Do Minister Stanford’s comments on Kiwi jobs apply to seafarers on the MV Buffalo?

The Mar­itime Union of New Zealand (MUNZ) says Immi­gra­tion Min­is­ter Eri­ca Stanford’s tough talk on employ­ers pri­or­i­tiz­ing migrants over Kiwi work­ers must be backed up by her Gov­ern­ment in the case of loss of 32 sea­far­er jobs on the MV Buf­fa­lo.

Min­is­ter Stan­ford stat­ed this week that employ­ers will be stripped of accred­i­ta­tion for not gen­uine­ly try­ing to hire New Zealan­ders.

Ms. Stan­ford not­ed that “we have New Zealan­ders who are des­per­ate for jobs and need to be giv­en the first oppor­tu­ni­ty for those,” and that this applies to sec­tors includ­ing trans­porta­tion and logis­tics.

Mar­itime Union of New Zealand Nation­al Sec­re­tary Carl Find­lay says despite this, the Gov­ern­ment is dither­ing while New Zealand sea­far­er jobs are on the chop­ping block.

He says the Mar­itime Union is cur­rent­ly in a strug­gle to retain expe­ri­enced, qual­i­fied New Zealand sea­far­ers on the cement ves­sel MV Buf­fa­lo.

“This is the exact sce­nario Min­is­ter Stan­ford is talk­ing about – skilled New Zealand work­ers fight­ing to keep their jobs in the trans­port sec­tor.”

The ves­sel’s char­ter­er, glob­al cement cor­po­rate Hol­cim, is seek­ing an exemp­tion from the Gov­ern­ment under the Mar­itime Trans­port Act to replace the New Zealand crewed MV Buf­fa­lo with a for­eign-flagged ves­sel using a non-NZ crew, who will receive low­er wages and infe­ri­or con­di­tions.

“This is a bla­tant attempt to replace skilled Kiwi work­ers with a cheap­er, for­eign crew. It is the very def­i­n­i­tion of what Min­is­ter Stan­ford is sup­pos­ed­ly crack­ing down on,” says Mr Find­lay.

The Mar­itime Union is call­ing on Asso­ciate Trans­port Min­is­ter James Mea­ger to reject Holcim’s appli­ca­tion for exemp­tion.

“Min­is­ter Mea­ger needs to lis­ten to his col­league, apply her log­ic to his own port­fo­lio, and put New Zealand work­ers first. He must inter­vene and can­cel any exemp­tion that would allow Hol­cim to dump its New Zealand crew and under­mine our domes­tic ship­ping indus­try.”

“The gov­ern­ment can’t talk tough on Kiwi jobs out of one side of its mouth while sign­ing off on Kiwi jobs being axed. Min­is­ter Mea­ger must act now to save these sea­far­er jobs on the MV Buf­fa­lo and pro­tect New Zealand’s ship­ping capa­bil­i­ty.”