCOR -White Cap Management was concluded today with no agreement and we have come to the end of legally determined period of time to reach an agreement . According to the law in force, on 24th January, our union has to declare its decision to go to strike. This does not mean that AMCOR-White Cap workers will start to strike as of 24th Jan. since we still have another week till 2nd February in order to start to strike de-facto according to the law. The main point of dispute was related with the provision on coverage that AMCOR - White Cap Management strongly and repeatedly rejected to include white collars into the collective agreement.

In the plant in Istanbul, the taps for jars and bottles are being produced. The total number of blue and white collar workers in the AMCOR-White Cap in Istanbul is 114. 59 of them is blue collar, 42 are white collars. There are also 13 subcontractor’ workers who are not our members. As it is obvious from these rates the increased number of white collars beside subcontracting who are kept out of collective agreement represents a serious threat for the existence of union in the workplace. On the other hand, management’s persistent to keep white collars out of collective agreement constitutes two types of violations of trade union rights: 1) Freedom for organizing and collective bargaining 2) Discrimination in the workplace.

Dear friends, since AMCOR is a multinational company we strongly believe that an international campaign for trade union rights of our members could be possible. However, let me remind you that all AMCOR workers in the world are not organized only by metal unions. The important part of organized AMCOR workers are members in paper&graphical unions. Another part of them are organized by chemical workers’ unions. So, in this case we have a chance to organize a broaden campaign to show AMCOR-White Cap Management that all AMCOR workers are ready to support and be in solidarity with their friends organized by another union in another country.