THE PRESS THURSDAY, JUNE 14, 1984. Fragile peace at refinery

Press, 14 June 1984, Page 20

THE PRESS THURSDAY, JUNE 14, 1984. Fragile peace at refinery

Work should be back to something like normal at the Marsden Point refinery expansion job today. The Government can claim a tactical victory for the Whangarei Refinery Expansion Project Disputes Act that became law on Tuesday night. Not all of those who have been on strike will accept the act’s direction to return to work on the conditions that applied when the strike began in May. Some workers will have left the district; some will have found other jobs; some may well refuse the terms of settlement, even though the act denies them the right to receive the unemployment benefit for four months. By late yesterday, however, enough workers had returned to justify cautious optimism. How long work will continue this time is going to depend on a variety of factors, not least of them a degree of luck. Tempers are strained at Marsden Point. Only the police appear to have acted with consistent restraint in the tangled events of the last few weeks. A quite small incident on the site could set off a new, unhappy challenge to the peace. The Expansion Project Disputes Act itself will be a source of bitterness as long as it remains in force. Court appearances are likely in the wake of the handful of violent incidents during the strike. Some of those at work on the project will not readily accept that events during a large industrial confrontation should be subject to the normal processes of the law.

The Federation of Labour has made belated attempts in the last week to associate itself with any settlement. Because the Opposition in Parliament was sorely embarrassed by the strike, and because public opinion was strongly on the side of an early return to work, the F.O.L. had good reason to be seen to be doing its bit to get work started. The effort foundered on the federation’s request for an independent inquiry into all aspects of industrial relations at Marsden Point. Such an inquiry could have become a long-running source of assertions and counter-assertions that did little more than aggravate old grievances. Even though its principal effort to achieve a settlement failed,

the federation was busy yesterday at the site, helping to smooth last-minute flurries. By returning to the job, workers have accepted the conditions laid down in the new act. If a dispute arises, however, not all those at Marsden Point will necessarily abide by the conditions. These include restraints on further stoppages and an undertaking to submit disputes to established procedures — the site undertakings and the provisions of the Industrial Relations Act. Many employed at the Marsden Point expansion are members of a highly paid, elite labour force. Stoppages cost the workers money; they are said to add as much as $1 million a day to the cost of the contract. Eventually, that cost will have to be met by all New Zealanders who use the products of the refinery.

Much will depend on the restraint shown by the unionists and the contractors in the next few days and weeks. Procedures for the peaceful settlement of disputes have still to be tested. Disputes can hardly be avoided in a project of such size and complexity. The habit of work, rather than the habit of an early resort to strike action, is not well established at Marsden Point. The Expansion Project Disputes Act has provided an opportunity for tempers to cool and for work to proceed. The project, and the act, are still vulnerable to concerted action by those employed there. Care will have to be taken by the contractors and the workers to ensure that no provocation — whether intended or accidental — upsets the settlement. Only steady, uninterrupted progress will show that the act has worked and that its uncommonly firm conditions are justified. The passing of the act was a gamble by the Government, and the unions probably have no reason to want to show that the act was a success. They will see it as a drastic ultimatum. They may also view the act as a measure that cut through the antagonisms and forced the job to go ahead. This puts money in pockets and creates an opportunity to sort out differences while the work proceeds. The opportunity should not be lost, whatever view may be taken of the legislation.