Maritime Union of New Zealand

The Ports of Auckland has confirmed that it is proceeding with a plan to sack its stevedoring workforce.

Maritime Union National President Garry Parsloe says the union met with management this morning to find out the details of a management scheme to outsource jobs.

Mr Parsloe says the union attended the meeting to find out what the company plan was, and to receive information that would be taken back to the membership for discussion.

“The position of the Maritime Union and our members at Ports of Auckland remains clear. We will not accept this attack on workers and their basic rights of employment through contracting out aimed at undermining job security.”

Mr Parsloe says there was still a window for a negotiated solution, and nothing had been finalized.

“We think management need to change tack pretty quickly, because where they are heading could have very bad consequences for the port.”

He says their decisions brought into question their judgement, their motives and gave a sense there is another agenda here that the people of Auckland who own the port have not been told about.

Strong statements of support for port workers had been received from the Council of Trade Unions and affiliated unions, the International Transport Workers Federation, political organizations and representatives, and individual members of the community.

“People understand this how contracting out action would lead to a casualized workforce in one of Auckland’s key assets, and is being used as part of a broader port privatization grab.”

Maritime Union of New Zealand National President Garry Parsloe says a major stumbling block in the current industrial dispute at Ports of Auckland is the contracting out of work covered in a signed collective employment agreement between the parties.

He says the Union is prepared to lift its strike notice in the new year, but needed an indication of good faith from management.

“We can work with the company to sort out a timeline on outstanding issues, but we need to see that the company is not just pursuing an exercise to casualize the entire workforce, which they have been threatening.”

Mr Parsloe says if Ports of Auckland management want to make a genuine show of good faith, they could make progress by ensuring the existing shuttles that move containers within the port are manned 24/7 by skilled workers trained to operate them.

In the event of undercapacity, Mr Parsloe says the Union is prepared to negotiate in good faith to resolve any issues within an agreed time frame.

Industrial action could be lifted as long as management negotiated outstanding issues in good faith.

“During the term of the previous agreement, Ports of Auckland management contracted out the shuttle work to a company called Conlinxx, which they are the main owners of.”

He says the ownership structure of the Conlinxx service showed the contracting out exercise was clearly aimed at undermining terms and conditions within the signed collective agreement between the parties.

The Maritime Union tried to resolve this issue with past and present management during the term of the agreement, but the contracting out had led to a dispute over the protection of workers livelihoods and their families futures

Mr Parsloe says many New Zealand workers had experienced the bad results of contracting out and casualization, which had decimated wages and conditions and made working life harder for many people in this country.

“Casualization and contracting out isn’t about productivity in our view, it is about taking advantage of workers by driving down their wages and conditions.”

The Maritime Union says the dispute at Ports of Auckland is about workers maintaining a family life outside work.

Maritime Union National President Garry Parsloe says members will be meeting tomorrow at a special meeting that will also bring together family members.

Maritime Union members at the Ports of Auckland are taking industrial action on 23 December and Christmas Day, 25 December.

He says there are several key issues that have consistently been misrepresented by Ports of Auckland CEO Tony Gibson in his attacks on his workforce, including the fact that workers had turned down pay increases.

“The dispute is not about money. It is about ensuring secure jobs, decent hours and conditions for workers.”

“The idea that maintaining a family life is somehow up for sale is repugnant. This sinister idea that you can just wave around some cash in people’s faces and tell them to give up more time with their family when they already work long and unsocial hours.”

Mr Parsloe says proposed “flexibility” means that workers will be on call for round the clock shift work and lose any semblance of job security through outsourcing and casualization in the future.

“How can you have any balance here between working life and family commitments?”

He says that the pressure put on families was already severe.

Mr Parsloe says it should be noted that Maritime Union members at Ports of Auckland, and in other areas of the maritime industry, work on public holidays.

“Our members work in 24/7 industry where unsocial hours, long shifts and hard work in an unforgiving heavy industrial environment are the norm. Add to this the issue of two income families with both parents in the same situation and it is really a shameful reflection on the dark ages attitudes and values of corporate managers.”

Mr Parsloe says it should be noted the upcoming industrial action was taking place during a time of year the majority of New Zealand managers and workers were on holiday with their families.

“Our members already work over this period, yet the employer always wants more.”

Mr Parsloe says this brought another issue to light, that Ports of Auckland CEO Tony Gibson had repeatedly put around information about wages and hours of work that were inaccurate and had caused a massive backlash amongst his own workforce who saw it as an indication their employer did not value their productivity.

“The simple fact that any Ports of Auckland worker earning the amounts stated by Mr Gibson would have to be doing hundreds of hours of overtime a year, over long shifts, round the clock, public holidays and weekends, in highly skilled and responsible roles.”

“Our members see Mr Gibson throwing around these inaccurate figures in public, yet he has refused to release his own salary and perks, alongside that of his senior managers, to the public. This arrogance has unsurprisingly resulted in a breakdown of the relationship with his own workforce.”

Mr Parsloe says it should be remembered that Ports of Auckland workers had a high level of responsibility operating heavy machinery in what was still one of the more dangerous industries.

The Maritime Union has put in a further 48-hour strike notice at Ports of Auckland from 7am on Friday 30 December until 7 am Sunday 1 January 2012.

Maritime Union National President Garry Parsloe says the strike notice is a legal requirement and can be withdrawn as soon as any progress is made with Ports of Auckland CEO Tony Gibson.

“The answer is in Mr Gibson’s hands. He can stop trying to attack the union and the majority of his own workforce and start dealing with the real issues. It’s simply a case of trying to get him back on track.”

Mr Parsloe says the issue is not and has never been about wage increases.

What the Maritime Union and its members are concerned about is protecting the conditions of employment, secure jobs, and ensuring a strong collective agreement, he says.

“The position of the CEO has no credibility. First of all he tries to offer non union workers a much greater wage increase than members of the union in a blatant attempt to undermine the collective agreement. Then he waves money around when this inconvenient fact is pointed out to him. But it has nothing to do with the real issues at hand.”

Mr Gibson’s statements about flexibility while simultaneously claiming that he intended respecting employees’ preferences about when they work were hollow, says Mr Parsloe.

“You don’t respect something by undermining it. The flexibility Mr Gibson describes means workers give up their family time, personal life and normal existence to be called into work whenever the employer wants. That’s the flexibility he means, in a nutshell.”

Mr Parsloe says Mr Gibson seems to think family time or regular hours and secure jobs are “restrictive and old fashioned”.

“It is this attitude of regarding the wellbeing of his employees as an impediment to raking in even more profit that is causing so many problems in these negotiations.”

Mr Parsloe says the POAL agenda is also reflected in continued letters from Mr Gibson to members homes that have created stress and concern for family members by threatening contracting out of work at the port.

He says there is an agenda of outsourcing and casualization behind Ports of Auckland management’s approach and that until Mr Gibson starts to negotiate on a more sensible basis, the strike notices will remain in place.

“If port users are concerned about the effect of these stoppages, we suggest they consider the result of some of Mr Gibson’s more hare-brained concepts that he is throwing around, such as complete contracting out.”

The Maritime Union of New Zealand says National’s announcement of attacks on workers rights will be fought hard.

Maritime Union General Secretary Joe Fleetwood says the restrictions on union access to workplaces was a serious attack on the right of New Zealand workers to organize.

“National have now dropped any pretense of moderation in their policies – the phoney war is over and National’s agenda of tax cuts for the rich, privatization and now tearing up the basic rights of working people is out there for all to see.”

He says that National is embarking on a repeat of extremist 1990s policies but doing it in a more cunning way.

“The fact they have a smiley face fronting it this time around does not change the sinister intention.”

He says the attack on workers and their organizations is not surprising as the Government had failed to deal with unemployment, which was now rising again, and were looking to go on the offensive.

Mr Fleetwood says any attacks on workers would be met with fierce resistance.

He says unionized workers are one of the few obstacles to National creating a New Zealand where a majority of people would face an increasingly grim situation of high unemployment, poor wages, casualization and unaffordable housing and food.

“Unionized workers have better wages, better conditions, and safer workplaces – all reasons why National wants to bag unions and drag us back to the nineteenth century when workers had no rights.”

Mr Fleetwood says there is one way that New Zealand workers will “catch up with Australia.”

“That is to unionize and negotiate better pay.”

“The problem is that workers are getting less and less of a share of the wealth they produce which is being sucked up as corporate profits that accumulate to the already wealthy.”

Mr Fleetwood says the Maritime Union would campaign hard against any Government that threatened the hard won rights of the working class to organize.

He says all working New Zealanders must realize that the divide and rule approach of National was hurting their interests.

ENDS

For more information, contact Maritime Union of New Zealand General Secretary Joe Fleetwood on 021364649

The Maritime Union of New Zealand has denounced attacks on unemployed New Zealand workers by the National Government.
John Key and Paula Bennett today announced plans to make life harder for the unemployed –at the same time that unemployment is at its highest since the dark days of the last National Government in the 1990s.
Maritime Union General Secretary Joe Fleetwood says many things are responsible for high unemployment in New Zealand, including the global recession, the instability of a deregulated economy, and a National Government with no ideas.
However, unemployed New Zealanders were not one of the major causes of unemployment.
“There may be a few people who want to stay unemployed, living on the poverty line. But there are tens of thousands more wanting work who can’t find it, shouldn’t we be helping them instead of blaming them?”
He says to put the boot into unemployed people when many had already suffered the effects of redundancy were the despicable actions of a heartless Government, attempting to whip up resentment between those in work against those without.
Mr Fleetwood says that with unemployment peaking recently at nearly 70 000, National was anxious to deflect the blame from their economic policies onto the victims of their policies.
“It’s not like we suddenly had thirty thousand people get lazy overnight and say, oh, I can’t be bothered working anymore, I’d prefer to be stuck on a benefit struggling to put food on the table.”
Mass unemployment means that tens of thousands of New Zealanders are unable to contribute to their society and are forced to accept miserable benefits to survive, which was an indictment on the free market economy.
“National don’t care about the human cost, but surely they must at least realize how inefficient it is.”
He says the Maritime Union has identified two areas where jobs could be created for New Zealanders immediately.
He says that New Zealand coastal shipping could provide jobs but was currently dominated by global shippers who paid no taxes in New Zealand but were permitted to move cargo on the New Zealand coast.
In addition, local workers had been forced out of the fishing industry by employers who chose to employ low wage overseas crews from poor countries.
Mr Fleetwood says the Maritime Union would defend all working class New Zealanders from attacks by the National Government.
“It is time to fight back against this Government’s anti-worker agenda.”

ENDS

For more information, contact Maritime Union of New Zealand General Secretary Joe Fleetwood on 021364649