Spotlight needs to go on Ports of Auckland privatization rumours

The Mar­itime Union is con­cerned about rumours of pri­va­ti­za­tion at the Ports of Auck­land, involv­ing glob­al net­work ter­mi­nal oper­a­tor (GNT) DP World leas­ing oper­a­tions.

The New Zealand Her­ald today report­ed claims the Dubai-based multi­na­tion­al cor­po­ra­tion has senior man­age­ment hold­ing upcom­ing meet­ings with Coun­cil staff and oth­er key play­ers in Auck­land.

Mar­itime Union Nation­al Sec­re­tary Craig Har­ri­son says there is no need for dis­cus­sions, as the Ports have a great future as a pub­lic asset.

He says after a decade of mis­man­age­ment, the Ports are now back on track to deliv­er to the peo­ple of Auck­land.

“The pre­vi­ous prob­lems of the Ports were not caused by pub­lic own­er­ship, but by lack of over­sight by the own­er and Board of the pre­vi­ous man­age­ment and their bad deci­sions.”

Mr Har­ri­son says it is not clear under whose author­i­ty Coun­cil staff are engag­ing with DP World.

He says the Union is one of many stake­hold­ers dis­cussing the role of the Ports with the new may­or of Auck­land Wayne Brown.

“There is already a con­struc­tive dis­cus­sion about the best way for­ward for the Ports, and to have these extra dis­trac­tions fly­ing around is not help­ful.”

Mr Har­ri­son says the Mar­itime Union sup­ports a con­tin­ued role for the Ports of Auck­land as a pro­duc­tive asset for Auck­lan­ders and an essen­tial hub in New Zealand’s sup­ply chain.

He says the dif­fi­cul­ty and cost in relo­cat­ing Port oper­a­tions is under­es­ti­mat­ed.

“Main­tain­ing a secure sup­ply chain should be the num­ber one pri­or­i­ty for New Zealand in the cur­rent volatile eco­nom­ic envi­ron­ment.”

He says New Zealand needs a long-term nation­al ports strat­e­gy that inte­grates rail and coastal ship­ping, with a focus on sup­ply chain resilience and low emis­sions.

Mr Har­ri­son says DP World do not have a great record, and is the own­er of P & O Fer­ries, whose sack­ing of fer­ry crews in the UK by text ear­li­er this year led to mass con­dem­na­tion from the British pub­lic and even UK Gov­ern­ment MPs.

He says pre­vi­ous attempts to sell off the Ports of Auck­land failed, as did a 2006 attempt to part-pri­va­tize the Port of Lyt­tel­ton with the involve­ment of the GNT Hutchi­son Port Hold­ings.

Mar­itime Union mem­bers make up the great major­i­ty of steve­dor­ing work­ers at the Ports of Auck­land.

The Mar­itime Union has been a strong advo­cate for health and safe­ty at ports, and pre­dict­ed the failed automa­tion project at the Ports of Auck­land was not fit for pur­pose.