THE PRESS THURSDAY, AUGUST 26, 1982. Boiling point at Marsden

Press, 26 August 1982, Page 20

THE PRESS THURSDAY, AUGUST 26, 1982. Boiling point at Marsden

The threatened escalation of the dispute about the boilermakers who should be employed to extend the Marsden Point refinery reinforces the need for some give and take. The employers want to hire 50 boilermakers from overseas; the Federation of' Labour insists that all available boilermakers in New Zealand be hired first. Delays on the $1035 million project will cost hundreds of thousands of dollars a week. The F.O.L. has warned that unions outside Marsden Point are also ready to act on the dispute. Workers on the site will begin a 48-hour strike this morning. The dispute is a narrow one. Its significance is considerable. By early next year the project will provide about 2000 jobs. In common with most of the big energy projects, Marsden Point extensions were put forward as a source of jobs at a time of high unemployment. The jobs should go to New Zealanders who are suitable and who have the skills required or who can attain them. This is recognised in the site agreement for Marsden Point which says that local labour will be used “to the greatest possible extent.” It is also recognised in the training programme at Marsden Point, the largest ever set up in New Zealand. The programme is expected to impart new skills to about 1200 New Zealanders. At the same time, training an excess of people whose newly acquired skills would not be wanted when one job is finished would be wasteful and irresponsible. The site agreement and the training scheme should have ensured that the extensions fulfilled their promise of employment. They have not. The employers and the F.O.L. differ in their interpretation of what is the greatest possible extent to which local workers can be employed. The F.O.L. maintains that this is unconditional. The employers say that it applies only to suitable workers, having regard to previous work history.. The employers are right to argue that they must be able to decide who is acceptable; hiring poor workers or known troublemakers would be foolish. At the same time, rejections must be only for the soundest

reasons if the spirit of the site agreement is to be observed. Some signs suggest that this might not be happening. When speaking last year of the need for industrial harmony on the energy projects, the Minister of Labour, Mr Bolger, praised the South Island Boilermakers’ Union as having a commendable work record. Some members of this union have said that applications from them for jobs at Marsden Point have not even been acknowledged. While this suggests that the employers might not have gone to the greatest possible extent in hiring local labour, it does not justify the F.O.L.’s insistence that every available New Zealander with a boilermaker’s ticket be employed on the site. A person with a bad work record cannot expect to be treated in the same way as a person with a good record. A preference is inevitable. The great problem lies in the assumption that a person who, in the past, has obstructed progress on a job will be just as obstructive or demanding on another project. The assumption may be mistaken. The employer, however, does not know this for certain; nor, perhaps, does the prospective employee. Must the employer be forced to take a risk, against the evidence, and imperil the whole project and the earnings of hundreds of other employees? Even the union leaders must, bear this in mind. Given’ the background that has already been drawn around the Marsden Point extension, the chances of the obstructive employee being dismissed are negligible. The right of the employer to select employees cannot be lightly swept aside.

The country cannot afford disastrous delays at Marsden Point of the order that stalled work on the Wellington Bank of New Zealand building. Nor should it tolerate them; but the bank episode and the Mangere Bridge delay showed how effective union pressure tactics can be. The big energy projects are vulnerable to the same pressures. The pressures at Marsden Point will not be eased by intransigent or precipitate action so early in the planned four-year life of the project.