Joe Hansen, United Food and Commercial Workers International President, Places Change to Win Constitution Before Delegates
St. Louis, Mo.
September 27, 2005
I am honored and privileged to bring before this convention the resolution to adopt the Change to Win Constitution.
The constitution is our pledge.
It is our pledge to restore hope, opportunity, and prosperity for American workers and their families.
It is the bedrock of our foundation.
It emerges from our shared values—our common resolve—and our common vision—
To engage and organize workers industry-wide.
Raise working and living standards.
Ensure affordable, quality health care, retirement security, safe workplaces, and fairness on the job
Our constitution comes with great responsibilities and obligations.
And it provides great opportunities to restore work—and those who work—to the center of our economy and political life.
It requires a streamlined and nimble operational structure.
It requires that 75 percent of Change to Win resources go to our central task of building a powerful worker movement to raise pay and benefit standards for all working people.
It demands a strong and vibrant political program based on the needs, concerns and goals of working people—a political program that conveys the voice of workers to politicians and elected leaders—not the voice of politicians or any political party to workers.
It binds us to unite the strength of all working people on behalf of:
Equal opportunity
Full legal rights for immigrant workers
The right to a union
Diversity at all levels of change to win—and the opposition to all forms of discrimination
To unite with unions and allies in other countries to negotiate with global corporations to raise living standards and respect for workers’ rights everywhere.
We are here to change course.
Our first step on that course is to establish our constitution.
I move that we adopt the Change to Win Constitution.
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