Booklet 5 - Organizing in Diversity

Table of Contents

1. Solidarity in diversity

2. Young workers

3. Older workers

4. Workers with disabilities

5. Lesbian and gay workers

References and additional reading

Additional examples and case studies

1. Solidarity in diversity

"As unionists, we must strive to learn, to teach and to accept the diversity that enriches the fabric of our society and to fight for equal rights for all". ⁽¹⁾

The labour force is increasingly diverse. Yet the norm for a "worker" is the able-bodied, masculine, heterosexual member of the dominant cultural group. Those who do not fit this norm - women, young people, older workers, people with disabilities or different abilities, gays and lesbians, ethnic minorities, indigenous people - all tend to be labelled as different and to be subject to sexist, ageist, racist, xenophobic, homophobic or other forms of overt or indirect discrimination in the workplace. As people who are different, they also challenge the labour movement's normal form of democracy and representation. Their call for equality is often seen as wanting special rights, so that they are discounted as special interest groups.

Unions, by virtue of their essential characteristics - solidarity and universality - have an extraordinary power to instill new values and change assumptions about diverse types of workers. By action and example, they can influence change in their members, employers and society at large. Their openness and acceptance of difference will challenge the oppression of silence that reinforces discrimination and prejudice in many workplaces today.

At its 17^th World Congress in Durban in April 2000, the ICFTU formally adopted a resolution to "make sure action to overcome discrimination at work - including against migrants or on the basis of race, colour, national extraction, sexual orientation, disability or age - is given the highest political commitment and the financial resources to match. The ICFTU will lead by example, acting as a catalyst for change in the trade union movement, to promote solidarity in diversity, as all workers must have their place in our organizations".

In accordance with the Congress resolution, an International Workshop on 'Trade Unions Fighting Racism and Xenophobia' (Aylmer, Canada, 5-9 May 2001) drew up a Plan of Action for trade unions at national, regional and international levels to fight racism and xenophobia more effectively in communities, in the labour market, in the workplace and within trade unions:

ICFTU No to Racism and Xenophobia! Plan of Action for Trade Unions

The basic principles of the ICFTU No to Racism and Xenophobia! Plan of Action for Trade Unions are worth noting: Trade unions stand against racism and xenophobia as a matter of fundamental principle. The promotion of human rights, equality and diversity is an integral part of the trade unions' daily struggle for freedom, equality and justice for all. Trade unions take an explicitly anti-racist approach in the development and implementation of their policies, programmes and action. Trade unions recognize the central role to be played by those affected by racism, xenophobia and ethnic discrimination in developing, implementing and monitoring relevant policies, programmes and activities, paying special attention to the most vulnerable groups: women, youth and persons with disabilities. Trade unions recognize the crucial importance of integrating a gender perspective when developing and implementing policies, programmes and activities in the fight against racism and xenophobia, in order to address more effectively the issue of multiple discrimination against women.

To promote solidarity in diversity, unions can:

Adopt a 'rights-based' rather than a 'needs-based' approach.

Satisfying basic needs and creating basic rights

A needs-based approach entrenches the perception of a particular group as the passive recipients of services, aid and charity - or a burden. Within this approach, the needs of a particular group may be progressively satisfied through welfare benevolence, resource allocation and administrative and policy planning. But they are not treated as having a right to enforce the satisfaction of those needs. Unions should, of course, assist diverse groups of workers to satisfy and meet their basic human needs. But within a needs-based framework, there is little scope for the empowerment of these groups. More recently, there has been an enormous shift in policy direction from the passive to the active. The rights-based framework recognizes the right of, for example, older workers or workers with disabilities or workers with different sexual orientation, to non-discrimination and to equality of opportunity and treatment in the provision of services and the pursuit of decent work. Such an approach creates entitlements for rights-holders. An older worker is entitled to equality of opportunity and treatment, and there is a corresponding obligation on the part of States, employers, unions to ensure that this occurs.

Promote the capacity to name, blame and claim. At the heart of the rights-based approach is the ability of workers to define an experience as unfair and possibly even subsequently lodging a grievance:

Naming, blaming and claiming

2. Young Workers

Over one billion young women and men live in the world today. One person in five today is aged between 15 and 24 years; this means that youth comprise almost 18 per cent of the world's population. Eighty-five per cent of young people live in developing countries, with 54 per cent in Asia and the Pacific alone. During the current decade, the size of the youth population is expected to grow by 116 million or about 11 per cent, reaching almost 1.2 billion by 2010. ⁽²⁾

Some 628 million young people work, accounting for about 22 per cent of the global labour force. But youth employment problems are serious. Around 66 million young people are unemployed. This means that young people account for about 41 per cent of the world's 160 million unemployed. In countries as diverse as Colombia, Egypt, Italy and Jamaica, more than one in three young persons are without work, actively looking for work and/or available for work. Youth are two to three times more likely to be unemployed than adults. Youth are often the last hired and the first fired. This is partly because firms spend less on training young workers, and they tend not to be covered by protective legislation since they often do not meet the requisite qualifying time, thus they are cheaper to dismiss. Faced with recession, firms will usually cease recruitment before commencing redundancies. Young workers are disproportionately affected by both.

Disproportionately large numbers of young women and men are exposed to long-term unemployment or are limited to precarious or short-term work. As a result, many drop out of the labour force or fail to enter it successfully in the first place and become inactive. In developing countries, where very few can afford to be openly unemployed, the youth employment problem is more one of under-employment and low-pay and low-quality jobs in the informal sector.

Youth employment problems tend to track adult employment problems over time. Failure to find or maintain a job at an early age can have lasting effects on occupational patterns and incomes. Unemployed youth may very well have difficulty finding work throughout their entire lives as, without some solid experience at a relatively young age, their chances of employability continue to slide - thereby perpetuating a vicious cycle of poverty and social exclusion.

Young women (like their older sisters) normally experience higher unemployment rates than their male counterparts. A review of 97 economies revealed that young women are more likely to be unemployed in two-thirds of them. In many cases the differences are marginal, but in others they are indeed significant. Over a quarter of industrialized countries have female youth unemployment rates exceeding those of the males by more than 20 per cent. And of the 34 economies surveyed in the Caribbean and Latin America, more than half have female youth unemployment rates more than 50 per cent higher than male rates. Access to education and training is fundamental to enabling young women to compete with men on the basis of objective criteria for recruitment and promotion. While more and more young women are having access to schooling and are often outperforming the men, they are still not going into the types of education and vocational training relevant for labour market needs. Particularly in developing countries, young women are often unable to take advantage of training opportunities due to barriers to entry, discrimination in selection and gender stereotyping.

The importance of these issues has been acknowledged in the recent launch of a high-level policy network on youth employment [ box below]. Unions have been active in reaching out to the young and championing youth employment concerns. In April 1999, the ICFTU launched a campaign "The Future Starts Now - Join a Union" to inform young people, to organize them in trade unions and to campaign for proper policies on employment and education for young people. On May Day 2000, the Youth Campaign was relaunched, targeting in particular young women. The campaign is seen as vital for the renewal and ultimately the survival of the trade union movement. Union leaders are also part of the High-Level Panel of the Youth Employment Network.

"Young people will join unions when trade unions wake up, rethink their strategies and work hand-in-hand with their young members to organize young people into unions and to develop an effective response to the tremendous dilemma young people are facing now. Building solidarity between generations will be for the benefit of the young and for the benefit of the trade union movement as a whole". ⁽³⁾

Trade unions need to:

Because young people are entering later and later into the labour market and finding jobs in sectors where trade unions are poorly represented and because trade unions in the past did not give them the space they deserve, young people often have a rather negative image of the trade union movement. Young people tend to perceive unions as too traditional, bureaucratic and hierarchical. Unions need to change their image and start to work hand-in-hand with young unionists to make the unions an attractive and an open place for the young. Instead of waiting for young people to come, unions should reach out to the young so as to better understand their concerns and needs and what they expect from unions. Unions should organize regular activities and special campaigns to inform young people and organize them. Particular attention should be given to the needs and concerns of young women.

Guidelines:

Unions need to give youth the means to make their voices heard within the labour movement. The new generation in the trade union movement is often hardly seen and their voices not heard - because they are hardly represented at the decision-making level, and they do not receive sufficient support to set up youth structures and youth committees or to implement youth policies and activities. Trade unions need to change their culture and procedures to ensure the full integration of youth in the trade union movement.

Checklist:

The transition from school to work is a critical part of the life of every young person. Young people entering the labour market are hampered by their lack of experience and all too often they have inadequate education or skills, either because they left school too early or because the education and training they received was not suited to the requirements of the labour market. Often, when they do manage to find a job, it is subject to low wages, a low level of job security and an equally low level of social protection - which sets the affected youth on the path towards a vicious cycle of poverty and social exclusion. Young women are much more likely than young men to be adversely affected. Unions should, therefore work with the government, public and private sector training providers, employment/recruitment services, employers to:

Checklist:

"Job creation and special measures in the labour market are still the keys for young people to get proper access to employment. Trade union action is required to put job creation for young people at the centre of the political agenda during collective bargaining procedures and at the tripartite level". ⁽⁴⁾ On their own, trade unions cannot create jobs for young people; commitment and involvement of the social partners is essential. At tripartite level and in collective bargaining procedures, trade unions could urge for:

Checklist:

At the international level, trade unions should:

3. Older Workers

"We envisage a world where elderly women have decent pensions and are not reduced to misery and want; where they are not forced to do menial jobs in order to meet their daily needs. We see a society which does not consider older people useless and insignificant, but values them for the contribution they have made and continue to make". ⁽⁵⁾

Over the last half century, some 20 years have been added to the average life span. Longevity is one of the great achievements of the twentieth century. However, the ageing of the world's population is producing unprecedented challenges to citizens, policy makers and the labour movement - relating not only to the protection of the economic and social security of older persons but also to the elimination of discrimination on the grounds of age - and, importantly, the elimination of double discrimination on ageist and sexist grounds.

The number of persons aged 60 years or older is currently estimated to be about 600 million and is projected to grow to almost 2 billion by 2050, at which time the population of older persons will be larger than the population of children for the first time in human history. Although the proportion of older persons is now highest in industrialized countries, the major growth of the world's oldest population will be in developing countries.

Women account for the bulk of the over 60 years population in almost every country of the world. The feminization of later life is occurring at a much more rapid rate in the less developed regions, and will be compressed into a much shorter time frame. Within the next twenty-five years, nearly three-quarters of the world's older women will be living and working in the developing world, particularly in Asia. Poverty in old age also has a strong gender dimension; since female life expectancy is higher women tend to stay in poverty longer at the end of their life. Older women have less economic security in old age, because they have been working in the household or informal economy, have interrupted working lives, have lower-paid or part-time jobs, have weaker property rights, benefit less from pension schemes.

In the world of work, the "older worker" is, however, not defined only by chronological age. For "older women", other sociocultural factors associated with the loss of "youthful" beauty appear to also play a significant role in determining when a woman worker is considered old. There is mounting evidence that ageist and sexist stereotypes are effectively withdrawing women as young as 35 years from the labour force on the grounds that they are "too old" for work. In a growing number of countries, women as they approach their mid-thirties are more likely to be made redundant, less likely to find alternative employment, than other groups within the labour market.

Sexist and ageist discrimination means that women become increasingly vulnerable over their life cycle and many do not have basic economic security in their old age. Women face a much higher risk of a drastic drop in living standards when they retire. "Poverty among women in old age is not the result of a random or accidental process. It is in large part a result of the fact that most societies relegate women to inferior economic positions throughout their lives". ⁽⁶⁾

As part of its commitment to supporting "a society for all ages", the trade union movement has been looking at the issues of its older members and the role of older people in society in general. The main concerns have been the establishment or maintenance of a system of social protection for such workers and the elimination of discrimination on the grounds of age. Unions are also exploring how older and retired workers can actively contribute to the labour movement. Not only can older persons' experience be a valuable resource, but their presence in the movement can also give trade unions wider public appeal. In particular, trade unions are recognizing that the position of older women is an urgent one for action. Trade unions can:

With human capital - the knowledge and know-how embodied in people - now a dominant determinant of national economic performance and enterprise productivity, discrimination against older workers involves a heavy economic price through wasting or limiting their human resource potential:

"The union movement simply cannot afford to waste a resource as precious as the combined experience, knowledge and dedication of its retired members" ⁽⁷⁾

Unions could, therefore:

Guidelines:

Adopt a rights-based approach to address the issues of older workers

There are essentially two main approaches to addressing the concerns of ageing. One is a needs-based approach, focussing on meeting the needs of the old, in particular for pensions and health care. But such an approach tends to perpetuate the stereotype of the old as unable or unwilling to participate in and contribute to their own support. It entrenches the perception that as a group, they are inactive recipients of services, aid and charity - or a burden.

In contrast, the rights-based approach recognizes the right of older persons to non-discrimination and to equality of opportunity and treatment in the provision of services and the pursuit of decent work. The rights-based framework also shifts the perspective from regarding older people, especially women, as helpless and vulnerable, to a greater emphasis on their contributions to society (largely invisible and unrewarded) and on their productive potentials.

Unions should adopt the rights-based approach and support policy reform, including international legal reform, to promote the right of older persons to non-discrimination and to equality of opportunity and treatment in the provision of services and the pursuit of decent work. ⁽⁸⁾

Currently, there exists no legally binding universal instrument directly calling for national policies to eliminate and outlaw discrimination in access to employment, training and work conditions on the grounds of age. For example, many countries have ratified the ILO Discrimination (Employment and Occupation Convention, 1958 (No. 111) and the United Nations Convention on the Elimination of Discrimination against Women (CEDAW). But age is not listed as one of the seven grounds upon which discrimination is prohibited by these conventions. And for a woman, it has been suggested that as she grows older or is perceived to be older, her access to rights within the scope of these international instruments tends to diminish, for example because of misconceptions reinforced by a youth-obsessed media and society's lack of recognition of the significant economic contribution of older women workers.

Therefore, trade unions are urged to monitor closely and to support a proposed Optional Protocol to the ILO Discrimination (Employment and Occupation) Convention, 1958 (No. 111), as it represents a crucial opportunity to create a comprehensive legal basis in international law to promote the rights of older workers in general and older women workers in particular.

In promoting the rights of older workers, especially older women workers, unions should give particular attention to:

Guidelines:

"We may think of a society for all as one that adjusts its structures and functioning, as well as its policies and plans, to the needs and capabilities of all, thereby releasing the potential of all, for the benefit of all. A 'society for all ages' would ....enable the generations to invest in one another and share in the fruits of that investment, guided by the twin principles of reciprocity and equity". ⁽¹⁰⁾

To support a society for all ages, trade unions must, importantly, ensure that no one group is excluded from society's benefits on the grounds of age, neither old nor young. However, unions are often confronted with the dilemma of balancing the contradictory issues of high unemployment, particularly among the young, with the needs of an ageing workforce. Unions can:

Checklist:

• programmes to prepare people for retirement;
• developing policies of retirement that are linked to recruitment
whereby older workers can gradually move towards retirement by going part-time, at the same time passing on their knowledge and skills to new, younger workers who will eventually take their place;
• ensuring lifelong learning and continuous training opportunities for workers of all ages. Lifelong learning rejects the notion of an age-structured society. The aim should be to motivate, enable and encourage everyone to learn throughout life;
• policies to enable care givers (who are normally women) to have time to look after elderly relatives;

The active participation of older workers, in particular older women, in advancing their rights is an essential mechanism to guard against those rights becoming burdens. Providing older workers with a collective voice - through the right to organize and collective bargaining - is pivotal to facilitating meaningful participation.

While associations of retirees and retired trade unionists are relatively common in industrialized countries, it has only been in more recent years that trade unions in developing countries have been giving attention to organizing older people as a separate and special category. To organize older workers and retirees, trade unions can:

Checklist:

Checklist:

Unions can provide a range of services or facilities to help address the economic and social needs of older workers, in particular older women workers. These services should not be a substitute for collective bargaining nor a substitute for the responsibilities of the State. Rather, the special services are a way of making unions more relevant to the lives of older workers and can be regarded as an organizing strategy. The services can include:

Guidelines:

4. Workers with disabilities

"Making sure that workers with disabilities have the same right to dignity, autonomy and to reach their full potential must be part of trade union strategy" ⁽¹¹⁾

Some 600 million people or one tenth of the world's population today and an estimated 386 million of the world's working age population have some form of disability - physical, intellectual or sensory impairment, medical conditions or mental illness. Such impairments, conditions or illnesses may be permanent or transitory.

Nowadays, disability is regarded not merely as an individual condition but is defined by the relationship between disabled people and their environment. The British Trades Union Congress (TUC), for example, emphasizes the social definition of disability: "Although disabled people have mental, sensory and physical impairments, these impairments do not cause their disabilities. People with impairments face unjustifiable discrimination, and consequent exclusion from employment, education, housing and transport. This discrimination, not the impairment, is the disability". ⁽¹²⁾ The Standing Committee on Equal Opportunities has recommended to Education International Europe a change in terminology from "disabled" to "differently-abled" persons to help break down some of the attitudinal barriers towards disability.

Unemployment rates for people with disabilities are twice as high as those for non-disabled people. The duration of joblessness is around three times that of people without disabilities ⁽¹³⁾. Even those who are employed confront ignorance and discrimination not only from employers but also their own workmates.

Throughout the world, women bear the main burden, not only in dealing with their own disabilities, but as the main carers for those with disabilities. In caring for the disabled, the work burdens of women inside and outside the home increase accordingly. Women with disabilities: ⁽¹⁴⁾

Women with disabilities are often serious victims of "double discrimination". Statistics speak for themselves. In the Congo, illiteracy among women with disabilities in rural areas runs at 30 per cent. In the United States, a government survey found that only 3.8 per cent of women with disabilities had college degrees, compared with 20 per cent of women without disabilities. In Latin America, women with disabilities earn less than half of their male counterparts' income. ⁽¹⁵⁾

Relevant ILO Standards:

Vocational Rehabilitation (Disabled) Recommendation, 1955 (No.99);

Convention concerning Vocational Rehabilitation and Employment (Disabled Persons), 1983 (No.159); and

Recommendation concerning Vocational Rehabilitation and Employment (Disabled Persons), 1983 (No.168)

Trade unions have a fourfold responsibility towards workers with disabilities:

Workers with disabilities should enjoy the right to participate fully in trade union structures and functions as in any other societal institution. To promote equality for persons with disabilities within their own internal structures, unions should:

Guidelines:

Trade unions have a crucial role to play in campaigning for the implementation of existing legislation which assists workers with disabilities and for an enhanced legal framework and public policies and initiatives that take account of the problems facing workers with disabilities and promote their full participation in the workplace and in society. Trade unions, on their own behalf or in alliance with other players in the civil society and fully consulting and involving workers with disabilities, can take action as part of "social unionism" to:

Guidelines:

Enabling people with disabilities to work is part of basic workers' rights and social justice. For workers with disabilities, especially women with disabilities, work is crucial for economic independence and key to social integration. To promote equality of opportunity and treatment for all persons with all types of disabilities to secure, perform and retain suitable employment and to achieve satisfactory occupational integration, trade unions should:

Guidelines:

• job retention and the right for an adequate vocational rehabilitation programme for persons with disabilities - whatever the cause of their disability;
• no discriminatory practices are directed against persons with disabilities;
• a supplement to workers' compensation benefits provided wherever necessary;
• the provision of technical mechanisms or workplace modifications to accommodate differently-abled persons; and
• a greater variety of entry level positions made available to persons with disabilities who are unable to perform "non-essential" duties of entry level positions.

5. Lesbian and gay workers

"It is the year 2000 and still not one country has managed to guarantee the same rights to homosexuals as to heterosexuals. Most of the discrimination occurs in the world of work. Given that the trade union mission is to defend workers and that the rights of homosexuals are trampled on at work, it is normal that the unions should come to the assistance of this minority..........The fight by women to make their voice heard within the trade unions has had a decisive impact. It is often within the 'women's' or 'equal opportunities' departments of trade unions that the first demands from minority groups, increasingly from homosexuals, emerge." ⁽¹⁹⁾

Homophobia describes any negative personal attitudes or behaviours about homosexuality. Homophobia is reinforced by heterosexism, which defines the systematic belief that everyone is heterosexual and that heterosexuality is inherently superior to homosexuality. However, heterosexuality is but one thread within the complex weave of human sexuality. Those who are attracted to members of the opposite sex are heterosexual; people who are attracted to members of the same sex are lesbians or gay men, and those who are attracted to both opposite and same-sex partners are bisexual - all are sexual orientations. Homophobia manifests itself in many ways, ranging from social intolerance and cultural exclusion, to criminalization of homosexual acts. In many countries, homosexuality is still taboo; at best it is viewed as abnormal, at worst a crime punishable by death. It is still illegal in some 86 countries, those where lesbians and gays are most oppressed.

In the workplace, lesbians and gays are harassed, discriminated against in hiring and promotions, and possibly fired without cause (Being lesbian or gay is not a justified cause). Their unmarried partners cannot get the same benefits that heterosexual partners receive as a matter of course. Homophobic attitudes may be just as prevalent among co-workers as among employers. Work colleagues, union members, can be equally mean and vicious to lesbian and gay workers. Shop stewards do not always want to take up blatant discrimination or harassment cases. Homophobic comments or jokes by fellow workers reinforce the feeling that lesbians and gays are different and do not belong.

The lives of lesbians and gay men are incomparably more difficult than those of heterosexuals. Isolation is a very common problem for lesbians and gays; often to be anonymous is to be safe from discrimination. Many do not 'come out' or acknowledge their sexual orientation publicly in the workplace, even if they forego rights for possible same-sex partners. They fear repercussions ranging from the loss of respect to the open hostility of colleagues and employers. They cannot get health benefits for their partners. They pay more taxes as they are not eligible for spousal deductions. Since they are not always considered family members, they might be refused paid leave to take care of, or even entry into hospital rooms to visit sick or dying lifetime partners. They are not entitled for survivors' benefits under pension plans. Children are taken away from lesbian mothers in custody battles by courts for whom the traditional patriarchal family structure is the norm.

Unions can fight homophobia in a number of ways. The first step of course is that unions themselves must be alert and sensitive to the numerous difficulties faced by women and men whose only 'offence' is to love differently. Within union ranks, lesbian and gay participation should be encouraged and promoted. Education, awareness raising and sensitization of union rank and file to confront and eliminate discrimination against lesbians, gay men and bisexuals in unions, in the workplace and in society should be a union priority. It is also crucial that unions negotiate collective agreement provisions that ensure that all workers have the same rights and receive the same benefits and that sexual orientation is squarely placed in all anti-discrimination clauses. Unions should, together with employers, have the responsibility to ensure that the workplace is kept free of homophobic harassment. Unions can also engage in public campaigns and legal and political action to eliminate discrimination on the grounds of sexual orientation.

In the struggle for lesbian and gay rights, trade unions can [ PSI and Education International, Working for Lesbian and Gay Members]

Guidelines:

• making lesbian and gay issues visible, eg. by publishing articles, producing leaflets, posters, etc;
• publishing the union's policy on lesbian and gay issues and making it clear that harassment or discrimination on the grounds of sexual orientation will not be tolerated;
• providing opportunities for lesbian and gay members to meet and discuss issues;
• making sure that there is readily accessible information about lesbian and gay community groups;
• nominating a contact officer for lesbian and gay members, and making the contact details widely known amongst members.

• Support from the leadership. It is important that the leadership understands why lesbian and gay issues are important and strongly supports equality for homosexual workers;
• Issuing official policy statements, convention resolutions, etc. supporting lesbian and gay rights and including sexual orientation as prohibited grounds for discrimination;
• Ensuring that union staff are supportive of lesbian and gay members and understand that confidentiality is the cornerstone of building the trust of lesbian and gay members;
• Giving lesbians and gay men a voice within unions through having their own structures, holding caucuses, etc.
• Facilitating the development of an active network of members who are lesbian, gay or bisexual.

• hold special forums such as workshops, training sessions, meetings, conferences;
• establish a lesbian and gay committee or caucus;
• establish self-organization structures, eg. elected structures within the union for lesbian and gay members;
• allow for lesbian and gay representatives to be elected to other appropriate levels of the union's organization, eg. in the collective bargaining committee, equality committee;
• provide resources for activities, eg. an adequate and agreed budget, education and training, publicity and communication resources.

• Ensure that the culture of the union is supportive of all its diverse members, including lesbian and gay members.
• Inform and sensitize union members on the issues. The discrimination lesbians and gay men experience both in and outside the workplace is often little understood and misconceptions are common;
• Integrate lesbian and gay rights issues in union education programmes, not only in human rights courses but as an integral part of the education process from steward training onward;

• Put sexual orientation into anti-discrimination clauses. Contract language should ensure that lesbian, gay and bisexual issues are included in employment equity and ensure protection for and recognition of members in same-sex spousal relationships and their families; and ensure benefits, including pensions, are given to same sex partners;
• Ensure that such contract provisions are and remain a priority during the collective bargaining process. They must not be seen as bargaining chips to be given up for advances in other areas. Contract negotiations should not divide the membership at the very time that unity and solidarity are most called for;
• Recognize, however, that no-discrimination clauses are only a first step; they do not in themselves solve the problem of discrimination in the workplace, either by managers or, regrettably, by union representatives. No-discrimination clauses may not prevent the denial of many employment benefits to same-sex spouses and their families;

Remember: Because lesbian and gay members are denied benefits based upon marital or family status as a result of the heterosexual definition of the word 'spouse', they are in fact subsidizing other members with their dues.

• Ensure that contract language referring to benefits such as family-related leave, bereavement leave, adoption leave, care and nurturing leave, relocation expenses, and so on, are made equally applicable to lesbian and gay members;
• Include lesbian and gay representatives in negotiations on issues that directly affect them.