Mill union to meet

Press, 29 August 1986, Page 4

Mill union to meet

PA Kawerau The Northern Federation of Pulp and Paper Workers’ executive will meet today’ to review its position on the Kawerau mill dispute after talks in Wellington on Wednesday failed to break the impasse. The assistant secretary of the federation, Mr Harold Appleton. said he expected there would be a meeting of the full membership “very shortly.” The Tasman Pulp and Paper Company’s director of operations, Mr Graham Ogilvie, said the company was now expecting about 800 workers in the federation to finish with a week’s pay in lieu of notice on Wednesday, September 3. About two-thirds of the

475 salaried staff were already on holiday. “We will keep salaried staff on as long as is reasonable,” Mr Ogilvie said. The mill’s 640 pulp and paper workers have been either on strike or locked out for six weeks. They have rejected a company demand that they sign an agreement to abide by six conditions before being allowed back to work. The company is not prepared to negotiate the conditions. Mr Appleton denied there had been any pres<mre from “other so-called unions” at the mill for his union to accept the company’s conditions. He said that the company’s statement that all the other unions had signed an efficiency

agreement with Tasman was a "myth.” “Some site delegates have signed the efficiency document But most national secretaries of these unions do not agree with what they have done and said that in their constitutions, the site delegate’s signature is not legally binding. “This includes the boilermakers, the plumbers, the labourers, the electricians and the engine drivers and firemen.” Although the pulp and paper workers had eventually signed an efficiency agreement through the Arbitration Court, he said there were “significant differences with many safeguards” in the federation’s agreement with the company.