A WAS report on the events of Priama Akcia including photos
On the occasion of the centenary of our international trade union federation, the International Workers Association (IWA), several affiliated sections organised anniversary celebrations. So did Priama Akcia (PA), our Slovak sister union, which organised various events to mark the occasion in Bratislava on 4 March.
One of them was a photo exhibition about the activities and struggles that PA, which exists already since 2000, has fought in its history. The exhibition was completed by several old issues of the newspapers („podaj d’alej“ as well as „Žerme Bohatých“; the latter means „Eat the Rich“) published by PA.
After more than a year of workers’ struggle, Tüwi has finally decided to pay an out-of-court settlement to an illegally dismissed worker. But this is just the start.
Since more than a year a group of Tüwi’s workers have started protesting against the unbearable conditions in which the Verein, as well as the Tüwi kitchen and Beisl, are. The main demands have been raising the salary to the minimum and that the tips stay with the workers (until September 2022 workers at Tüwi were only earning 8 euros per hour and, to this day, they cannot keep the tip money).
On top of this, workers have been asking for more accountability and transparency in the way the association is run. In fact, the current manager and other coordinators have been barring people that are members of the association from checking its finances, while systematically silencing and marginalizing dissent. Even though Tüwi supposedly has statutes, the decision-making of the collective has been repeatedly overruled by a small group of people that are in power positions.
In September 2022, one of the people most involved in the internal conflict has been unilaterally fired by Tüwi’s manager. The reason he explicitly gave was that the person was making “too much trouble” and that he did not want “Tüwi to become another Gagarin”.
Even though Tüwi and Gagarin have very different structures, they are both commercial places that are based on an ideal of collective values and solidarity. They “sell” a space where people like to spend their money because they believe it will not be paid to some huge capitalist multinational and where they can hang without any pressure because the prices of food and drinks are low.
The problem is that both spaces have shown not to be able to live up to their standards or even to show self-criticism. Shady power structures are one part of the problem, which needs to be solved internally. The other part is, and there is no way around this, people need to be paid fairly for their work! Den Rest des Beitrags lesen »
In the context of our labour dispute together with your former worker, we have had a lot of time over the last few weeks to think things over very carefully. And we are now fully convinced that our union made a huge mistake in demanding that you comply with any minimum labour standards. We have now realised that if the employers are (anti-)politically close to us, we should give up sick pay – sick leave is so 20th century! The fact that marginal employment workers get 13th and 14th wages and holidays is also knowledge that should not be spread in „left“ circles. It was irresponsible of us to publish this information. It is unthinkable what will happen if all „alternative companies“ are now confronted with workers who know their rights.
Our idea that fought-for minimum bourgeois standards should also apply to cool projects was completely off the mark. Sorry! But even more blatant was our assumption that if we demanded 5000 euros for our comrade out of the roughly 28,000 euros the Gagarin saved itself in the 30 months of employment, that you would then be interested in an out-of-court solution.
Through your persistent refusal to communicate with us, we have had the opportunity to work on ourselves and to realize that no minimum standards should apply to alternative projects! As you have rightly told us, it is not at all your business that people’s residence status depends on their job and therefore your practices. What is important is the project and being part of it. It is not your fault that in capitalism people are economically dependent on their jobs. And besides, everyone knew beforehand that Gagarin doesn’t respect collective bargaining agreements. They all got involved voluntarily. The fact that some of them don’t even know the language is also their problem, not yours. As you rightly said, we simply haven’t understood how Gagarin works yet!
But what really gave us the final push to understand your position were your additional activities of the last weeks. The fact that you want to ally yourselves with another hierarchical company against the WAS showed us that we have driven you into the arms of the class enemy through our stupid activities. The letter from the Chamber of Commerce, and especially the letter from your lawyer, made it clear to us once and for all that we can no longer hold any rallies in front of the Gagarin and that we must delete all previous articles on the case. We are morally obliged to do so! After all, you can pay whatever you want for organic cheese noodles, how dare someone demand for payed holidays! And last but not least, you have also intimidated us financially. We didn’t realize before that companies could try to use expensive injunctions against trade unions, their public information, and rallies.
In any case, we will stop all actions and soon censor all information on this case, as your lawyer has asked us to do. In addition, all trade union activities will be stopped. In the future, we will also stop accepting Eastern European migrant women into our union who only want to denigrate our cool left and autonomous projects. After all, they can only „betray the family“!
Finally, we want to publicly apologize for all the mistakes we have made. We hope that in the future we will be able to feel closer to movements and groups in Vienna again, as we will leave behind us all deranged talks about economic dependency relations in capitalism. We also intend in future not to worry ourselves with the real concerns of our members, and not to take their material conditions seriously. We rather want to limit ourselves to important campaigns for far away things we have nothing to do with. Maybe it will be the situation of Senegalese small farmers, or baby seals north of the Arctic Circle, … that is not yet clear.
We hope that you can accept our apology and that we will not make such a terrible mistake as a union in the future.
Submissively
Your trade union Vienna Workers‘ Syndicate
P.S. Did you imagine something like this as an answer? Sorry, you can forget about that! We recommend you to get in touch with us and consider other possibilities.
Article published on November 15, 2022. Can be copied with source reference.
MAP – IWA – AIT – IAA … wo der herrschaftsfreie Internationalismus keine leere Floskel ist.
Das alljährliche WAS-Grillfest findet dieses Jahr am 7. August in Wien Hetzendorf statt.
Wir laden euch als unsere GenossInnen, KollegInnen, FreundInnen und an einer Organisierung im WAS interessierte Menschen ein.
Wir feiern dieses Jahr auch 100 Jahre Internationale Arbeiter_innen-Assoziation (IAA) – das ist die internationale anarchistische Gewerkschaftsföderation, in der wir Mitglied sind. Wir würden uns sehr freuen, diesen Teil der Arbeiter_innen-Bewegung mit Euch gemeinsam zu feiern.
Bitte bringt euer Grillgut und Getränke bitte selber mit und, wenn ihr habt, eine Picknickdecke.
Es wird kinder- und familienfreundlich sein, da es in einem Garten stattfinden wird.
Wir beginnen um 15 Uhr und enden um 22 Uhr.
Wenn ihr teilnehmen wollt, kontaktiert uns und wir schicken euch die Adresse.
The last weeks, the workplace struggle with Gagarin has been stagnating. We tried to reach out to them to continue the discussions multiple times. Their communication has been very confusing and contradictory, first they answered that they are still open to meet and discuss, and later – without any explanation – they announced that the communcation will be only via e-mail.
We want to make it clear – once again – that we do not give up our struggle until our rightful demand to receive the compensation for our union member for the missing wage parts is not fulfilled. We will be standing in solidarity, and continue to protest, and in the worst case, we are not afraid of going to the court.
In the following, you can read the message that our comrade, the former worker of the cafe sent to one of the collective members of Gagarin. In their previous communication, she/he criticized the methods of WAS but encouraged our union member to reach out to her/him. Sadly, our comrade never received any answer to her message.
Dear xyz.,
I’m sorry that you are disturbed about the methods of WAS, but you have to understand, it’s nothing personal. It’s a union, that is fighting against workplace exploitation, something that has been happening in Gagarin in multiple levels. Clearly it affected people with different status and privileges differently, this might be the reason why you can be still a dedicated worker of the cafe. Please understand, that I wouldn’t have gone to WAS if I had had any other options, but I did not. The lack of ability to take responsibility in the group and care for its workers brought me to the union. You have to understand: Gagarin lost workers who were there for years, who were very much part of the group, and not only me. And NOT because of personal issues. It has to be reflected on. Den Rest des Beitrags lesen »
Durch unsere französische Schwestergewerkschaft CNT-IAA sind wir auf einen Kampf von ArbeiterInnen in einem „anarchistischen“ Kollektivbetrieb in der Stadt Montreuil aufmerksam gemacht worden. Die dort Hackelnden sind in einer sehr ähnlichen Situation wie in vielen „Alternativbetrieben“ wo es doch Lohnarbeit gibt, und die Widersprüchlichkeiten im Kapitalismus offen zutagetreten.
Die Fehlende Klassenanalyse führt immer zu selben zuerst selbst- und dann fremdausbeuterischen Strukturen, wo die „ach-so-wichtigen-Projekte“ auf jeden Fall über die Verhinderung von ökonomischer Ausbeutung gestellt werden (gegen die man eigentlich einmal angetreten ist). Egal ob in der Bäckerei „Die Eroberung des Brotes“ in Frankreich, oder dem Gagarin in Wien. Auch in Montreuil wollen Chefs vom angeblich anarchistischen Kollektivbetrieb die reale Ausbeutung kleinreden und die derzeit Streikenden öffentlich diffamieren. Daher haben die im WAS organisierten (ehemaligen) Arbeiterinnen von der Bäckerei LeFirin, vom Gagarin und vom Tüwi folgende Solidaritätsnote verfasst, und an die GenossInnen in Frankreich geschickt:
„As workers of Le Firin (a commercial bakery), of Café Gagarin and of Tüwi (collective cafés) organized within the WAS-IAA, we deeply understand and empathize with the struggle of our comrades in Montreuil that we have got to know through our comrades from CNT-AIT.
As we promised in our last article, we would like to give an answer to the most important questions and concerns that have been arising the last weeks. Here you go!
Why are you asking for compensation?
A lot of people were supportive that we publicly questioned the working conditions in Gagarin, but more reluctant about the compensation. We want to stress that we are not interested in a statement war but in proper material change in favour of the life of our union members and all workers. Additionally, our union members’ efforts of two and a half years working there and starting an internal process that changed the situation a bit, but did not manage to go to the root of the problem – the exploitation – convinced us even more that further steps are needed in this case. Besides, the amount we are asking for our comrade may seem large to some. However, it is in the ridiculous range of 167 euros divided to the months she was working there. This is the absolute minimum, payed holidays, 13. + 14. payment, sickleave.Den Rest des Beitrags lesen »
21st of May, 5 – 8 pm Garnisongasse 24, 1090 Vienna
Support the fight against exploitative structures at Café Gagarin!
In recent years, Café Gagarin, the supposedly „anti-authoritarian“, „collectively run“ café, has been a place of intense internal struggles. Questions of precarious working conditions have been discussed unsuccessfully for a long time. Although Café Gagarin is commonly believed to be run by a collective of equal workers, in reality there has been a division between the „collective“ and the „springer:innen“. The members of the „collective“ take on more responsibility, but also have more privileges, power and status. Coincidentally, or perhaps not, the „collective“ at this point was consisted of white Germans and Austrians, while the „springer:innen“ were mainly migrants.
When they tried to challenge the status quo, the workers repeatedly encountered racist, authoritarian and chauvinist reactions. The demand to restructure the place was tolerated first, but later it was followed by violent and aggressive reactions. Our union member was shouted at and was publicly humiliated by male members of the „collective“. Her demands to make them take responsibility for that were ignored, and the collective tried to reframe the situation as an individual conflict with a hysteric woman. Finally, she decided to quit.
It is clear for us: the rigid power structures made it impossible to question the hierarchies and the bad working conditions, in which exploitation and conflicting class interests are shamelessly interwoven with racist and sexist structures and their individual reproduction.
The problem with labour rights not being respected is not that laws are disregarded, but that „left places“ undermine even the minimum standards of the state, creating widespread acceptance for exploitation in all labour relations. Under the pretext of „good cause“ nobody should push the little boundaries of exploitation and simply negate paid holidays, 13th and 14th salary, sickleave, and so on.
We are aware that a company that is interested in „solidarity economy” is of a different calibre than an ordinary capitalist company. Unfortunately, in the case of Gagarin, the structures that developed over the years have led to extreme situations of exploitation, and a solution does not seem to be in sight. The social trap of „external constraints“ seems to have replaced any ideals. And worse, we have the impression that there is no class consciousness at all, and also zero knowledge and therefore no consciousness of the least labour rights.
We therefore demand a one-time compensation of less than 20% of the amount our union member would have earned in the last 2.5 years if the labour law minimum standards had been respected. This amount is made up of the lost income accumulated over the years through unlawfully reduced working hours, unpaid tips, unpaid sick leave, unpaid vacation, unpaid 13th and 14th salary, and so on.
For us as a union, the interests of wage workers – in this case, the irretrievably lost insurance years, the threat of old-age poverty, the multiple burden as a migrant worker, etc. – are central on the road to a liberated society.
So far, unfortunately, there has been no serious reaction from Gagarin to our offer to settle the matter amicably and without publicity, just a vague suggestion to have a talk with payroll accounting in mid-June. So we had no choice but to make the struggle public and bring it to the Gagarin Street Festival.
And to avoid any misunderstandings right from the start this is not about individual villains! It is about an alternative enterprise reproducing structures that it actually once stood against. Everyone in the „collective“ has to face the question of how it got this far and, above all, how the situation can be changed without continuing to rely on the exploitation of workers, mainly those who are affected by racism and sexism, and without undermining the minimum legal standards by up to 200%.
We want to show clearly: we are not afraid to confront bosses and fight against all forms of exploitation, even if they are painted over with red and black colours!
We invite you to join our demonstration in front of Café Gagarin on 21 May from 5pm! The address is: Garnisongasse 24. You can find us at the black-red flags!
No more sexism, no more racism, no more exploitation! For the liberation of all workers!
Leaflet with the call for a rally for May 21, 2022
Article published May 19, 2022 on wiensyndikat.wordpress.com. Copying with source reference possible.
Considerable reformist improvements achieved, revolution still has to wait
With a mixture of happiness and sadness, we discontinue all trade union struggle measures against the Secession for the time being. On the one hand, the Secession still owes its workers thousands of euros, but on the other hand, thousands of euros have been successfully fought for and serious structural changes in the museum have been set in motion.
Since shortly before Christmas, it has been quieter around the industrial action at the Secession. On the one hand this was due to the stressful pre-Christmas period and the following holidays, on the other hand it was due to the incredible delay and stress tactics of the Secession itself. What happened? We remember: Secession vaguely promised to recalculate and pay out all outstanding claims. These calculations were not done for months, until on 22 December letters with calculations and „offers“ arrived at the struggling workers. However, those affected were then supposed to accept them within a few days and to accept the – again false – „offers“ in written form. What a farce that a (left) liberal institution pretends that one could confirm back pay, which continues to be below the collective agreement requirements, i.e. that one would have to renounce or even waive claims in order to get paid, …
From that point on, most of the workers did not want to be subjected to the pressure by the Secession. The mixture of non-communication from the management (e.g. zero information in the last lockdown), multiple wrong calculations, refusal for years to even consider the claims, perfidious pressure from the new board, also via external university and private channels, and the refusal to communicate at all with the WAS was for some out of proportion to the still outstanding salary components. In addition, the succès d’estimes had already been quite striking. A justified early resignation was accepted. In the meantime, all low-paid workers received back pay, in some cases amounting to almost six months‘ salary. The permanent contacts in free time, i.e. the on-call treatments, were actually stopped. All ten or so full-time employees in the department confirmed the problem areas we had raised at an internal company jour-fix, and the management is embarking on serious structural reforms.
After the first payments were made to everyone, haggling over the amount was not central to the people concerned, and no one wants to go to the labour court because of the still missing 1000 to 2000 euros per person (besides, there are still more than two years to go). As WAS we would have considered it important not to let bosses get away with simply not paying out salary components or calculating them incorrectly again, but the colleagues who work there naturally have the final say in this matter. In addition, out of a total of eight low-paid workers in the company, four are no longer there and simply want to have their peace.
Therefore, the situation now is that the Secession must continue to put up with public reports that it never calculated the salaries correctly and continues to withhold money from its workers. Thousands of euros are still missing. Among them – apart from a number of inconsistencies that may still have to be checked – in any case, as we now know for sure, all Sunday bonuses and all pro rata 13th and 14th salaries for the overtime and extra hours worked in the last five years. The Secession presumably even believes that its current calculations are correct, … There seems to be no awareness of the fact that the employees have now been running behind their full salaries for year and day. So much for the „sadness“.
On the positive side, as a small grassroots union we really fought vigorously against an institution like the Vienna Secession and very quickly brought about very real changes. We quickly got the museum into trouble because it had been violating a lot of labour laws for years. It was not for nothing that the management wished that „the employees would rather have organised themselves in the ÖGB (Austrian Trade Union Federation)“, … In this respect we can only repeat that a good union is known to be the one your boss doesn’t like. The active solidarity of women artists exhibiting there is also remarkable and reveals the precarious reality for the majority of artists, apart from the high society, which is big in business.
It is also very positive that we as a whole WAS would not have been at the end of our powers and abilities by a long shot. On the contrary, we are highly motivated and could have shown great staying power in this matter. Moreover, it has been proved once again that struggles are best fought when workers organise together before any problems arise. In such exceptional situations like labour disputes, it is much more exhausting to start building structures and working out basics like „free agreements“, „hierarchy-free decision-making“ or „common goals“ than to be prepared!
Financially, anyway, this labour dispute has brought a very real improvement for the marginal workers. And there is still the small possibility that those responsible at the Secession will once again deign to produce a correct final payroll for all the marginal workers and also transfer the missing few thousand euros – and that without constantly contacting their (former) employees, annoying them, putting them under pressure or generally playing dumb as far as payroll accounting is concerned. By the way, another positive collateral benefit, quasi: all part-time and full-time employees will supposedly have their salaries recalculated as well and will participate without having been actively involved. The Secession itself is of course „not amused“ about such five-digit euro amounts and would have preferred – have we actually mentioned this already – to organise its employees in the ÖGB 😉 .
In any case, we can count the last six months as an extraordinarily good and important testing, training and refinement of our ways of acting and organising. This will strengthen us massively for the coming disputes with bosses who believe that they do not have to comply with labour rights.
Our thanks go to all those who have supported us in this struggle, both locally and internationally, and for whom class solidarity is an honest concern!
The affected marginally employed workers of the Secession continue to fight for compliance with labour law at their place of work. The management has already agreed to put some of the points to practice, but has not yet agreed with all the points. Your practical solidarity is therefore still necessary. Here is a short and sweet overview of what has happened so far.
Goals of the marginally empoyed workers
1. Minimum labour standards
Hourly billing during the pandemic:
reimbursement of illegally deducted plus hours during the “Lockdowns”
reimbursement of illegally cancelled holidays during the “Lockdowns”
withdrawal of illegally generated minus hours, even outside the “Lockdowns”
calculate halved working days during the exit restriction as whole days and not as hours
Communication:
no communication outside working hours
vacations in which the workers were contacted must be credited back
no unpaid stand-by duty
remuneration of previous stand-by duty with 800 Euro flat rate per person
Overtime:
no extra work, payment of timecredit and overtime with surcharge
In addition:
payment of holiday overtime rates and Sunday bonus
no activities other than stated in the job description
punctual notification of the work schedule
handing over of the works agreement at the conclusion of the contract
the agreements also apply to former marginally employed workers
2. necessary improvements
no more isolated communication
more staff
step-in bonus
basic equipment (water, clothing)
salary increase to at least 450 euros
designation “Springer_in” hast to be changed
→ The management has agreed to implement 6 out of 20 points (5, 9, 12, 14, 19 and 20), the majority is still open!
Chronology of events
2021
February
first colleague throws in the towel because of untenable conditions and quits
August
the colleagues start to organize, all agree that „something has to happen“
23.9.
new board of directors takes over at the Secession; we wait with contacting to have with „the new ones“ maybe also an unburdened basis
9.10.
registered letter of WAS to the management of the Secession with a list of the labor law grievances and an offer for talks
13.10.
phone call of the Secession management to WAS with an appointment for 21.10.
21.10.
first meeting between WAS and management: precise description of all problem areas under labour law, including valid legal norms; listing of the specific goals of the marginally employed; management agrees that contacting during free time will stop immediately
„early justified resignation“ (possibility of the Austrian labour law to leave immediately with all entitlements when the company is not correct, kind of fireing from employees side) of the next colleague because of the conditions
22.10.
the colleagues are contacted in the free time …
pre-postponement of the next meeting date via email by the management to 10.11.
25.10.
WAS calls the management by phone that the agreement of 21.10. has been broken and the colleagues are called again during their spare time; the contacts in the free time are stopped from then on
2.11.
after a plenary meeting of the affected marginally employed, WAS sends an email to the management stating that they will not take any action until the next meeting and that they accept the very long deadline of three weeks
10.11.
second date of talks: commitment by Secession on a few points of the goals, refusal on the remaining points, ex-colleague was forgotten, commitment to inform by 12.11. whether the „offer“ also applies to him
12.11.
no communication about the ex-colleague, agreement is broken by Secession
15.11.
WAS email with improvements and deadline to confirm them until 17.11.
17.11.
Secession ignores our improvements and deadline two calls of WAS to the management to make clear that we will do the rally if we continue to be ignored
18.11.
„threat“ of the workers‘ council to the colleagues concerned that they should not do the demonstration
letters from Secession to the marginally employed workers: some of these contain incorrect time lists, in addition, accumulated overtime from 2018 and 2019 was simply set to zero; in some cases 105 hours of overtime per colleague „disappeared“ in January 2020
invitation by the Secession board to all Secession employees to get to know each other and to talk to each other
WAS protest rally in front of the Secession during the opening of the exhibition
23.11.
email of the colleagues to the board: acceptance of the invitation with information that they will come accompanied by another (external) WAS-member
WAS email to management pointing out incorrect time lists in letters and recommending professional or external payroll services
25.11.
email from board: denial of accompaniment by external WAS member
26.11.
email from the management: payment date of the promised claims could not be met due to overload of payroll accounting (postponement from November to December) plus sketchy promise for „due claims“
29.11.
email of the colleagues to the management board that they postpone any discussion until after the management has met the minimum standards under labor law
email from WAS to the management that the struggle will continue until all points (see above) are fulfilled or at least promised in writing
in the new lockdown, there is no information yet on how the marginalized workers are supposed to work; they are standing in front of closed doors; on email inquiry, it is said that the information on this is posted in the Secession, where, however, the colleagues have no access due to a lack of keys, …
30.11.
third colleague quits, among other things because of these conditions
3.12.
new vague information from the management that an external payroll audit of the claims is unfortunately delayed
13. 12.
Discussion between employees and the director, which was called „Jour fix“. All employees from the sections cash desk/guarding/shop are invited. Practically all colleagues confirm the problem areas which were publicised and are in solidarity with the marginally employed. The management again admits that mistakes were made and announces that also the payments of the regular employees will be newly billed. From February on, there should be structural changes. The management talks about how problematic WAS is for a long time and how the wished the employees would organise with ÖGB, the big yellow trade union.
The management carries on with not talking to WAS and there is still no answer regarding the points that have to be implemented!
16.12.
Rally in front of the Secession
22.12.
Letter from the Secession to the colleagues with a „recalculation“; this results in a few thousand euros in back pay, but is again wrong in essential points (13th & 14th salary, minus hours, …); the management is pushing for signatures under „agreements“ that all claims would be settled with this payment; on-call duty is still categorically denied
2022
January
After repeated false accounting by the Secession, the recalculation of the last few years is now being meticulously recalculated by WAS itself. At the same time, different sources report that there is a real positive change and restructuring in the Secession. If applicable, we will publish more detailed information on this at a later date.
Gewerkschaftliche Beratung:
findet zur Zeit nicht statt jeden vierten Donnerstag im Monat, 16 bis 19 Uhr Ort: Bikes and Rails, Gemeinschaftsraum/ Garten, Emilie-Flöge-Weg 4, 1100 Wien Details zur Beratung
Zitat des Monats
„Die meisten Menschen haben auch bereits eine dunkle Vorstellung von der Unhaltbarkeit der heutigen Zustände, doch nur eine kleine Minderheit hat bis jetzt klar erkannt, daß eine neue und vielleicht die größte Katastrophe, von der die Menschheit je befallen wurde, nur durch eine entschlossene Abkehr von den alten Wegen der Machtpolitik der Staaten und der nationalistischen Verblendung der Völker abgewendet werden kann.“
Rudolf Rocker
Random Arbeitsrechtswissen
Über Gewerkschaften/ Koalitionen und Chefitäten (speziell auch mittleres Management): "Das ArbVG spricht in § 4 Abs 2 leg cit von "auf freiwilliger Mitgliedschaft beruhenden Berufsvereinigungen". In der Wissenschaft hat sich vor Allem der Ausdruck "Koalitionen" durchgesetzt. (…) Charakteristisch für eine Koalition ist, dass die Mitgliedschaft dem sozialen Gegenspieler verschlossen ist (Gegnerfreiheit) und dieser soziale Gegenspieler auch keinen direkten oder indirekten Einfluss auf die Tätigkeit der Vereinigung nehmen kann (Gegnerunabhängigkeit)."
Wiener ArbeiterInnen-Syndikat 