Freight rolls again

Press, 27 April 1984, Page 2

Freight rolls again

Inter-island freight movements returned to normal yesterday after a freighthandling ban by Picton members of the National Union of Railwaymen was lifted at midnight on Wednesday, almost a week after it had been imposed. The dispute which led to the ban has not been solved and according to the union, it could flare again if the circumstances which led to it were repeated. The ban tied up more than $1 million worth of perishable goods during the Easter-Anzac Day holiday period and at least one container of goods — $20,000 worth of mussels owned by New Zealand Marine Foods — will have to be dumped because they were unfit for human consumption. A spokesman for the Railways Corporation said from Wellington yesterday that the underlying cause of the disnute was the decision bv

the corporation to cancel sailings of the freight ferry Arahanga during the holiday because tonnage booked on it was insufficient to warrant sailings. The freight could have been handled by the other ferries, and so rosters of staff had been trimmed, he said. What the union had in effect wanted was for its members to be paid penal rates for doing nothing, said the spokesman. The Blenheim branch chairman of the union, Mr Kevin Faithful, said from Picton that it was “rubbish” to suggest that the dispute had been about the desire for penal rate payments. The real reason for the rejection by the union of the corporation’s holiday roster was that it was “unworkable.” Mr Faithful gave two examples of the “unworkability” of the roster. One was the rostering of an uncertificated person for train

movements and the working of the signal panel. The other was the failure to roster anyone to feed information into the corporation’s computer which monitors freight movements. Asked what he thought had been achieved by the ban, Mr Faithful said that it let the corporation know that the workers were not happy with what had been done. “They gave everyone else (in other branches) two weeks notice of the roster changes but our members had only three days notice,” he said. The corporation’s spokesman said that the Blenheim branch had been advised on March 28 that there would be roster changes. The union had replied on April 2, rejecting any change but not giving any reason. On April 9 the roster had been given to the branch and an opportunity given for negotiation for changes. The

union had again rejected it, without reasons. Asked if he agreed that the withdrawal of the Arahanga had been behind the reason for the decision to cut staff numbers rostered on, Mr Faithful said he did not know how the corporation could estimate the tonnage to be carried. He agreed “to a point” that rostering was a management prerogative. He said that the union members had called for a meeting on the roster changes and had voted to reject them. The final roster proposed by the corporation would have meant that of the 40 members, 30 would have been rostered on and 10 would have been off. It was the first time that such a roster had been proposed at Picton, he said. The 30 members rostered on did work during the holiday period, ensuring the flow of railway traffic for passengers only.