Threat of freezing works shut-down

Press, 2 June 1982, Page 6

Threat of freezing works shut-down

PA Auckland ;a big industriar row that threatens widespread disruption to New Zealand’s export meat trade, is brewing between the. State Services Commission and freezing works meat inspectors. All 1600 inspectors throughout New Zealand have issued 14 days notice of industrial action. If carried out, the action is likely to stop processing in most freezing works as they are unable to run without the inspectors who check hygiene standards. The row flared this week when the State Services Commission announced it would not now pay out a recent 1.0.7 per cent wage rise won by. the inspectors because it. claims they have broken an obligation to observe correct settlement pro-, cedures during disputes.

'The Public Service Association, which represents

the inspectors, has responded angrily. The secretary of the Auckland branch, Mr Adrian Webster, described the commission move as one of “total overreaction."

There was a sharp response, too, from the 150 inspectors in Auckland who yesterday stopped work for a day in protest about the commission’s announcement. They will return today but have also issued 14 days notice of further action.

The argument has its roots in a row at the Rangiuru works near Te Puke, in the Bay of Plenty. There, the P.S.A. had offered surplus inspectors to a deer-slaugh-tering plant at Kaimai. The offer was rejected and two weeks ago the Rangiuru inspectors walked off the job. But the commission has interpreted that action, along with other “cases," as a breaking of the obligation the P.S.A. gave during the wage negotiations.

Mr Webster has accused the commission of turning a small local dispute into a national issue. He denied that the P.S.A. had broken the agreement. “We have been at pains to honour it but it is clear that our best is not good enough,” he said. “There have been talks at local and national level over the staffing problem at the Kaimai plant. It is the lack of an agreement that has let the Rangiuru inspectors to take continued action,” he said. Mr Webster said the P.S.A. had at no time undertaken not to take action when employers had shown an unwillingness to meet and settle. “At- Rangiuru we offered to supply surplus staff to Kaimai at no additional cost to the Ministry, of Agriculture. Unfortunately that conciliatory offer has been re-