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THE NATION
Grilling Burger King
Katrina vanden Heuvel
Last week I wrote about a Senate hearing on working conditions for
tomato pickers in Florida. Much of the discussion there revolved around
the "penny-per-pound" deal, and the Florida Tomato Growers Exchange
efforts to keep corporations like Yum! Brands and McDonald's from paying
it to the farmworkers.
One corporation that has refused to pay the extra penny is Burger King,
despite the fact that it would cost them only $250,000 annually , its
competitors have agreed to do it, and for workers it's the difference
between a sub-poverty wage that hasn't been raised in twenty years and a
decent one.
And it looks like Burger King's anti-labor activities run deeper than
just its refusal to pay the extra cent. Amy Bennett Williams of the Fort
Myers News-Press wrote a story last week that tied Burger King to
"libelous" attacks via email and online posts against the Coalition of
Immokalee Workers-- a respected anti-slavery group that has helped to
prosecute six federal slavery cases and has been praised by the FBI,
federal prosecutors, members of Congress, and civil rights
organizations.
Even worse is an alleged attempt to infiltrate a key CIW ally, the
Student/Farmworker Alliance, by using Diplomatic Tactical Services, "a
security and investigative firm that advertises its ability to place
'operatives' in the ranks of target groups."
I contacted Burger King about all of these troubling issues. As for the
penny-per-pound deal, they have a new line they are selling for anyone
who wants to buy it--let's call it the BKBS. Denise Wilson, Senior
Analyst of Communications at Burger King headquarters, sent this
statement via email: "At Burger King, we have always been interested in
finding a way to assure decent wages and modern working conditions for
the tomato harvesters in Immokalee.... We urge the CIW to immediately
provide us with a copy of the YUM and McDonald's agreements, repeatedly
cited. Our ability to review the agreement is an important first step in
bringing this issue to a resolution and garnering our full support."
"That's an argument aimed at the public, not at reaching a real
solution," CIW staff member Greg Asbed said. "Our demands are listed for
all the world to see on the website, as are what Yum and McDonald's
agreed to. The only thing that is not posted on our website are the
specific details of how the Yum and McDonald's agreements are
implemented within the differing contours of their supply chains ([the
chain of companies that get tomatoes from the fields to their
restaurants]). It is exactly those details that will need to be worked
out with Burger King, as well. So, if they're really interested in a
solution, they have everything they need already."
Seems reasonable that if the specific agreements can't be provided,
Burger King might be willing to use a template as a starting point for
negotiations with CIW?
Burger King declined to comment on that.
What about the allegations of emails and online posts as reported by the
Fort Myers News-Press? Did executives have any awareness of these--some
of which were traced to Burger King Headquarters?
Again, declined to comment.
Okay, fine. Well, at the very least Burger King will clear up any
allegation of infiltration, right? Can it state for the record that no
executives ever hired Diplomatic Tactical Services (or any other
investigative firm) to look into CIW and/or the Student/Farmworker
Alliance? And that they never received any reports from Diplomatic
Tactical Services or any other investigative firm regarding these
groups?
You guessed it, declined to comment.
"We have given you our statement regarding our intention to work with
the CIW and help the farmworkers," Wilson wrote in reply to these
questions.
One wonders what Burger King knows if they can't categorically deny
allegations that are clearly a PR nightmare for the corporation and
shareholders such as Bain Capital and Goldman Sachs.
It's not just the hamburgers that are being grilled at Burger King these
days.
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