In response to the merger of AT&T and BellSouth, Communications Workers of America released a statement saying that they believe the joining of the two companies will promote increased investment and build-out of high-speed networks that are critical to the region's economic growth and the nation's position in the global economy.
CWA President Larry Cohen said the merger agreement included real commitments by AT&T-BellSouth for an expanded build-out of both higher speed Internet services and DSL, an important step forward in bringing the full promise of the Internet to areas that have been passed by.
"Workers at BellSouth know that the future of communications and their own future is in the build-out of high-speed telecommunications services. This merger will help provide the resources to make this possible, and at the same time, should help create quality jobs," said Noah Savant, CWA's vice president for the Southeast and BellSouth territory. "Of course we remain concerned about the net effect on jobs within the region for frontline employees and the services we provide. We are pleased to see AT&T commitment to bringing thousands of support jobs back to the United States," Savant added.
CWA says that the United States has fallen to 16th in the world in terms of availability and access to high-speed Internet services. While most believe the availability and benefits of the Internet should be universal, residents in rural communities, low-income urban areas and other communities have less access to high-speed services. The union sees this as a growing disadvantage that needs to be addressed.
"High-tech innovation and job growth, advances in telemedicine and distance learning, and improving public safety and e-government all are possible and, in fact, are routine in much of the world. In the United States, however, current speed standards just aren't sufficient to support these kinds of services," Cohen said. "The build-out of true high-speed networks requires a huge investment of tens of billions of dollars and the AT&T-BellSouth merger will begin to provide the resources to do this," he added.
CWA is America's largest communications and media union, represents over 700,000 men and women in both private and public sectors, including over half a million workers who are building the Information Highway. Its members are employed in telecommunications, broadcasting, cable TV, journalism, publishing, electronics and general manufacturing, as well as airline customer service, government service, health care, education and other fields. The union includes some 1,200 chartered local unions across the United States, Canada and Puerto Rico.
Cohen stressed that CWA strongly supports an open Internet "where consumers can go where they want, when they want. Nothing should be done to degrade or block access to Web sites," he said. CWA also believes that reserving proprietary video bandwidth is essential in order to make such a build-out possible. The FCC recognized this in reserving the IPTV space as proprietary, much as cable controls the bandwidth on the set top box, Cohen noted.
For more on the CWA response to the merger, see the press release AT&T-BellSouth Merger Will Promote Critical Build-out of High-Speed Networks.
