BY SHANE BENTLEY
The seafarers' sit-in aboard the CSL Yarra has ended in an Australian Council of Trade Unions (ACTU) brokered deal that was signed by Canada Steamship Lines (CSL) on May 16.
The deal allows the CSL Yarra to resume cement shipments for six weeks with its original crew before it goes overseas. Australian ship owners have been asked to supply replacement vessels aftr that. ACTU president Sharan Burrow believes these will be crewed by Australian seafarers. Whether the seafarers of the CSL Yarra still have jobs after six weeks remains to be seen.
While the details of the settlement are confidential, the Maritime Union of Australia (MUA) argues that its concerns have been addressed.
Nine MUA members refused to leave the CSL Yarra on May 1 when it docked in Port Pirie, South Australia. Their 16-day protest was against CSL's plans to re-register the vessel as a flag of convenience ship in order to replace the crew with cheaper Ukrainian labour.
The federal Coalition government has undermined "cabotage" — the system where only Australian seafarers can carry cargo between Australian ports on ships registered in Australia — by issuing short-term permits, de-regulating Australian coastal shipping.
Federal Labor leader Simon Crean promised on May 13 to introduce a private members bill that would help restore cabotage.
The struggle of the seafarers aboard the CSL Yarra has been mired by MUA leaders' attempts to outdo the "national interest" rhetoric of the Howard government.
The CSL Yarra was once a part of the government owned fleet privatised by a federal ALP government in 1995. But, instead of condemning the inevitable result of that privatisation, MUA leaders have claimed government deregulation leaves Australian beaches "open to attack" and creates a "hole in Australian security and defence measures".
Union press releases have argued that flag of convenience ships are "camouflage for Osama bin Laden's operations" and responsible for both Islamic extremists slipping into the US and 263 seafarers jumping ship in Australia between 1996 and 1999.
The Coalition government is currently using the "war against terrorism" and "border protection" (read refugee-bashing) as pretexts for attacking civil liberties, including union rights. For unions to support Prime Minister John Howard's racist stereotypes of terrorists is outrageous and stupid.
A better approach was pursued by the MUA and the ACTU earlier this year when they went to the industrial relations commission in an attempt to try and make Australian wages and conditions apply to all ships operating on the Australian coast under the permit system.
From Green Left Weekly, May 22, 2002.
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