Port workers meet to decide next move in Auckland strike

The goods off diverted ships are to be brought back north by train, but some exporters miss out. Photo / Kenny Rodger

Striking Auckland dock workers will hold a mass meeting today to review their actions, as the port company prepares for the start of a short working week tomorrow.

The port's two container terminals and associated services have been crippled since Thursday night, when the 327 workers began the first of two 24-hour strikes with a two-day company lockout sandwiched between them.

That has disrupted six ships, several of which have been diverted to Tauranga and Wellington with thousands of containers, many of which are being brought back to Auckland by extra freight trains with Christmas goods on board.

Exporters have been less fortunate, KiwiRail turning some away at the Southdown "inland port" it operates on behalf of the Port of Tauranga, for want of enough trains at such a busy time of year.

A passive picket by Maritime Union members outside the Fergusson container terminal on Friday was scaled down to an almost zero presence during the weekend lockout.

But that belies the seriousness of a dispute which threatens to shut down the port for another four days from the end of this week, unless scheduled talks before a mediator tomorrow achieve enough progress towards a new collective employment agreement.

Union president Garry Parsloe said last night there would be a large gathering outside the port this morning, which would be swelled by representatives of other unions before a march to a meeting in Anzac Ave at 11am to decide their next moves.

He expected tomorrow's talks could proceed regardless, but today's meeting would give his members a chance to review the dispute and decide whether there should be more industrial action if mediation failed.

In the meantime, notices remain of a 48-hour strike from Thursday night to be followed by another company lockout of equal duration from late on Saturday.

The port company says it has offered to roll over an expired collective agreement with unchanged conditions and a 2.5 per cent pay rise, but the unionists remain upset a number of jobs were contracted out during the term of the previous document.

A union official not involved in the negotiations has meanwhile been banned from entering the port for two years under a trespass notice, after the company said it received a report accusing him of inciting workers to use force to block the path of non-unionists.

Mr Parsloe said the union was investigating the allegation, but the fact remained that no force had been used during the strikes and what is the first lockout at the port since the infamous 191-day stoppage of 1951.