Maritime Union of New Zealand

The Maritime Union says comments by Ports of Auckland CEO Tony Gibson about Maersk shipping pulling their Auckland service are mistaken and confused.

Maritime Union National President Garry Parsloe says the assertion that the move by Maersk was simply a result of industrial action was clearly inaccurate.

He says that shipping companies pulled out of New Zealand ports and swapped into others on a regular basis, for all sorts of reasons.

“Our advice to Mr Gibson is to stop playing to the gallery and start talking to his workforce.”

Mr Parsloe says management pulled out of mediation today at the last moment.

“We were all set to go along and get the talks underway and then at the last minute the company decide they are not coming.”

He says it is strange behaviour for POAL management to say how terrible the situation is for their customers, and then lock out their workforce and fail to show up at negotiations.

“Since the port company have locked its employees out for four days, perhaps the question should be asked what effect has this decision by management had on shipping and customers?”

“We really need to be asking what is the agenda here. Is this a company that wants a resolution? Or is this an agenda to attack workers?”

Mr Parsloe says media comments from big business executives and Port of Tauranga CEO Mark Cairns were transparent and derisory.

“The reality is these gentlemen would prefer it if workers were paid nothing. That would ensure more profits for them, which is all they care about and is all they have ever cared about.”

The issue was that workers at Ports of Auckland were not going to accept contracting out or the undermining of their collective benefits they had negotiated.

“The CEO keeps going on about side issues in an attempt to deflect attention away from this.”

“We are not going to see the years of work we have put into building a decent superannuation scheme and health scheme for working people be undermined.”

Cashing up those benefits for a tiny minority of workers on individual agreements is simply promoting freeloading and in the long term is clearly aimed at knocking out conditions first, then attacking wages later, says Mr Parsloe.

“Mr Gibson is talking like this is the first time a multinational shipping company has pulled out of a New Zealand port and it is all due to workers.”

But this claim was undermined by the fact that Maersk had publicly stated there were many reasons for the decision, and the global shipping multinational had been in discussions with the other port for some time.

“The interesting thing is everyone just goes along with all the economic damage that does, which will be a lot larger than the stoppage at Auckland. So let’s have a consistent approach to discussing economic problems, because if we want to start down that track, why don’t we put the acid on the shipping companies.”

Mr Parsloe says it is time questions were asked when Port Company CEOs, road transport executives and big business advocates were all singing the same song.

Maritime Union of New Zealand National President Garry Parsloe says management have failed to successfully negotiate with their employees and had no one to blame but themselves for the situation at the Port.

“After a week of inflammatory claims and public attacks on the integrity of his employees, Ports of Auckland Limited CEO Tony Gibson can boast of one accomplishment only – alienating his workforce.”

He says that port workers being locked out by POAL management would be losing pay, but Local 13 MUNZ members understood the long term importance of maintaining terms and conditions at the Port.

The three-year Collective Agreement between the Maritime Union of New Zealand Local 13 and the Ports of Auckland Limited (POAL) expired on 30 September 2011.

Mr Parsloe says there are several substantial issues around terms and conditions which are behind the dispute, which had been concealed by Ports of Auckland management.

“If management were serious about solving the dispute, they’d be addressing the issues instead of grandstanding in the media.”

One major point of contention was ongoing attempts by management to contract out the jobs of port workers, he says.

During the second year of the agreement (2010), the Port Company attempted to contract out ITF affiliated Dockers employment in the lash, straddle driving and container crane operations.

In August and September of 2010 the Port Company issued redundancy notices to MUNZ members working in the shuttle operation. Shuttles are trailer units that move containers between Fergusson and Bledisloe container terminals. It should be noted that the shuttle operation is carried out within the confines of the port area, wharf to wharf.

POAL contracted out the shuttle operation to a Company called Conlinxx which is a subsidiary joint venture between the POAL and NZL of which the Port Company owns 90% of the shares. Port Company employees also act as directors on the Conlinxx Board of Directors.

The Conlinxx operation is predominately a non-union operation which includes a high proportion of owner drivers.

The Port Company sold three of its trailer units and following an interim agreement with the Union the remaining two units were to be worked by MUNZ members. What unfolded was at best, a spasmodic operation of Union driven trailer units on a Monday to Friday basis of 1st shift only.

In talks to renew the Collective Agreement the Port Company has definitively stated that the contracted shuttle operation will remain despite the Union claim for this worked to be returned to union members.

As the Collective Agreement had expired the Union was in a position to take industrial action to support its claim for the return of the shuttle work.

At a stopwork meeting, rank and file membership unanimously instructed the Local 13 Officials to issue the Port Company with a two day strike notice to support their claim.

The Port Company responded by issuing a Lockout notice for two days in retaliation.

The second main area of the dispute was bad faith by the management who were offering higher hourly rates to workers on Individual Employment Agreements.

Management has justified its actions for a higher hourly rate by saying the rate in the Individual Agreements is a ‘Total Remuneration Package’ that effectively cashes up superannuation, meal monies and health insurance.

These conditions are conditions that have been won by the Union in previous struggles.

Local 13 is challenging the company on Good Faith bargaining, as the offer of a higher hourly rate undermines the Collective Agreement and the bargaining process.

“In recent weeks the Port Company has made much to do about their Company values, so the Union fails to see how an employer who offers a monetary incentive to leave the Union at the expense of a retirement plan can masquerade as a caring employer.”

The cashing up of superannuation entitlements along with other conditions is a sinister attempt to influence workers and establish vulnerable dependent employees in the workplace, says Mr Parsloe.

Mr Parsloe says the efforts were a transparent attempt to deunionize the workforce, with the intention of eventually tearing down hard won terms and conditions of employment.

He says at the end of the day the majority of workers in the Ports of Auckland chose to be members of the Maritime Union.

“Every time Mr Gibson opens his mouth and abuses the Union, he is abusing his workforce, the same workforce that delivered high
productivity in a round the clock industrial environment at the Ports of Auckland.”

“This CEO claims to respect his workforce but has spent the last week attacking their integrity in the news media.”

“He says he is concerned about the effect of stoppages on customers before Christmas, then proceeds to lock out the workforce for two days.”

“He says he wants a resolution but continues to engage in bad faith actions.”

In short, what the Union wants is simply to maintain hard won terms and conditions, and a unionized workforce.

The agenda of the POAL management continues to be one of radical undermining of terms and conditions through clearly anti-union measures such as contracting out and offering preferential treatment to some employees.

The Ports of Auckland management lock out of workers commences 12.01am Saturday 3 December and concludes 10.30 pm on Sunday 4 December 2011.

The first strike period is from 10.30 pm on Thursday 1 December 2011 until 10.30 pm on Friday 2 December 2011, then from 10.30 pm on Sunday 4 December 2011 until 10.30 pm on Monday 5 December 2011.

The second strike is for the period commencing 10.30 pm on Thursday 8 December 2011 until 10.30 pm Saturday 10 December 2011.

Ports of Auckland’s second lockout is for the 48 hours immediately following and will extend the stoppage until 10.30 pm Monday 12 December 2011.

Representatives of the Engineering, Printing and Manufacturing Union (EPMU), the Maritime Union of New Zealand (MUNZ) and the New Zealand Council of Trade Unions (CTU) delivered a letter to the acting Mexican Ambassador on Wednesday 30 June 2010 expressing deep concern at the Mexican government’s use of force against striking workers in the National Miners’ and Metalworkers Union of Mexico (Los Mineros).

The letter condemns the assault by heavily armed riot police on striking members of Los Mineros at the Cananea copper mine in Mexico earlier this month.

On 6 June hundreds of Mexican riot police surrounded the mine and used tear gas to dislodge workers who were occupying the entrances and to assault the union office. More than 1000 members of Los Mineros were on strike over a long-running dispute with the company, Grupo Mexico, over health and safety and other contract violations.

Los Mineros reported that three workers received gunshot or projectile wounds, and others had been beaten or were suffering from the effects of the tear gas.

The letter urges the Mexican government to allow the elected leader of the union, Napoleón Gómez, to return to Mexico from exile in Canada and resume his position.

The acting Mexican Ambassador Luis Enrique Franco gave an assurance he would convey to his government the deep concerns of the New Zealand trade union movement over the Mexican government’s treatment of the workers involved.

“We urge the Mexican government to allow the safe return of Napoleón Gómez, the elected leader of the National Miners’ and Metalworkers Union of Mexico, so he can resume his duties without fear of reprisal,” says the EPMU’s senior national industrial officer Paul Tolich.

“The Mexican government needs to honour its commitments as a member of the United Nations’ International Labour Organization (ILO) and guarantee freedom of association for all Mexican workers,” says MUNZ general secretary Joe Fleetwood.

The ILO has backed Los Mineros in the dispute saying that the Mexican government has acted in a way that is incompatible with ILO Convention No. 87 on Freedom of Association.

The Maritime Union says police have better things to do than expending major resources on running surveillance operations on union pickets and political groups.

Maritime Union of New Zealand General Secretary Joe Fleetwood says the Union is concerned at the level of police presence at public events revealed in a list of 84 police “operations” in 2008/2009. Peace Action Wellington obtained the records through an Official Information Act request.

Police in Wellington and Auckland ran several operations during industrial disputes, including on Maritime Union members engaged in a legal strike in late 2008 at Ports of Auckland.

Mr Fleetwood says the Union was unhappy about its members having to pay taxes to fund their own surveillance by police for legal and above board industrial activity.

“We question why these resources can’t be directed to investigating dangerous work places and illegal work practices on the job around New Zealand where workers are killed and injured on a regular basis.”

He says he did not see why there was a need for a major police presence or substantial observation at many of the events, especially when it was claimed police resources were over stretched.

“They might want to pop down to have a look as part of their daily rounds, no problem, but this appears to be at a different level.”

Mr Fleetwood says despite claims that police were there to look after the rights of demonstrators, the reality was that law enforcement appeared a lot more active when it came to workers and less so when it came to employers.

“The right to lawful pickets and demonstrations is a hard won right, a democratic right, and certainly in our Union we have a long memory about how police powers have been used to undermine workers rights.”

There had been a number of incidents in recent years such as the use of paid police informants used to spy on legitimate groups and the “terror raids” of 15 October 2007 which showed that there was a tendency for police powers to expand, and a culture of state control and surveillance to grow, unless challenged.

The Maritime Union was also concerned at the implications of the Search and Surveillance Bill that is currently before parliament, and which has generated widespread concern amongst many as undermining long standing rights of citizens.

“As it has been said before, the price of liberty is eternal vigilance.”

ENDS

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

The Maritime Union of New Zealand is supporting strike action by Maritime Union of Australia (MUA) members in the West Australian offshore oil and gas industry.

Maritime Union of New Zealand General Secretary Joe Fleetwood says many New Zealanders work in the Australian maritime industry.

He says that the Maritime Union of New Zealand works closely with the MUA and other unions in international alliances such as the Trans Tasman Oil and Gas Alliance.

Mr Fleetwood says the Australian workers had the full support of maritime workers around the world.

“The employers are making vast fortunes in profits. You don’t notice all the CEOs and politicians refusing their huge pay increases but when workers stand up for their rights it becomes the end of the world.”

He says the wages of those workers get spent in working class communities rather than being hoarded by wealthy shareholders.

“This is about workers getting their share of the wealth they create. After all, they do the work out on the remote rigs and vessels, away from home for long periods and in a risky, heavy industrial environment.”

Mr Fleetwood says the issue has important implications for New Zealand.

“The offshore oil and gas industry is an important part of our economy and will become more important over the next decade.”

The Maritime Union supports moves away from an oil based economy in the long term but there would be a transition period where oil and gas were still required and New Zealand had to make the most of that.

“This is a limited resource and one that is not having a positive effect on the environment. The wealth from our oil and gas reserves must be used to benefit our people and to move to a post-oil economy.”

He noted how diverse nations such as Norway and Venezuela had used their oil and gas reserves for the benefit of their citizens.

Mr Fleetwood says that New Zealand should maintain close control of its oil and gas reserves and should not allow them to be exploited by private corporations.