After months of battling to maintain working conditions and stop attempts by their employer to divide workers, members of the IUF-affiliated BCTGM have won a new five-year collective bargaining agreement with Kellogg’s.
- Members at Kellogg’s ready to eat cereal plants in Battle Creek, Michigan; Lancaster, Pennsylvania; Omaha, Nebraska and Memphis,Tennessee voted on December 21 to accept the recommended collective bargaining agreement. Approval of the contract ends the BCTGM’s strike against Kellogg’s, which began on October 5, 2021.
- The agreement includes a clear path from temporary to regular full-time employment; a moratorium on plant closures through to October 2026; a significant increase in the pension multiplier and no permanent two-tier system dividing workers.
- Commenting on the ratification, BCTGM International President Anthony Shelton stated, “From picket line to picket line, Kellogg’s union members stood strong and undeterred in this fight, inspiring generations of workers across the globe, who were energized by their tremendous show of bravery as they stood up to fight and never once backed down”
- BCTGM also expressed thanks for “the outpouring of fraternal support we received from across the labor movement for our striking members at Kellogg’s. Solidarity was critical to this great workers’ victory”
- The strike won the support of US President Joe Biden who said he was troubled by Kellogg’s plans and stressed the importance of collective bargaining as “an essential tool to protect the rights of workers that should be free from threats and intimidation from employers”.
