Hotel workers on strike today

Press, 3 December 1987, Page 8

Hotel workers on strike today

By

RICHARD CRESSWELL,

industrial reporter Hotel workers in Christchurch will be on strike all day today.

A Canterbury Hotel and Hospital Workers’ Union spokesman, Mr Philip Cheyne, said the 1500 workers would be on strike from midnight last night until midnight tonight

employers. The union had asked for a $4O a week wage increase, which ranges from 10.5 to 15.3 per cent, and a 14.9 per cent increase on allowances.

take lunch and dinner breaks all together to harass employers.

year “must be wearing thin.”

He said the move was the most economic way of airing their grievances with least pain to themselves.

He said every year industrial relations erupted at the same time and the general public suffered. The only way to stop the circus repeating itself was to reform industrial relations properly.

The action by hotel workers is in response to the breakdown of the Licenced Hotel Workers’ Award talks.

He said suggestions by the employers that the union had refused to negotiate at the talks were incorrect, and the Hotel Association had given a best and final figure of 7 per cent which the union could not accept.

The action will continue until the day before nonfood award talks in Wellington on Wednesday.

“The new Labour Relations Act has gone some way towards reform, but it is not enough,” he said. Until the big problems of award-round bargaining are ironed out the ritual of strikes, stoppages and general disruption, would continue.

"Industry employers appear to need a show of action before they’re prepared to talk about a realistic wage offer without pre-conditions tagged to them,” he said.

He said the turnout at yesterday’s meeting had been smaller than previous meetings because the grocery and supermarkets award had been settled.

Hotel workers are also planning to stop work on Christmas Eve, Christmas Day, and New Year’s Day.

Some groups had sent delegates to report back to members and that had also cut numbers.

He said the action would be extended and there would be further lightning strikes unless employers were prepared to negotiate further. The union was prepared to negotiate at any time, he said.

The Southern Distribution Workers’ Union secretary, Mr Paul Piesse, said there would be a stop-work meeting for retail butchers on Tuesday at 9 a.m.

However, his view is not shared by the South Island advocate for the Stationary Engine Drivers’ Union, Mr Norm Dewes, who said the present action involving Stevens NCF Kaiapoi, Ashley Meats, and the company’s Sockburn plant was because of provisions of the Labour Relations Act.

Suggestions by employers that the union was asking 15 per cent were incorrect, he said. The director of advocacy with the Employers’ Federation, Mr Steve Marshall, said last evening that the country’s ability to stomach industrial action at this time of the

Non-food retail shop employees had, at a meeting in Christchurch yesterday, decided to co-ordi-nate meal breaks and

Hotel workers have rejected an offer of a 7 per cent pay rise from their