NABET-CWA Blasts ABC Proposal to Freeze Pension Plan

Angered NABET-CWA leaders say negotiators for ABC, Inc. told the union bargaining team this week that the company wants to freeze the workers' pension plan effective Dec. 31, 2007.

"Your proposal is unethical, immoral and you should be ashamed of yourselves," NABET-CWA bargaining team member and pension plan trustee Dennis Allen told the ABC representatives.

NABET-CWA President John Clark said the proposal came nearly three weeks into negotiations, and only eleven days before the current four-year agreement expires on March 31.

"It is a completely unacceptable demand on top of the many other attacks on jurisdiction, seniority and other working conditions in the company's proposal," Clark said. "ABC executives want to pull the rug from under the people whose hard work, professionalism and talent make the network run. We will not stand for it."

Clark said the ABC pension plan is not only healthy, but has a credit balance. Yet ABC's proposal, according to the union's early analysis, would reduce the average plan participant's retirement benefit by nearly 25 percent.

The union represents about 2,500 technicians, news writers, camera operators and other employees at ABC from coast to coast. In addition to the pension bombshell, the company is also proposing to allow layoffs without regard to seniority, eliminate paid meal period and subcontract certain bargaining unit work.

Job security, pension protection, retiree medical benefits and wages, which have fallen behind other networks and even independent TV stations, were top issues for NABET-CWA going into bargaining.

At one bargaining session, for instance, Local 59051 President Kevin Wilson gave a PowerPoint presentation showing how, during the term of the current agreement, KGO employees in the San Francisco Bay Area have failed to keep pace with the wages and working conditions of competitors in the local TV market.

Regular bargaining updates - posted daily as sessions are scheduled - are available online at www.abc-contract.info.