Kawerau workers back

Press, 9 August 1985, Page 7

Kawerau workers back

PA Rotorua A flurry of industrial action at the Tasman pulp and paper mill, Kawerau, has ended while the pulp and paper workers consider their next step. Members of the union held a stop-work meeting in the town on Tuesday after 37 workers had been suspended without pay last Frid3Three of them had refused to use new equipment on the mill’s No. 1 paper machine, and were deemed to be on strike, while 34 others were suspended because of the lack of work. Workers at the meeting reviewed these events, defied to levy $2O a person each week in support .of the off work, and then

returned to work tnemselves.

No further industrial action was decided at the meeting. The secretary of the Northern Pulp and Paper Workers’ Federation, Mr J. Murphy, declined to comment afterwards.

Tasman’s public affairs manager, Mr D. B. Nicholson, has disputed reported comments by Mr Murph}’ to the effect that Tasman had “engineered” the dispute. According to Mr Murphy the company had given a backtender operator five minutes to start the No. 1 paper machine before sending him home. Mr Nicholson said it was nonsense to suggest the suspensions were sprung on the pulp and paper worjbrs.