Wildcat occupation by Feltex workers
Workers at the Australian carpet company Feltex's Riccarton factory engaged in a seven hour illegal stike and occupation of their cafeteria. The occupation which began on Wednesday lunchtime was to call for Feltex’s new owner, Godfrey Hirst, to pay them their full redundancy. Workers are angry that they face the loss of up to $45,000 worth of redundancy money. The workers said the wildcat strike occupation would continue until the new owner promised to pay the full redundancy. However the occupation ended shortly after 7pm. Workers who are not being made redundant are demanding that they be rehired by the new owner on the same pay and conditions. [Media Release]
The National Distribution Union and the Engineering, Printing and Manufacturing Union who represent these workers began negotiating with Feltex on the same day. 55 Feltex staff were made redundant on October 3 when the Feltex factory near Marton closed. The workers were angry at management and said they felt like they had been, "stuffed around for two years." [Media Release]
Related
Comments
Re: Wildcat occupation by Feltex workers
Take it and run it yourselves in lieu of unpaid redundancy, years of exploitation, low wages, graft, shorttime, overtime, sweating on piece rates etc.
140 X $60,000 is probably more than what the depreciated plant and machinery is worth.
Wildcat carpets made by the workers for workers.
Re: Wildcat occupation by Feltex workers
a word of warning: don't trust the unions much either. compromise always means someone loses.
see the film 'The Take' and read 'Breaking Free' if you can.
Re: Wildcat occupation by Feltex workers
What did 'The Take' offer as something concrete for the Feltex workers? What is 'Breaking free'? And what does it offer?
Re: Wildcat occupation by Feltex workers
Nothing. Just something for naive little faux-anarchists to hoist their flag on while understanding very little of how the world actually works.
If the workers took over the factory they'd end up on charges and lose their chance at getting their redundancy entitlements. These people have families to feed and futures to worry about.
Don't be so bloody selfish. These are real people, not pawns in your revolution.
Re: Wildcat occupation by Feltex workers
I'm not sure that a situation like in 'The Take' could happen in NZ right now. Things aren't as desperate as they were in Argentina 2001-2002. This isn't a huge economic crisis and the Feltex workers possibly wouldn't have the community support that made the factory occupations in Argentina both achieveable and sustainable.
Human Rights for Workers Campaign
Human Rights for Workers
First campaign planning meeting
7.30pm this Wednesday, 18th October
Trades Hall, 147 Great North Rd, Grey Lynn
The Workers Charter national conference held last Saturday decided to
launch a Human Rights for Workers campaign, based around the following
three demands:
1. $15 minimum wage.
2. Abolish youth rates - equal pay for equal work.
3. The right to strike over any issue.
The immediate goal of the campaign is to get the CTU to call a
nationwide meeting of unionists around these three demands and how we
can get them put into practice.
Workers around the country are continuing to move onto the front foot.
This campaign - backed up by regular leaflets and good use of the
Workers Charter paper as a campaigning tool - has a good chance of
grabbing their imaginations, as well as the imagination of the more
staunch and forward-thinking union officials. Our lively conference,
attended by some of those union leaders, shows the potential that our
paper and our concept have. But now it's time to make some practical
steps towards building a real movement among workers.
With that in mind, we're calling together our first Auckland Campaigning
Meeting for Wednesday, October 18th, 7:30 pm, at Trades Hall. If this
campaign takes off in Auckland, it will spread like wildfire to the rest
of the country. It also intersects with the vital union struggles going
on at the moment, such as the Feltex workers' redundancy struggle,
SFWU's Clean Start campaign and Solidarity Union's push to organise
industrial workers in South Auckland.
Hope you can all make it to this important occasion. Please get in touch
with any questions, comments, or if you need transport.
Daphne Lawless
Chair of Auckland Workers Charter
daphlawless@paradise.net.nz
(027) 220 9552
Re: Wildcat occupation by Feltex workers
"I'm not sure that a situation like in 'The Take' could happen in NZ right now. Things aren't as has desperate as they were in Argentina 2001-2002. This isn't a huge economic crisis and the Feltex workers possibly wouldn't have the community support that made the factory occupations in Argentina both achieveable and sustainable."
These are good questions. I'm "not sure" either. These questions should be discussed widely in the labour movement.
For a start I think it is fair to say that NZ is not facing the same severe crisis Argentina faced in 2001.
But we don't have to wait until things get desperate to raise the need for workers' occupation and workers' control of industry. In the long run this is our only option to survive.
You can't start too early raising this issue. In fact many of us raised it in the 1980s in the first round of closures as removal of tariffs brought the textile industry to its knees. But right through this period there was no real grasp of how serious things were. A sort of post-traumatic shock set in.
Anyway in Argentina, the occupations were very slow to start, and out of sheer desperation. They were seldom allout confrontations between workers and bosses, as typically workers appealed to government to let them form cooperatives where the bosses walked out owing them wages. But if theyd come about earlier and stronger, who knows how far they would have gone?
It's not possible to know in advance when is the time to push for occupations. Only trial and error can do that. But better to start sooner than later, and when actually facing a big closure that has the potential to rally support and put pressure on the government.
I think the time is long overdue to demand that the Labour government backs its own statements about keeping production in NZ and developing kiwi design and techology. All those privatised workers in the 1980s and 1990s that went down the road never really got the chance to fight for their jobs. This should not be motivate by NZ nationalism i.e. protecting 'our' jobs from foreigners, but as a step towards workers control of production internationally.
The NDU campaign is already on the 'back foot' demanding that the redundant jobs should be sold at the highest price. To get on the 'front foot', the NDU should be demanding that its mates in government back the nationalisation of Feltex in lieu of lost redundancy payouts. At the very least this will create a debate about why Labour is talking 'kiwi' but not defending its own worker supporters' jobs, even in the SOEs.
Of course we know that Labour will not do this unless put under huge pressure (read my pledge card!). The government owns the majority of Air NZ and its not protecting the 1000s of jobs at risk there. Why should it nationalise Feltex when it has an interest in seeing Godrey Hirst restructure Feltex to make it efficient and win more export orders?
It will only do it if the workers themselves take a stand and get huge public support. They would really have to go on the 'front foot'. Facing closure they would have to decide that it is better to occupy and fight than go down the road to look for other jobs.
If the NDU swings a higher redundancy (its mates may cough up to make the NDU look good) then that may close off this option. If not, it will depend on how many want to fight and who will support them. That's something that only the workers concerned and their supporters can decide.
None of the occupations in Argentina or even Venezuela (under a sympathetic government) were straight forward or happened overnight. In most cases workers had to occupy for months or even years facing long legal wrangles and often evictions. Some lost, some won. The main example in The Take 'The Forge' was not typical.
'Brukman' was more typical. That was basically 30 women machinists putting up one hell of a fight with 3,000 supporters. Now instead of making designer garments theyre making workclothes.
What could we do with 100 and 30,000 supporters?
Dave Brown