CORPORATE HUMANITY - AN OXYMORON

YOU ARE JUDGED BY THE COMPANY YOU KEEP SANDY. THIS MEANS UNIROYAL/CROMPTON/CHEMTURA & NOW LANXESS (BAYER/MONSANTO)


What a litany of corporate monsters. Recently we have had the Waterloo Region Record article written by Greg Mercer and titled "Rubber Town". Today the Record published "A long fight for compensation" also by Mr. Mercer. Much of the heat is focused upon our corrupt provincial governments removing the right to sue from employees and installing an equally corrupt Workman's Compensation Board, now optimistically named the Workplace Safety and Insurance Board (WSIB). Today's article makes it clear that the WSIB takes its direction from both the provincial government and employers and has reduced employers' WSIB premiums drastically by reducing payouts to injured workers.

Bayer and Monsanto are currently in the news due to class action lawsuits and decisions that a Monsanto herbicide, Glyphosate, has caused cancer in human beings. Of course we all know about Uniroyal Chemical and the 1989 Elmira Water Crisis. Oh and of course Uniroyal, Dow, Hercules, and others are all implicated in the production of Agent Orange and its accompanying by-product dioxin. This dioxin (2,3,7,8 TCDD) has damaged and killed human beings in Vietnam and even here in Ontario due to its work as a brush remover along highways and power lines.

Getting back to local rubber producers the two most mentioned are B.F. Goodrich and again Uniroyal Chemical. There are still living persons whether union men or management or even company consultants who know first hand how bad the fumes were inside the local tire plants. The Waterloo Public Interest Research Group (WPIRG) produced a booklet regarding solvent fumes and poisonings and distributed it to rubber workers including Uniroyal employees. After I blew the whistle on Varnicolor Chemical here in Elmira, I was given a copy of the WPIRG booklet detailing the various solvents and their health effects.

Once again having health and safety laws that are either not enforced or easily stick handled around has elevated shareholders' profits on the backs of employees health and lives.

GO AHEAD SANDY, KEEP ON SUPPORTING UNIROYAL/Chemtura/Lanxess. That speaks volumes to the informed and intelligent people in Woolwich Township and further afield.