KEY POINTS:
One of the unions representing Air New Zealand baggage handlers and check-in staff is accusing the airline of using a $3000 bribe to try and drive a wedge between union members.
The Service and Foodworkers Union (SFWU) says workers are being offered a one-off taxable $3000 payment and an offer of targeted redundancy/severance in return for cuts in their pay and conditions.
But SFWU says the offer will only apply if all the conditions of an Engineering Printing and Manufacturing Union (EPMU) negotiated deal are accepted by its members at meetings over the next few days.
Furthermore to get the payment, airport services workers will have to be EPMU members or agree to individual employment agreements (IEAs).
The EPMU says it has negotiated the deal as the best chance of stopping 1700 ground staff jobs at the airline from being contracted out.
SFWU northern regional secretary Jill Ovens said today their members would remain on their current superior terms and conditions.
"Air NZ can't do anything about it because they can't force us to break our collective agreement," she said.
Ms Ovens said the EPMU-negotiated deal involved splitting up the current EPMU collective agreement.
The two unions each have collective employment agreements that do not expire until June 30, and these also cover staff in cargo, finance, call centres and travel centres.
The proposed EPMU collective agreement would be for airport services staff only.
Ms Ovens said: "Our members voted against splitting up the collective at meetings held last week. To agree to this would greatly weaken their position in the upcoming negotiations."
SFWU told Air NZ in January that the union was prepared to renegotiate its collective agreement immediately after initiation of bargaining on May 1.
"We did not want to go into negotiations at that time when we would have had two hands tied behind our backs and a gun to our head," Ms Ovens said.
She said even if workers gave in to Air NZ demands, there was no guarantee the airline would not go ahead and outsource at a later date.
EPMU national secretary Andrew Little said the union had negotiated the deal as the best chance of saving 1700 jobs from being contracted out.
He said EPMU members were voting this week and next week on whether to accept the deal.
Mr Little could not comment on SFWU's assertiont that Air NZ was offering the EPMU-negotiated agreement to workers who chose to go on to an individual agreement.
He said: "If they've been told that in order for them to get it they have to sign an individual employment agreement, then that's a matter between Air New Zealand and the Service and Foodworkers Union and their members. They certainly haven't raised that with us."
He acknowledged a rift had grown between EPMU and SFWU over the deal.
"That wedge has been there since December last year when they walked away from the joint process -- it doesn't surprise me.
"The airline -- we accept now that they are genuine in that they want to keep the work in house if at all possible."
Mr Little said the union was "reasonably happy" with the deal on the table for members and the threat to contract out work had been serious.
He said the deal involved a $1000 payment to everybody if the deal was accepted and the work not contracted out, anybody who lost income would get a "slice" of redundancy, but if they elected to stay on they would get the $3000 payment to compensate for loss.
Negotiated pay rises for this year and next year were for a total of 7.5 per cent.
- NZPA
