Year: 2005

Fishing industry report confirms worst fears

The Mar­itime Union says the release of a Gov­ern­ment report into employ­ment con­di­tions in the New Zealand fish­ing indus­try has con­firmed its worst fears.

Mar­itime Union Gen­er­al Sec­re­tary Trevor Han­son says the report has shone light on dark places in regard to the treat­ment of over­seas crews.

“We are dis­ap­point­ed at the Gov­ern­ment response to the report con­sid­er­ing what is actu­al­ly going on onboard some of these trawlers.”

Ferry company safety shortcuts not acceptable

The Mar­itime Union says attempts to sack the crew of the Cook Strait fer­ry “Kent” by employ­ers Strait Ship­ping is dri­ven by attempts by man­age­ment to bypass new safe­ty reg­u­la­tions.

Mar­itime Union Welling­ton Branch Sec­re­tary Mike Williams says the threats to sack a crew is because the work­ers will not com­pro­mise on health and safe­ty.

A maritime tale of struggle and betrayal

“Betrayed: the sto­ry of Cana­di­an Mer­chant Sea­men” is a hard­hit­ting new Cana­di­an doc­u­men­tary on the strug­gle of Cana­di­an mer­chant sea­men against the Cana­di­an Gov­ern­ment and ship own­ers which led to an inter­na­tion­al strike in 1949.

Mar­itime work­ers in New Zealand lent their sup­port to the Cana­di­an sea­men who fought a des­per­ate bat­tle to pro­tect their jobs and con­di­tions.

Doc­u­men­tary mak­er Elaine Brière is pro­mot­ing “Betrayed” in New Zealand with two screen­ings in Auck­land and Welling­ton, host­ed by the Mar­itime Union of New Zealand.

Time to expose conditions of overseas crews on New Zealand coast

The Mar­itime Union says the week­end inci­dent when a group of Chi­nese fish­er­men jumped over­board in Welling­ton Har­bour should be set­ting alarm bells ring­ing.

Mar­itime Union Gen­er­al Sec­re­tary Trevor Han­son says the inci­dent is just one of a con­tin­u­ous series of ship jump­ing and prob­lems expe­ri­enced by crew onboard for­eign and joint ven­ture fish­ing boats.

“The Mar­itime Union has been con­tin­u­al­ly point­ing out that there is some­thing bad­ly wrong as over­seas crews are being sub­ject­ed to abuse and exploita­tion while they are in New Zealand waters, and even New Zealand ports.”

Maritime Union backs ‘Aratere’ ferry investigation

The Mar­itime Union says it sup­ports the Mar­itime Safe­ty Author­i­ty (MSA) deci­sion not to allow the inter­is­land fer­ry ‘Aratere’ to sail until it was sat­is­fied the fer­ry was safe.

The ‘Aratere’ suf­fered steer­ing prob­lems yes­ter­day evening in Welling­ton har­bour.

Lithuanian workers issue has opened container of worms

Mar­itime Union Gen­er­al Sec­re­tary Trevor Han­son says there are two major issues at stake – first­ly the sta­tus of import­ed work­ers doing jobs on the water­front, but liv­ing aboard ships, and a sec­ond issue of safe­ty and work­ing con­di­tions.

He says it appears that employ­ers are now try­ing to get around immi­gra­tion reg­u­la­tions by accom­mo­dat­ing work­ers on board over­seas ships, then get­ting them down the gang­plank to work with­in New Zealand each day.

Mr Han­son says the work­ers were moved from their cur­rent accom­mo­da­tion in con­vert­ed con­tain­ers on the water­front because the Lyt­tel­ton Port Com­pa­ny did not believe they were sit­u­at­ed safe­ly.

Overseas workers living in converted containers on Lyttelton waterfront

The Mar­itime Union is con­cerned that a group of over­seas work­ers are liv­ing on the Lyt­tel­ton water­front in con­vert­ed con­tain­ers. Mar­itime Union Gen­er­al Sec­re­tary Trevor Han­son says inquiries by union offi­cials into the liv­ing con­di­tions of five Lithuan­ian rig­gers in Lyt­tel­ton had uncov­ered a dis­turb­ing sit­u­a­tion. The work­ers were flown in from Ger­many to work […]

Labour shortage claim has been blown out of water

The Mar­itime Union says that its fears about short-term casu­al labour being intro­duced into New Zealand have been con­firmed.

Mar­itime Union Gen­er­al Sec­re­tary Trevor Han­son says the intro­duc­tion of more cheap for­eign labour into the New Zealand fish­ing indus­try is the death knell for New Zealand fish­ing employ­ment.