In a union, everyone’s job is important and worth fighting for, and I feel that the Sun Journal editorial writer (July 5) owes the workers at Bath Iron Works an apology. I feel that the information used was one-sided. I also felt that the facts were based on corporate-related information. Where is information on the UNICCO corporation that had been considered to subcontract and replace union jobs? Why does the Sun Journal believe that these jobs are too few in numbers to care about when we have hundreds of people already struggling because of layoffs?

Outsourcing those few jobs could have been just the beginning of many more. Our union people risk their health, as well as their lives, every day while working in the shipbuilding industry, and even cleaners are exposed to harmful industrial chemicals.

Many cleaners are workers who have held other skilled positions in the company and for health reasons were offered those positions. They are workers who have devoted their lives to BIW and do not deserve to be permanently replaced in that manner.

Good opinion writing should be factual. In that particular editorial, I did not feel that was the case.

Kathleen J. Carpenter, Raymond

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