More Talks Today On Containers

Press, Volume CIX, Issue 32166, 9 December 1969, Page 1

More Talks Today On Containers

(New Zealand Press AeeoeiationJ WELLINGTON, December 8. The executive of the Waterside Workers’ Federation will meet again tomorrow to discuss the dispute over the packing and unpacking of containers in offwharf areas.

But there is no indication of whether the ban on containers between the North Island and South Island will be lifted.

The ban, imposed last week by Wellington and Lyttelton watersiders, applies to containers and unit-loaded cargoes packed or assembled off the waterfront.

The ban has affected the rail ferries and the Maori, and the Tasman ship Maheno, which spent today idle at the Taranaki Street wharf, unable to load or discharge. The Maheno’s sister ship Marama sailed from Lyttelton tonight with a cargo of cars and heavy construction equipment The Maheno will have to move into the stream tomorrow morning to make the berth available. It had been expected that after today’s meeting the national executive of the Waterside Workers’ Federation would ask the Wellington and Lyttelton unions to rescind the ban on containers. The Employers’ Federation and the Storemen and Packers’ Union had given an undertaking that a new award for storemen negotiated last week would not come into force before all unions affected by container shipping services met in Wellington on December 17.

The new award specifically excludes work traditionally done by watersiders, but the Wellington and Lyttelton Waterside Workers’ Unions claimed that it violated an earlier agreement reached with the Federation of Labour.

The secretary of the Waterside Workers’ Federation (Mr J. E. Napier) said tonight that he could give no indication of how long the federation’s executive would meet tomorrow. Nor could he give any indication of whether the unions would be asked to lift the ban.

If the unions are asked to lift the ban it is likely that stop-work meetings of members will be held to discuss the request Trade with Australia could be back to normal within four to sik weeks if all ships are able to load and unload normally.

But a continuation of the container ban will mean that the Maheno, scheduled to sail' for Sydney on Thursday, and the Marama, expected to sail for Melbourne a week later, will not be able to leave.