Buller miners firm about keeping jobs

Press, 26 July 1980, Page 2

Buller miners firm about keeping jobs

Westport reporter

Buller miners, need jobs now and their national union is going to make sure they keep them, according to the secretary of the United Mine Workers’ Union (Mr M. Bassick). He says his national council will seek support from the Federation of Labour if protesters have any adverse influence on Buller coal exports to Japan. In -- Westport with the national president (Mr Anslow) to negotiate a bonus scheme for day wage workers at the Stockton opencast mine, Mr Bassick said the Japanese contract had saved 100 local mine workers from redundancy. “If we did not have that order we would be talking redundancy, not bonuses,” he said. Mr Bassick said that miners welcomed any coal

buyers, either from overseas or in New Zealand. He said that the high sulphur content of Stockton and DenniSton coals . automatically limited markets in such cities as Christchurch which had areas governed by the Clean Air Act.

Referring to suggestions by protest groups that the coal be left in the ground until there are internal markets for it, Mr Bassick said: “We cannot have our men redundant, sitting about for 15 years waiting for a dream to come true.”

The amoun; of coal being exported was a drop in the ocean, he said. There was enough coal in Buller to supply an order for half a million tonnes a year for 20 years, with plenty left over. The union would support an off-shore loading facility to get the coal to export markets.