Fast Track passed in House

One of organized labor's least favorite topics - granting Fast Track trade authority to President Bush - took a big step forward Dec. 6 when the U.S. House approved the legislation by a single vote, 215-214.

There were 21 Democrats who voted for Fast Track, which would let Bush negotiate NAFTA-like trade treaties without worker rights or environmental protections, then submit legislation implementing those pacts to Congress for up-or-down votes, with no amendments.

AFL-CIO President John Sweeney called the vote "an historic low," "disgraceful," and said it "capped a year of punishment for working families" in the GOP-run U.S. House.

The Wall Street Journal said the Senate is expected to pass Fast Track, but Majority Leader Thomas Daschle (D-S.D.) said the legislation would not come up until next year, if then.

"The basic facts about fast track have not changed. Fast track costs good Americans jobs," Sweeney said. "A strong majority of the American people oppose fast track trade legislation and they will hold lawmakers who voted against their interests responsible."

Teamsters win limits on Mexican trucks

Labor's legislative victories this year have been sporadic, but the Teamsters are entitled to crow about one of them - the ban on unsafe Mexican trucks from U.S. roads.

With little help from other unions, but a lot of shoe leather and grass-roots pressure, the union overcame opposition from Republican leaders, including President Bush, to the ban.

The final plan, in Transportation Department funding legislation approved in late November, confines the trucks to a zone within 20 miles of the U.S.-Mexico border. They can travel beyond that only after a study and certification of whether they meet safety standards.

"We're proud of the fact that we worked to make highways safe in America," Teamsters President James R. Hoffa said during the AFL-CIO convention in Las Vegas in December.

Increased training for World Trade workers

OSHA has signed an agreement with union construction workers and contractors at the World Trade Center site in New York stipulating ways to protect workers.

The Construction Labor Report said the partnership represents a commitment "to exercise leadership in preventing occupational fatalities and serious injuries and illnesses."

The WTC site had recorded a remarkable 5,000 workplace injuries at the site through early November, including 40 "near-miss" cases in which workers were almost killed. A site-specific safety training program has been developed, which will include an initial three-hour class.