Ver.di clean sweep on Deutsche Post supervisory board

At a packed meeting on 11 April in Berlin, ver.di won all 10 worker representative seats on the Deutsche Post DHL supervisory board, which oversees the company'sex ecutive board of managers and the CEO.

Shareholders make up the other half of the supervisory board. Five of ver.di's representatives on the board are women, compared with only three of the shareholder representatives. There is only one woman on the company's executive board.

Some 1,700 electoral delegates from all branches and all locations came together for two days to question the candidates and then vote in the five-yearly election.

The meeting opened with the screening of an ITF/UNI film called 'Global delivery: better in union hands'. This was followed by powerful addresses by ver.di candidates on a range of issues, including the importance of fighting for a global framework agreement and condemning the treatment of workers by DHL in Turkey. In an impassioned speech, Andrea Kocsis, ver.di head of postal services, forwarding and logistics and currently deputy chair of the outgoing board, declared that "trade union rights are human rights".

The ITF and UNI Global Union had been invited to the election meeting for the first time.  ITF's global head - supply chain and logistics, Ingo Marowsky, described the atmosphere as "electric".

He commented: "On the invitation of ver.di, I was lucky enough to attend this event. The energy and power in the room, the hunger for continued international engagement and solidarity was tangible.

This is a massive victory for ver.di and I was proud to be present. It was a great two days."

The global delivery video can be viewed here.(http://www.itfglobal.org/global-delivery/global-delivery-network.cfm)