What Is the UFWA position on the proposal for guest workers?
We’re very much against it. We do not need captive, submissive labor in this country. That is something that happened many years ago; it shouldn’t come back. We have unemployment in the fields. There are American workers who want to do the work. We don’t need them, unless they want to bring them here so they can have a larger labor pool so they can continue to keep the wages and the conditions down. Q: Yesterday, the UFW filed a $100 million lawsuit against the general counsel of the state farm labor board. Has the farm labor board failed in its duties to oversee farm labor relations? A: They failed miserably. That law that was enacted back in 1975 is totally not working today. The workers are owed over $70 million of cases that have been, that have gone through all of the hearing procedures including up to the state Supreme Court and then back. Seventy million dollars have not been collected. This last budget session, the state legislative analysts proposed that it be a million-dollar
