Happy New Year!

Thank you for your interests and supports so far. In the new year of Tiger, we at the KWWA will speak out our demands loudly like the roars of tigers and take easy and composed attitudes like proud tigers. In 2010, we at the KWWA will work hard for the following activities with our 11 regional organizations: to increase our members; to have meetings with young women in their 20s; to reveal and publicize worsening women's employment situations; to stabilize social economic structures; and to win victories in the coming local election in 2010. May you have meaningful, happy day everyday with us.

Jeong Moon Ja

Chairperson

KWWA

Leaps towards hopeful and bright futures in 2010! Holding 6th NCHM's representative meeting.

On January 10, 2010, the 6th representative meeting of National Cooperative of House Managers (NCHM) was held with its 60 representatives and observers' attendance.  In the meeting, NCHM's 5 year evaluations and tasks were shared and action plans in 2010 were approved based on 2009's activities and 5 year project evaluations. The new action plans include ▲ the stabilization of care jobs; ▲ the social re-recognition of care work and the realization of legal protection of care workers; ▲ the reinforcement of identities of NCHM as an alternative economic structure; and ▲ the searching for communication and solidarity at regional levels. 

There was a section for introducing participants by region and regional performances, presided by the chairperson of the Seoul branch, prior to the representative meeting. The Seoul branch that had danced to the music of 'Superman' won the first prize and the Jeonju branch having showed our resolutions with white headbands around the head got the second place. Initially, only prizes for the first winner were prepared. However, all the regional branches performed very well, so the second winner was awarded, too. Nevertheless, we felt something lacking, because other branches also prepared so much.

After the regional performances, a lecture entitled 'social economy and the NCHM' was delivered by Moon Bo-kyung, a general manager of Korea Foundation for Social Investment. The chairpersons of the KWWA and its regional branches also joined the meeting to offer their congratulations.

On both of the last January 9 and 10, KWWA's 18th regular general meeting was held. The meeting gave a momentum to us for gathering all of our 100 full-time activists from our regional branches, sharing KWWA's activity directions for 2010 and making new resolutions.

On the first day, we at the KWWA had a good time to receive a lecture about a political situation entitled 'the reality of Korean politics and tasks' given by Kim Ho-gi, a professor of the Dept. of Sociology, Yonsei University, in order to have broader perspectives on the society.

He identified our current reality as 'the era of uncertainty.' Although very separate and different seem issues by generation like unemployment amongst those in their 20s, job insecurity, private education costs for their children, and preparation for their golden years in their 30s and 40s, alienation from social changes in their 50s and 60s, he highlighted the great majority of people experience grave uncertainty stemming from their economic difficulties due to the lack of social welfare policies. He also raised his concerns for increases in not only social conflicts but also the crisis over democracy hit by the deepening social polarization.

Under these circumstances, civil NGO's roles are crucial. There have been diverse changes in the Korean NGOs: conservative NGOs represented by the 'New Right' movement have risen and support bases for progressive NGOs has been weakened. In this regime, progressive NGOs have faced difficulties in developing new agendas and gaining supports from people.

He also stressed that the progressive movement should introspect on both of its strong points and demerits to increase its influences in the local election in the coming June and suggested to be concerned for how to communicate with people and what to do with people.

We at the KWWA have been preparing a variety of activities to make the year 2010 the year of beginning to activate projects for our members. In the preparatory process, we had a time to carry out deep discussion on these topics: "How should we fulfill members' project guidelines at regional levels?" and "How should we change the culture of our structures to activate our projects for members?"

We also discussed our various concerns: if our activities were self-content and limited; what we at the KWWA did with our members; How we will explore and increase our membership; and how we should change ourselves. For example, we expressed our opinions like 'More important thing is not a desk theory for increasing our membership, but good and practical communication with the public.'; 'People are not interested in serious and boring topics.'; 'We should adjust our perspectives suitable to the public.'; and 'it is not real and good communication just to upload many articles on our website in this era of two-way communication.' We have decided to approach our public through changing our structures and using various internet cultures in order to activate our activities to increase our membership. For instance, all secretariate of the KWWA joined the Twitter to strive to introduce our activities on our real-time bases and communicate with the public.

In the evening, we had a time of unity and communication by region. We had wonderful and happy moments to dance including belly dance, sing, and change song lyrics.

On the second day, KWWA's 2009 annual report and audit report, and action plan for 2010 were presented.  Activity basis for 2010 was decided as the completion of the alternative social movement ▲ to solidify structure powers to meet women workers' demands and cope with realities; ▲ to demand legal reforms to overcome the polarized labor market; and ▲ to overcome the existing values and the principles of the labor market. For this, were set 8 action directions such as △ to gain financial independence through the 50% increase in the number of regular members and support members; △ to make the women involved main forces of their structures; △ to meet women in their 20s and attempt to organize them; and △ to reveal worsening realities of women employment and to carry out activities to correct women's realities.

January 12, 2010

June 17, 2009, we at the KWWA brought a lawsuit against the Ministry of Public Administration and Security to the Seoul Administrative Court to request the 'cancellation of the decision to stop government's subsidies'. Choa Se-jun, a lawyer belonging to the Lawyers for Democratic Society argued the case for the KWWA that had been selected as a NGO in charge of carrying out its project, but its subsidies were stopped in its second term of 2009.

At that time, the Ministry of Public Administration and Security did not reveal its clear reasons for stopping its subsidies to the KWWA, and rejected disclosing its scores against NGOs as a standard for stopping its subsidies. The ministry just replied that it would reject the release of its confidential information, since that would result in disadvantaging the public. However, only after we at the KWWA brought a lawsuit against the ministry, it revealed that the KWWA had been 'a NGO  joining illegal and violent rallies' as its reason why it stop its subsidies to us. 

In this case, the Division 6 of the Seoul Administrative Court made a decision for the ministry. According to the verdict, "the KWWA took active part in  candlelight demonstrations since 2008 when the KWWA joined the People’s Countermeasure Council Against Mad Cow Disease. Joining violent and illegal rallies and demonstrations itself is applicable to a criminal offense."

On the other hand, on December 10, 2009, the Korea Women's Hot Line having brought a lawsuit against the Ministry of Women received a very different verdict. The 14th Division of the Seoul Administrative Court decided "the rejection of subsidies by the Ministry of Women is illegal since the Korea Women's Hot Line cannot be defined as an illegal violent organization just on the ground that it joined the People’s Countermeasure Council Against Mad Cow Disease. There is no proof that the Korea Women's Hot Line organized and led illegal demonstrations, nor was it an illegal organization since its staff has not been punished or actively participated in illegal demonstrations, either."

We at the KWWA doubt about decisions by the court that made very different verdict within a month. The KWWA and the Korea Women's Hot Line are in the same positions because both of the NGOs did not organize or led any illegal and violent demonstrations, nor were their staff persons punished under the Assembly and Association Act. We cannot understand the verdict that sees joining the mad cow disease related candlelight demonstrations in 2008 itself as 'criminal offenses,' from the factual and legalistic perspectives.

The Korea Women's Hot Line filed its case on September 1, 2009 and received the court's decision on December 10, 2009. However, we at the KWWA had to spend 7 months, a far more time compared to the Hot Line: we filed our case on June 17, 2009 and received the verdict on January 8, 2010. Because the Ministry of Public Administration and Security applied for the resumption of its argument in the morning on November 6 when the court was supposed to reach a verdict, court's decision was postponed. Additionally, the unprecedentedly long process was also very doubtful, since the verdict was reached 7 months later.  

The 14th division of the court reached the verdict for the Korea Women's Hot Line decides "The government's condition for deciding on its subsidies is just needed to accomplish its purposes for granting subsidies regulated by relevant enactments and budgets. What is irrelevant to the purposes for granting subsidies cannot be qualified conditions."

On the other hand, the Division 6 of the court brought into relief, the justification of the rejection of the subsidies by the Ministry of Public Administration and Security. However, "questioning activities and characteristics of subsidies-receiving organization regardless of achieving goals for the grants is a serious violation of  freedom of assembly and association stipulated by the constitution." The Division 6 is against the purpose of the Non-governmental Organizations Aid Act,  "NGOs' self-regulation should be guaranteed."

The verdict against the KWWA stigmatizes as illegal and violent organizations,  1,862 NGOs joining the People’s Countermeasure Council Against Mad Cow Disease, and further denounces the candlelight demonstrations as illegal and violent rallies. What is worse is that the verdict views all of over one million citizens participating the candlelight demonstrations as criminals. We at the KWWA would like decide to appeal to denounce the crucially faulty decision by the Division 6 of the Seoul Administrative Court and correct the verdict.

The past December 31, 2009, we at the KWWA joined 'one person demonstration to demand to provide unemployment wages for interns' in front of Government's Complex.

Workers had to return their unemployment wages because of the lump-sum instruction by the Ministry of Labor that their unemployment wages have to be unpaid, if workers work for 180 days without Saturdays. Since December 7, one-person demonstration has been carried out everyday to make protests of that instruction, and to demand the government to take more fundamental measures to youth unemployment problems. Organizations such as the Democratic Labor Party, Korean Confederation of Trade Unions, and People’s Solidarity for Participatory Democracy and individual members have joined the one-person demonstrations.

The tentatively named 'Youth Union' planning the demonstration is a youth NGO aiming at being a trade union which individual youth workers including unemployed youth can join. Modeled by Japanese 'Youth Union,' the NGO (with the membership of about 280, http://cafe.daum.net/alabor) was founded in August 2009, to do a wide variety of activities such as organizing one person demonstrations, forums, lectures and concerts. It has recently begun to buckle down to establish a trade union through collecting its promoters.

Cho Geum-deuk, secretary-general of the Youth Union joining the one-person demonstrations expressed his view for forming strong solidarity with the KWWA, saying "We, a newly formed NGO have many difficulties and problems to tackle including how to organize youth. We'd like to work very hard with  other supportive organizations and our members. Your concerns and eagerness are very valuable."

On December 10, 2009, A ‘press conference to oppose the decrease in budget for social service jobs and call for job countermeasures for women from vulnerable classes’ was hosted by the Korean Care workers NGO Network (composed of by KWWA, People's Solidarity Against Unemployment, Woman Resources Development Centers, Korean Association of Self Sufficiency Promotion, and YMCA Korea).

The Ministry of Labor handed in a budget bill for 2010 which shows large reduction in its supports to social public jobs to 148.7 billion won, by 21.1% compared to those for 2009. Owing to such a reduction plan, the existing social public job projects were mostly excluded and eliminated in the process of the examination and re-examination of social public job projects which have been undertaken since December. As a result, the actual 2 year projects to support social enterprises are left out or have to largely reduce their necessary personnel just around the point of 1 year fulfillment of these projects.

According to 2009 Guidelines for the Exploration of Preliminary Social Enterprises, there was a stipulation that the supports should be stopped if a social enterprise cannot reach a certain ratio of the sales or target sales compared to its total support for one year before the date when the Ministry makes its announcement. However, the government suddenly changed its re-examination standards to ‘by the month before the re-examination was carried out.’ Due to the changed clause, more than a half of the existing projects in the Gwangju and South Cholla Province cannot apply to the re-examination.

While the Ministry of Labor had agreed to support the 2 year social public job projects to assist authorized social enterprises, without any specific reasons it excluded and eliminated social enterprises that have applied to the scheme, and so it is true to doubt if the Ministry is willing to cultivate social enterprises. Moreover, its unclear administration processes such as unfair changes in examination standards, unclear stipulation on the reasons for the exclusion, and the undisclosed selected organizations have driven us more in confusion and puzzles. In particular, due to the concentration of the rejected projects mostly in the care service sector, livelihood of the women from vulnerable classes was highly threatened. That is because they were on the verge of unemployment without any time for them to prepare.

l     Which way should we take:

Korean Care workers NGO Network designed to expand care service into the society and guarantee women’s safe jobs held a press conference to complain about the unfair treatment, oppose the deduction in the budget bill as to social public job projects, and demand the government to set up countermeasures to women’s jobs.

In her prostectus, Kim Jeong-yeon, chairperson of PWWA deplored the matter, saying “On November 30, 2009, 26 women from vulnerable classes became unemployed, who had joined social public job offered by the Ministry of Labor.  They were care workers who had received the real wage of 773,320 won, just minimum wages less than 800,000 won, when their wages were deducted from the payment of the major 4 social insurances.

Through its visiting childcare project, PWWA had provided night childcare service for children in low income family neglected at night. She also emphasized that the one-sided reduction in the number of social public jobs by the Ministry of Labor has resulted in the unemployment amongst the participants in the project, and that this would neglect children of two paycheck couples from low income classes without any measures.

l     Is it that difficult to give the minimum wages to women?

It was really embarrassing for a participant to receive a notice that her contract had been expired just 3 days before her contract was really expired, without giving any time to make preparation. She gave her speech, saying “Even though I am in trouble, I cannot have been sleeping for several days because I am concerned about the child of that single parent that I have taken care of.” She was proud of her job although her job was very difficult since she was sent to a single parent family as a childcare worker. However, she was resentful of unemployment situation of her and her coworkers. She gave full release of her anger and thought if the government’s policies would lead them to all the unemployment.

Hong Hee-duk, a congressman of the Democratic Labor Party who took part in the press conference expressed his view: he was very sorry as a congressman belonging to the Environment-and-labor Commission that he just knew about the unreasonable reasons for the exclusion by the Ministry of Labor and the too speedy unfair treatment. He stated that the budget for the 4 major river restoration project was passed in the Budge and Account Committee, but the budget used by the Ministry of Labor is under examination. He was angry about the reality that the reduction in the budget for the 4 major river restoration is not made at all, while the government gets rid of jobs of those working to look after children of vulnerable single parent families.  He promised his effort to correct the wrong policy in the budget examination of the Ministry of Labor.

Although it was raining, a lot of participants engaged in the social public jobs and driven into the same abyss of unemployment got together to demand the government’s countermeasures. All the participants joined a performance and ended up the press conference: they ripped the papers in which bad policies such as the reduction in the budget for social public jobs were written and threw them into the basket, and instead, they dropped into the basket, the placards containing our wishes such as ▲ achieving a sufficient budget for social public jobs and ▲ setting up measures for women’s jobs.

 On the past November 27, We at Women’s Action for Decent Lives and Jobs (WADLJ) hosted a forum entitled ‘Women’s jobs-and-childcare budgets for 2010 should be like this’ in the Hall of Congressmen.

The National Assembly has currently carried out examination on budgets by sector. This forum was held in the Hall of Congressmen with the help from the office of Rep. Kim Sang-hee of the Democratic Party, in order to let National Assembly members to know our opinions directly.

In the greetings, Kim Sang-hee, a National Assembly member mentioned the forum was meaningful because it is held in a right time when political parties were arguing about budgeting, especially related to people.  She emphasized the need for uniting women’s circle and people to fight with the government’s anti-people and anti-women policies.

Lee Sang-dong, a researcher of the Saesayon made a presentation on the theme of women’s employment trends and issues in budgeting for 2010. He found the employment rate of women in their 30s was stagnant, caused by the expansion of women’s stopped working careers and women’s insecure employment. In order to decrease the wage gaps between men and women, he also highlighted the necessity for making good balances between social policies and employment policies, and further for achieving social security nets as well as employment security nets.

Next, Baek Sunhee, a professor of Social Welfare at Seoul Theological University had a presentation on problems and measures to childcare budgeting for 2010.  She criticized the decrease in most welfare related budgets, and especially childcare related budget which is the most necessary for working women to work securely. She also emphasized that the expansion and increase in public childcare is needed for women to work securely. She pointed out as alternatives, the increase in the number of childcare facilities, expansion to universal childcare systems, the expansion of substantial supports to two paycheck couples, and effective maintenance of childcare fee support systems.

On the past November 18, we at the KWWA held a workshop entitled ‘Women workers, meet social economy based on reciprocity and solidarity’ in its underground training center.

Through her presentation, Lim Youn Ok introduced our social public job projects and social economic activities that we at the KWWA have practiced to tackle women’s unemployment and poverty issues increasing under the strong wind of neo-liberalism for 10 years from the Korean economic crisis in 1989 up to the current economic crisis. Our social economic activities include social enterprises, community coin movement, and credit union activities. The social economy is generally defined as ‘social economic activities carried out not by companies or nations but by the 3^rd sector such as nongovernmental organizations or foundations to realize the social purpose for benefiting communities’.

We searched for development methods as well as found what significances the social economy movement gave to the lives and work of women workers and what changes were made, through in-depth interviews with the total number of 32 women workers. The research outcomes showed how independently they have led their lives and solved their problems in terms of jobs, consumption and financial issues, based on the principles of sharing, cooperation, reciprocity and solidarity in their communities rather than relying on assistance by the government and market.

Next, case studies of the National Cooperative of House Managers (NCHM), Credit Union and Exchange of Hope carried out by the KWWA were presented.

Date and venue: at 10:30am on November 12, 2009, in front of the tent strike placed in front of the National Assembly.

The government and the ruling party announced the immediate enforcement of the Trade Union Act and the Labor Relation Mediation Act which prohibit full time unionists from being paid and the unified negotiation window in case of the introduction of multiple workshop-based trade union system.

In last April, the ILO recommended to solve the issues related to wages of fulltime unionists through the autonomous and voluntary agreement between workers and users. Nevertheless, the government spread the distorted truth that ‘there is no country where companies pay full time unionists’ in order to ‘terminate the Korean labor movement.’

Presently, small-size company-based trade unions with their union membership of less than 300 accounted for over 87% out of the total number of 4,900 trade unions in Korea. However, in fact there would be no full-time activists in trade unions with their union membership of less than 300 or union membership fees have to be raised to pay a fulltime union activist, if the present acts are put into effect. Since the wage levels of workers working in a small-size company with less than 300 workers are not high enough to support the increases in their union membership fees. It means there will be no full-time activists in most trade unions at last. Further, it will be clear that union negotiation and activities will be largely withered due to no fulltime activists. Under the current situation in which most women workers work in the companies employing less than 300 workers, the government policy will have negative influence on women workers’ circle.

The policy to unify the negotiation window in the case of the introduction of multiple trade union systems means that the right to negotiate with the company will be given to only one trade union if two or three trade unions exist in a company. If so, the isolated trade unions will lose their bases, and serious conflicts amongst workers will be caused to obtain the right to negotiate collectively. In conclusion, the unification of negotiation windows will eventually cause conflicts amongst workers, and further, it will be a very poisonous article because it violates the freedom of association as well as infringes the basic labor rights.