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Steelworkers File Complaint with U.S. State Department over Breach of OECD Guidelines by German-based Continental Tire

For Immediate Release                                         August 6, 2006

(Pittsburgh, PA) — The United Steelworkers (USW) has filed a complaint with the U.S. State Department over breaches by Continental Tire, a German-headquartered company, of the Guidelines for Multinational Enterprises of the Organization for Economic Co-operation and Development (OECD).

“The conduct of this German company and its apparent belief that it can violate U.S. laws and the Guidelines with impunity is shocking," said Leo W. Gerard, USW International President in an August 2, 2006 letter to Wesley Schotz, Director of the State Department’s Office on Investment Affairs. "The full force of the U.S. Government should be brought to bear on this matter.”

The letter outlines Continental’s protracted and hostile labor practices since its 1987 acquisition of General Tire that include a forced one-year strike in 1998; use of paid union-busting consultants to prevent workers at its only U.S. nonunion plant from organizing; few investments in unionized plants in c