News

IUE-CWA members this week voted to ratify their new four-year contract with General Electric with 79 percent approving the agreement, which boosts wages by 16 percent and provides significant pension increases for the 10,000 workers.

CWA members and retirees, community supporters, elected officials and activists concerned about the possible closing of the Alcatel Lucent facility in North Andover, Mass., rallied at the local community college on June 24 to show their determination to keep the plant open.

As this issue went to press, thousands of CWA and IBEW members were descending upon Verizon's New York City headquarters to stage a "We Won't Back Down" rally tonight, June 28, to protest the company's anti-worker and anti-customer policies. Some 2,000 workers were expected at the rally, with many bussing in from New England and Mid-Atlantic States.

Calling their cause "Scrubs for Sicko," CWA nurses are part of a huge coalition of nurses and doctors who are rallying around the new Michael Moore movie – titled "Sicko" – examining America's badly broken health care system.

CWA's release this week of the first-ever national state-by-state Internet speed survey, showing that actual user speeds for broadband services in the United States are far below speeds in most other developed nations, drew widespread media coverage.