National Secretary’s Report

Craig Harrison

National Secretary

2021 continues to throw all sorts of surprises (good and bad) our way. But as you will read in this issue of the Maritimes, MUNZ members throughout New Zealand are continuing to keep our industry and nation going through their essential work.

If you are someone in our industry who is not a member of MUNZ, and would like to become one, please drop us a line and we can discuss how to make it happen.

Coastal Shipping

The global shipping shortage is now really biting hard and congestion at our ports is at an all time high. This is a worldwide problem but New Zealand has left itself open by not maintaining our domestic shipping capability and by not having a national freight strategy that plans for the future.

The idea of “leave it to the market” and “just in time” has been shown up as a complete failure with commentators referring to the current situation as “just in case”.

We’re now at the point where the need for New Zealand flagged and crewed coastal shipping is critical. There has been more news coverage and discussion of the issue than for decades and the Government and even business is on side.

MUNZ is pressing hard to get action not just talk, and rebuild New Zealand shipping. Our Union is lobbying and has been campaigning to keep our two coastal tankers on the coast.

In the coming weeks we will be ramping up the fight to ensure these vessels remain on our coast. I urge all members and our Branches around the country to make contact with your local MP and send them a message that our country needs these vessels on our coast.

COVID

COVID has caused ongoing problems for our industry, as it has in general. However despite the delays for union activity like negotiations and training, we are slowly getting back on track.

With ongoing likelihood of more constraints, our Union is moving ahead with a digital project that enables our Union to be able to function into the future with online meetings and database support. New Zealand has one of the lowest rates of infection and death from COVID in the world. The new Delta variant is still causing over two thousand deaths every week in the USA. The vast majority of serious illness and death is for people who have not been vaccinated.

The Maritime Union encourages members to get vaccinated and to make an informed decision by getting information from a reliable source like your doctor or health professional. Our Union will of course respect the freedom of choice of each individual member.

More information on the situation for mandatory vaccination of port workers in this issue of the Maritimes. I urge all members to read the “Maritime Border Order” as there are numerous commentators out there who have no idea on who it covers.

POAL

The legacy of Tony Gibson’s reign at POAL is still casting a shadow. Gibson and the POAL are due to appear in the Auckland District Court on health and safety charges relating to the death of Amo Kalati last year.

There was widespread sense of revulsion at the former CEO being paid off with a million dollars by the Board. This decision has been widely condemned – even by the owners of POAL Auckland Council, represented by the Mayor. The story is not over yet and our Union will be campaigning to see those involved are held to account.

April next year is the tenth anniversary of the Ports of Auckland dispute. Apparently when they locked us out the gate one manager at a briefing of those left inside the gate stated “they’re out and they won’t be coming back”. Well, MUNZ are in there and growing in numbers, and he’s gone and door hit him on the arse on the way out.

Union Women and Union Youth

We’ve seen some great progress for our women and youth members lately.

Our national women’s rep Fiona Mansell and national youth reps Shanaya Hunter and Matt Hayward have been busy and MUNZ had strong representation at recent CTU national meetings for women and youth. More about this in this issue of the Maritimes.

We are now at the point where we are getting women and youth reps at many branches and this is another good development. As I write these comments a delegation of our youth members is about to be involved in an online meeting with the ITF.

All the experts have their opinions and from what I have seen over the last ten months most of their positions change like the weather.

Who would have thought that there would be a global shortage of containers and as a result some cargo is going back to break bulk? We now read predictions that shipping and port congestion will be around to the end of 2022.

I think over the next few years we will see demand stay at the current level. Our Union should see this as an opportunity to grow our density (membership level) within the industry, as it is density that gives us leverage to meet the aspirations of our members. Our Union is involved with Maritime New Zealand and industry stakeholders in developing codes of practice around fatigue, and also people and plant in on the waterfront.

With a refurbished meeting room at National Office we will do more inhouse training of delegates and members, and create a strong foundation for younger members.

I would like to thank all Branch Officials and delegates for their work over the last few months, as it’s been hard to operate around the lockdowns and deal with the issues facing our membership.

Maritime Union Napier Branch members from HBSS and C3 were the first intake for the new training programme for the Union. The training brings together members to learn skills for effective workplace leadership. We learn about how the Union operates in the workplace, delegates on the job, communication skills, building membership, employment law and about how our Union works and some of its history. This two day course is paid to attend under Employment Relations Education Leave (EREL) and once the COVID situation has come under control, more courses will be held throughout New Zealand.