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.”