Union council may discuss containers

Press, Volume CXI, Issue 32702, 3 September 1971, Page 1

Union council may discuss containers

(New Zealand Press Association) AUCKLAND, September 2. Container shipping might be one of the first problems to be dealt with by the newly-formed Australasian Council of Trade Unions.

Mr T. E. Skinner, president of the New Zealand Federation of Labour said tonight that the container ♦ problem was a typical case where a joint approach by the trade union movements of both Australia and New Zealand was desirable. The council, he said, would begin to work as. soon as possible. “It will meet from time to time on common problems." One of these was the question of container shipping. “In Australia the problem of handling containers has settled down a little,” he said, “but nothing final has been achieved and there are still some problems, particu-

larly over lines of demarcation.”

The Congress of the Australian Council of Trade Unions (A.C.T.U.) today agreed to unite with the New Zealand trade union movement on common problems for workers in the two countries.

The move came after the address yesterday by Mr Skinner.

He said that Australia and New Zealand had a common problem of inflation and

workers in both countries had common aims to achieve.

The A.C.T.U. Congress, meeting at the University High School in Melbourne, supported an executive recommendation expressing approval of Mr Skinner’s views and calling for closer collaboration between the A.C.T.U. and the New Zealand trade union movement. The congress asked its executive to co-operate with New Zealand on their common problems. The president of the A. Mr R. J. Hawke, said that the executive had spent time considering Mr Skinner’s views before formulating the resolution. The Tasmanian Trades and Labour Council secretary, Mr B. Harradine, who put the motion, said the executive hoped closer relationships and closer examination of

common problems could be achieved and solutions found. The assistant Trades Hall Council secretary, Mr J. R. Grenville, in supporting Mr Harradine, said that Britain’s entry into the Common Market would bring the two countries closer in the interests of trade, and the time was right for co-operation to achieve mutual protection on industrial issues.

Mr Skinner said yesterday that the two countries had virtually the same big employers, particularly in the vehicle industry, and the time had come for Australia and New Zealand to get together and face the problems and organise ourselves on a common basis.