By editors of The Spark
In late October 2011 over one hundred workers belonging to the New Zealand Meat Workers Union and employed at the ANZCO-owned CMP mutton processing plant in Marton, in the Manawatu area, were locked out by the company. The company was demanding that the workers take between 20%-30% losses of renumeration. The workers and their site organisers were not prepared to sign on to individual agreements and accept the cuts. Locking-out was a highly aggressive action from the company as lockouts are usually used as a retaliation to strike action. The workers hadn’t taken strike action but the company used locking-out as an ultimatum against those not prepared to accept the cuts. The lockout continued until December 23 when the workers voted to go back to work even though – we understand – they still faced some lesser conditions to those that existed prior to the lockout. The workers and site organiser involved are among the staunchest in the workers movement in the country, however ultimately the company was unable to be defeated.

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“MANA supports wholeheartedly the rights of the wharfies who work for the Port of Auckland,” states MANA leader Hone Harawira. Harawira says “Workers across the country need to wake up and smell the coffee – if the wharfies lose this fight then the casualisation of working hours will become a permanent feature of employment in this country. Everybody who earns a low to middle income job will have to wait by their phones for their boss to call to see if they are working or not, not knowing how many hours they will work and be paid for each week.”

“As a country we should be doing our utmost to back our wharfies. Despite the efforts of National and the country’s media to make this dispute about money, this is all about having reliable and stable employment. The workers want to know that they have a set number of hours per week. If it was about the money why would they only want to settle for a 2.5% pay rise when they are being offered 10%? What I don’t understand is why the workers are being held responsible for risks to the business. Tony Gibson will get his huge salary each week no matter what and the Council wants a 12% return on capital no matter what. It is the wharfies who are expected to pay the price each week if business is down. Under any other business regime, the owner is the one who takes the risk, not the workers!

“As for politicians saying that we should not get involved, what a load of crap. This dispute became political when Rodney Hide set up the appointments of the Board of Directors for the port…

“In 1951 there was a watershed strike involving wharfies. Today we are faced with another defining moment regarding employment rights in this country. Rest assured that if the wharfies lose then this right wing Government will see it as an endorsement to go ahead with the casualisation of hours and it will be another blow to the union movement, a movement that has for so long protected blue collar workers.”

There are significant labour struggles going on with firefighters and port workers. Firefighters have been taking industrial action since August 5^th. “They are still carrying out emergency response work, firefighter safety work and public safety work but not general duties.” Auckland union president Mike McEnaney told Stuff.co.nz. The professional fire service is strongly unionised- with 99% of New Zealands paid firefighters.

While no ones saftey is put at risk by the industrial action being taken, it has had an impact. The Herald reported a “media black out on emergency news” as reports from the control room are not being sent to media organisaions. Reports are also not being supplied to insurance companies and bills related to fires are not being sent out. [Read more…]

Originally posted by the Socialist Party of Australia.

Workers at Baiada Poultry, Australia’s largest chicken supplier, have won their dispute with management after a 13 day strike. The workers stared down bullying, intimidation and police violence without any sign of wavering. It was this determination that forced this rouge employer to retreat and concede to the bulk of their demands.

Primarily the workers were fighting for a union agreement which included a decent pay rise, job security and improvements to health and safety – particularly they wanted an end to the constant bullying and harassment that takes place on a daily basis.

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The following article updates on an earlier post on this blog in which we reprinted a September 7 press release by the Northern Amalgamated Workers Union.

On the 28th of September SPL (Warkworth) and Northern AWUNZ Union signed an agreement brokered through the Department of Labour to settle their dispute over the 13 workers made redundant on 4 October.  All 13 of the workers made redundant will receive offers of permanent seasonal employment of 5-9 months per year starting on 7 November. This offer is in addition to the affected workers being given 2 weeks pay in lieu of notice, and redundancy pay of 4 weeks for the first year of service, plus 2 weeks for each subsequent year of service.  The Labour Dept was satisfied that the outcome meant that the Recognised Seasonal Employer (RSE) workers were no longer displacing Permanent Resident workers.

The deal was unanimously endorsed at a meeting of the affected workers, and the union considers the outcome to be the best one achievable in the circumstances. The union understands that all of its affected members will be taking up the Company’s offer of permanent seasonal employment in November. The RSE workers will also benefit: the union was told by the company that the small increase above the minimum wage it negotiated in April will also be paid to the RSE workers who arrive next month.

The Union and the local Kiribati community had launched a lively campaign in response to the redundancies. A meeting attended by about 40 I-Kiribati workers was held in Warkworth on 14 September. Mana leader Hone Harawiri spoke, urging the workers and Kiribati community to push forward the struggle themselves. Harawira had also done a lot of work behind the scenes to get the Dept of Labour along to the meeting and getting them to force the company to participate in mediation. The star of the show was Mana activist Jesse Pene, who turned up, complete with a ceremonial fighting staff, and proceeded to give a rousing speech about how he was part of a militant struggle against redundancies by construction workers at the Aotea centre back in the day. He urged the workers to take strike action to defeat the redundancies and finished by appealing to those workers with residency to party vote Mana. His korero was greeted by rapturous applause by the I-Kiribati.

The negotiated deal represents a partial victory for the workers, considering the odds they were up against (i.e. workers from one of the poorest countries on earth versus a boss who is personal friends with John Key and Lockwood Smith). Union Organiser Mike Kyriazopoulos commented: “This proves that if you do nothing, you get nothing; but if you put up a fight – as we did – you can win something for the workers.”