IATSE going on strike?

From what I'm reading, I expect a resounding no from IATSE members to ratifying the new contract offer. Quoting a member of IATSE in a Variety story, "“I have not heard a single person saying they will vote yes.”". The same sentiment is expressed elsewhere.
 
Having read the agreement that is up for vote, I'm confused. Maybe I'm not reading the contract language correctly but as I read it:

Producers can 'invade' the 10 hour turnaround. I don't know what that means. 'Invade' is not defined in the contract.

If you work a 5 day week, you get a 54 hour weekend
If you work a 6 day week, you get a 32 hour weekend, which means bye-bye to 54 hours.

But, once again, it says the producer can invade the weekend hours by paying straight time. I must be misunderstanding this since why would they be allowed to pay straight time.

Regarding meals, it seems nothing changes. The contract calls for producers and the union to have a meeting about that in the future.

[edit] 'Nothing changes' means nothing changes regarding ensuring members get time to eat. But they do increase the meal penalty to $7.50 for a missed 1/2 hour meal.break.
 
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We will see. What we were presented by the press was largely complaints about missing lunch breaks, long hours, and not enough time to sleep. But what's presented in the press could be far from what's really up member's craw. There are a lot of items in the agreement. One of them is a 9% raise over 3 years. So is money and the other items enough to bring members around? We will know next Monday.
 
Mitch was right .... again. IATSE ratified the contract today. Well, there you have it. All the bellyaching about how tough things are lost to a 9% raise and other changes. Once again, members avoided a strike and kept their record of never striking.
 
I asked Brawley about it on facebook and he made the point that the new terms would amount to a massive raise for the crew on his current show if they continue with the hours they're working.

I'm still not sure what "invade" means and what the terms of that are. But long story short, under the new contract they will get much more than a 9% raise if they continue to be overworked. Which, one figures, must change the calculus for overworking them on any given day/week vs extending the shooting schedule
 
In the old ACTT agreements in the UK, it got very expensive if you started to work long hours, in order to avoid them being used excessively, There was an instance where a broadcast employer (apparently) deliberately used them on a major news event by keeping the same crew working on it for a few days, in order to use the amount being paid as part of a campaign against the union. The crew warned the employer about the cost of keeping them on the story.
 
Will go down as the biggest missed opportunity in the history of the union. Delegate votes: the last refuge of a questionable minority. Want a perfect example of expending a great deal of energy only to end up in the same place look no further.
 
To be fair, the overall vote was a 'No' by 8 tenths of 1%. One member comment - "That 54 hour turnaround without an increase on 6th day turnarounds [32 hours] practically commits shoots to a six day work week. 8 hours of OT on Saturday lets production pull call 4 hours ahead for Monday.

So thanks, Matt, for giving up our weekends, the exact opposite of what any of us asked for."
 
I'm not in the union and don't work on long-term, narrative type "union shows"(or IF I do something on a union show, it's a one-off, every few years), so none of this was going to have any impact on me, anyway... But I don't get it... There was all of this wailing and gnashing of teeth and foot stomping calling for a strike over unsafe working hours and turnaround, etc. and in the end, nothing was done about it. They still seem to be in the same boat, to me. Am I missing something?
 
Run&Gun said:
Am I missing something?
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I don't think you are. IMO, this is show business and at the end of the day most of the people are just barking and not biting because they don't want to lose their 1% jobs because many deep down inside probably know they could eventually be replaced since the show must go on one way or another.
 
NorBro said:
I don't think you are. IMO, this is show business and at the end of the day most of the people are just barking and not biting because they don't want to lose their 1% jobs because many deep down inside probably know they could eventually be replaced since the show must go on one way or another.
Click to expand...

I mean, it was pretty much a split decision, close to 50-50 vote. Ratification actually narrowly lost the popular vote in LA but passed due to delegate math.

per Deadline: "Among Hollywood locals, the Basic Agreement was rejected in the popular vote with 49.6% voting yes to 50.4% voting no. On the non-LA Area Standards Agreement the popular vote stands at 52% yes to 48% no.

Overall, 50.3% voted yes to 49.7% voted no for both contracts."

So while the decision to strike was practically unanimous, the decision to ratify was evenly split.

It's possible that only half the membership cared about working conditions and the other half cared only about the money. It's also possible that once the deal got a little sweeter, they lost the motivation to strike.

we'll have to see what happens when the contracts come up for renewal again. If there are 3 years of 6-day weeks and no weekend, they may come back with a stronger will to negotiate.

Brawley also made the point to me that these negotiations are in the works for months or years. It's not possible to come in at the last minute and make big asks. Which means that the next negotiations begin now
 
That's the paper outcome, but you/we don't really know what the people involved are really thinking or why the decision was the way it was.

Like with many other things in life, you'll just have to trust what you're told because you/we don't have the power and/or money to know any better (at least in this case).

On a side note, I wonder how many unions or "unions" are out there that have never gone on strike.
 
That may be so, but I was specifically responding to your assertion that "most of the people are just barking and not biting because they don't want to lose their 1% jobs". If there was foul play with the vote, then the deal was rejected and most of the people were actually biting.

My only point was that if the vote was close, then the membership didn't roll over for the deal. Half the members wanted to strike for something better
 
This info is not published, but it would be interesting to know the age/experience breakdown of the vote. Some say that the young & eager types are willing to put up with more abuse, but I wonder about the people who accept that this is the way it's been and will continue to be, so at least we get some more money out of it.
 
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