JV2 pay offer accepted

Press, 23 September 1983, Page 4

JV2 pay offer accepted

PA Whangarei About 2000 Marsden Point oil refinery expansion workers who walked off the job for 12 days in June will be paid for six of those days, costing the construction consortium up to $600,000.

A mass meeting of the site work-force yesterday agreed to accept a JV2 construction consortium offer for 48 hours pay at regular rates, without travelling time or a lucrative site allowance.

A JV2 spokesman said that the exact number of workers involved and how much they would be paid was not known. He estimated it would cost the consortium $500,000 to $600,000.

But a union source said the figure would be more like $BOO,OOO.

It is believed the workforce accepted the offer by a majority of about three to one.

Union officials in favour of accepting believed the men would get more money in their pockets than if they had formally taken JV2 to the Arbitration Court.

The walk-out on June 17 was after a flash fire in a partly constructed underground control room in which four men were seriously burnt. It was caused by hydrocarbon vapours which had seeped through its walls below the water-table. Storage tanks at the refinery had leaked, contaminating the water-table in the sandy soil with naphtha and other petroleum substances. In a statement yesterday, JV2 confirmed that the work-force had accepted an offer of 48 hours ordinary pay for those who were employed on the site at the time of the fire and who were absent from work from June 17 to June 24. The consortium also agreed to reinstate 48 hours of redundancy pay. In a letter to the unions JV2’s general manager (industrial relations) Mr Ron Richards, said that the basis of the settlement was associated with the development of a close relationship between the union, the workforce, and JV2 on subjects including safety.