All this business going on with the ports of Auckland has
really given me a bit of a wind up lately.
To be fair I have really done my best not to comment on it because to be
honest there is really no good going to come of me saying anything. But then I started seeing all this stuff
misrepresenting people in the papers and I started to get frustrated about it,
I got a bit wound up when I heard the New Zealand Herald write that wharfies
were getting paid nearly 100k a year to do 28 hours work a week. I got even more wound up when It was
reported that they were going on strike
yet again because they weren’t happy with the money they were earning or the
10% pay rise they had been offered.
I hate Wharfies, and to be honest compared to everyone else
you talk to I actually have first-hand experience with them. I work with them pretty closely from time to
time and have a fair idea what their habits are like. To be honest I find wharfies in general some
of the most regimentally lazy people I have ever met. They are slow. They take their union negotiated breaks like
clockwork, even if a ship needs to leave the wharf in a hurry while it is
paying a couple of thousand dollars a day in wharf fees; they don’t really seem
to care. The world stops when the
Wharfies stop. Here in Australia, I have
seen fights break out between ratings onboard and the wharfies when they are
too slow to get to the wharf and our boys have to put the lines on
themselves. The wharfies demand that
they get to do their job. Or else why
are they there? That would pretty much defeat the point of being employed they
said. Bloody wharfies.
I’m in a union. My
union looks after me when I have problems with the company I work for; they use
the collective power to bargain for what is genuinely a fair agreement. I get looked after well for what I do and a lot
of people sometimes get a bit of a bee in their bonnet about it. How is it fair that you only work six months
a year but you get a year’s pay they say? Why do you get paid more than the
average person does in New Zealand? You’re so lucky to be able to travel for a
job. The fact is that my union actually
negotiated my wage My union has fought
tooth and nail for years and years to achieve the conditions under which I am
employed. After the novelty wears off
the travelling. Once the time has dragged on and I’m 3 weeks into a 5 week
trip. When the ship has been rolling
heavily for days on end; when I get home and can’t sleep properly for a
week. I start to get some kind of
comprehension as to why my union negotiated so hard for the conditions I
have. I need them. Otherwise I wouldn’t be out here for 6 months
of the year; it just wouldn’t be worth all the down sides. See I don’t get the daily luxury of driving
home at the end of the day and giving my wife a kiss on the cheek. Pulling a beer out of the fridge and flopping
down on the couch to watch some crappy TV. Because I’m on a boat. Strangely enough; neither do the guys that are
working down on the wharves, they are working round the clock shifts and overtime. As it is, it pretty much negates any chance
of getting a normal routine going. So
what would happen if they lost the right to having some sort of notice of hours
worked? Most of the guys working down
there have been there for years and although they are well qualified, they are
only qualified at a very niche job.
It is known here that
people working high above are trying to erode the union I work for so they can
bring in cheap labour from overseas and I suppose pocket the difference
themselves. I am by no means a unionist. I get frustrated by a lot of the petty things
that unions end up fighting over. But I
do believe that unions can do some good in situations like the one unfolding at
the ports of Auckland.
I am only commenting on what I have seen through papers and
the union website etc, but from the looks of it the ports of Auckland (driven
by the new Super city council) are trying to remove the union from their
workplace by systematically undermining their presence and denying their right to
negotiate.
All this is frustrating, if not just down-right despicable
the path that the port are taking. I
think that the thing people miss here is that they are not really that
interested in what is happening to the workers, they are trying to set a
precedent and a very bold one at that!
If they can break the union here, if they can get them to bend to their
will, it will have a resounding echo through all other unionised industries
throughout NZ. By undermining the
workers who are involved in the union, the preference that should be given to
their workers in the agreement (that is soon to be null and void), can be given to people outside the
union. What makes this really
frustrating is this : how many people in Auckland are qualified to work on the
wharves? Not very many I would wager,
so who will fill the spots on the contracting crews? ? more than likely the guys who are in the
union. Maybe not straight away, but in
time they will anyways. So is this a
blatant move by the company to chop their workers pay ? I say yes.
What really gets to me is that AFFCO actually lost a very
similar case in court not long ago after something like 65 days of lockouts
that never made it to the news like the ports did. AFFCO were undermining the union by giving
work to workers not in the union and thus defeated the purpose of the
union. The court ruled that they were not allowed to
do this as they had a signed agreement with the unionised workers. The only difference in these two situations
is the fact that the Maritime union is in the midst of negotiating a new
contract. The fundimentals are the
same, undermine the union, give preference to non unionised members who will
work in worse conditions for less pay. That is the first step, what will follow
will be a lack of union presence and individual contracts, disallowing workers
from being able to easily negotiate a fair wage as they will be negotiating
individually against a very big company.
I could prattle on for hours and hours about why the ports
have ended up in this position, about how competing ports are under cutting
each other and everything that goes with it.
But I think I have had enough of a rant for now. I am interested in hearing your thoughts on
it too.
