McCarten backs 'exploited' club workers

By MATHEW DEARNALEY and REBECCA WALSH

Unionists were already working Auckland's red-light district, even before the Prostitution Reform Act became law overnight.

But for Matt McCarten, director of the Unite union and Alliance Party president, a picket last night of the Showgirls strip club in Customs St was a routine case of looking after "exploited" workers in a dispute which he says is coincidental to the new law.

Although he has not ruled out representing prostitutes in future, he says his priority for now is to win back the jobs of five cleaners sacked by Sante Fe Gold Ltd, owner of a string of clubs including Showgirls and what he says is an associated brothel upstairs.

Mr McCarten and about 14 picketers, including three of the sacked workers, braved the cold to voice their message but faced tough competition for attention from a group of dancers from the neighbouring Coyote bar who used the opportunity to put on an impromptu street performance.

Mr McCarten says the company will face more pickets, and legal action already begun in the Employment Relations Authority, unless it agrees to mediation.

The company's lawyer, Paul Collins, denied in a letter to Unite that workers were sacked for joining the union.

He accused them of destroying a "necessary bond of trust and respect" by clocking in several hours before starting weekend shifts at 6am.

But Mr McCarten said they were called to a meeting and threatened with dismissal if they joined the union, a day before a Unite organiser was due to visit Showgirls.

He said other cleaners were given a $2 pay rise, taking their hourly earnings to $11, on condition they not join the union.

Mr McCarten said the sacked cleaners, all Pacific people, were racially abused and in one case assaulted by their supervisor.

He accused the company of failing to pay sick leave to any staff, or even a week's accident compensation to a worker he said was injured by cleaning chemicals.

Mr McCarten said he was not making any special effort to recruit prostitutes in anticipation of decriminalisation, but would represent any exploited workers, regardless of how they made their living.