After years of sometimes testy relations, labor unions and environmental groups in the U.S. are joining forces to push for stronger protections for jobs and the environment at World Trade Organization talks in Seattle beginning November 30. Their coalition, the Alliance for Sustainable Jobs and the Environment, is kicking things off today with a full-page ad in the New York Times saying that union members and enviros are committed to holding corporations accountable for their treatment of workers and the planet. The coalition includes, among others, the teamsters’ union, the food and commercial workers’ union, the Sierra Club, and Friends of the Earth. One goal of the group is to put pressure on Maxxam Inc. of Houston, which is in a protracted dispute with labor at five aluminum plants and which plans to log old-growth redwood forests in Northern California.
