Maritime Union says minimum wage free trade deal will meet industrial resistance

Mari­time Uni­on of New Zea­l­and Gen­er­al Sec­ret­ary Tre­vor Han­son says the Uni­on will res­ist any attempt to under­mine wages and con­di­tions through short term cas­u­al work­ers impor­ted under free trade deals.

He says that com­ments by Trade Min­is­ter Phil Goff on the China free trade deal are dis­turb­ing for work­ers and not in line with the Labour Gov­ern­ment’s com­mit­ment to a high skill, high wage eco­nomy.

There will be no incent­ive for train­ing or pay­ing for skills if busi­nesses are able to step out­side the nation­al labour mar­ket and pull in trained staff on the min­im­um wage, says Mr Han­son.

“The Min­is­ter is say­ing that the min­im­um wage and min­im­um con­di­tions will be applied to any over­seas labour, but if this is being used as the bench­mark for skilled labour, then we are in ser­i­ous trouble.”

Mr Han­son says the glar­ing example of the fish­ing industry was show­ing what would hap­pen under free trade in work­ers.

He says that min­im­um wage con­di­tions and over­seas labour have become the stand­ard in the fish­ing industry, and a mass cam­paign by employ­ers is fight­ing any improve­ment.

“The industry is riddled with exploit­a­tion and abuse of which doc­u­mented cases are com­mon and have been the sub­ject of Depart­ment of Labour invest­ig­a­tion and reports, and many work­ers are not receiv­ing even the basic pro­tec­tions of the law.”

“Look no fur­ther – this mess is exactly what will be com­ing ashore under free trade deals.”

Mr Han­son says that the use of over­seas ship­ping with over­seas crews had dev­ast­ated New Zea­l­and ship­ping, and was a threat to New Zea­l­and ports.

“The use of short-term, cas­u­al­ized and tem­por­ary labour in ports has caused massive prob­lems in Europe, and would do the same in New Zea­l­and.”

Mr Han­son says the trans­port uni­ons affil­i­ated to the Inter­na­tion­al Trans­port Work­ers Fed­er­a­tion world­wide are run­ning a glob­al cam­paign against attacks on wages and con­di­tions through move­ment of short-term labour under free trade deals.

“These prob­lems emerge in all sorts of areas, such as the use of crews to load and unload ves­sels, and the replace­ment of per­man­ent jobs through employ­ers mov­ing cas­u­al labour over bor­ders.”

The China free trade deal is a first and is being described as a “tem­plate” for future deals which means that New Zea­l­and is being run as a exper­i­ment, says Mr Han­son.

Mr Han­son says polit­ic­al ques­tions on the future of work­ers in New Zea­l­and are being decided by unelec­ted trade offi­cials behind closed doors.

“The whole thing stinks of the Rogernom­ics era where change was rammed through as New Zea­l­and was used as a test case for free mar­ket policies which benefited the wealthy but caused ter­rible dam­age and harm to work­ers.”

He says that Aus­tralia is fol­low­ing a much more cau­tious line on free trade deals after “intel­li­gent res­ist­ance” from work­ers and farm­ers to the neg­at­ive implic­a­tions.

“Chinese busi­ness wanted to con­trol the entire trans­port and dis­tri­bu­tion line in Aus­tralia from mines to rail to ports to ship­ping, with Chinese work­ers employed under Chinese con­di­tions. Do they want that here as well?”

Mr Han­son says throw­ing fig­ures around like $400 mil­lion in increased trade are merely guess­work, and no atten­tion is being paid to who that money will be flow­ing through to.

“If it means that the busi­ness elite are get­ting their hands on it while work­ers are pushed down to the poverty line, they will have a major fight on their hands.”