Forum Post: UIUC workers want justice

At the last bargaining session, the union was offered an insulting deal: 50 cents more per hour the first year, then 30 cents the second year, and 25 cents in the last year of the contract.

Food and building workers make poverty-level wages, which have been further eroded in recent years by the administration. In real terms, wages have not kept up with inflation, and simultaneously, the state legislature has reduced workers' health care and pension benefits.

...Management showed its commitment to blocking employees from standing up for themselves earlier in negotiations when it retaliated against workers on the bargaining team. Two of them were fired on the made-up charge of a fight at work. Supervisors later changed their story when questioned about this, saying it was only a loud argument.

Three other members of the bargaining team were docked pay on days when they attended negotiating meetings, and another was put on probation simply for letting a union organizer into a campus building to talk to workers on their break.

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