By Ian Jamieson
BURNIE — "It's not just our problem, or a problem for the unionists at Robe River", says Brian Green, a metalworkers' union delegate at the strikebound Burnie mill of Associated Pulp and Paper, a subsidiary of the New Right-managed North Broken Hill company. "The strategy and tactics of the mill bosses are a cancer. It has to be stopped", Green told Green Left.
The long-expected industrial war at APPM finally erupted here last week with an indefinite strike by the 1100-strong work force after boilermakers were arrested for trespassing in their workplace. Deliberately provoked by management, the strike quickly took the form of mass picketing as hundreds of unionists rostered themselves for a round-the-clock watch on the plant's 10 gates.
Faced with a fight affecting the entire future of Australian trade unionism, the ACTU has promised at least $5 million to support the Burnie mill workers' campaign, though some executive members have been hesitant to get involved. The Burnie workers have raised calls for a widening of the dispute to involve other NBH subsidiaries, including Pasminco Mining and Smelting and other APPM mills including Wesley Vale.
APPM has made it clear it is out to destroy trade unionism at the plant, following the precedent of the Robe River iron ore mine six years ago. Using the pretext of award restructuring, a process in which the work force has cooperated fully, the company has renounced most of its over-award agreements and conditions and employed up to 50 security guards to enforce its will.
The company is refusing to recognise union delegates and officials and insisting that workers negotiate individually with company industrial and legal officers over pay and conditions. A recently retired mill worker told Green Left that many had been expecting an assault such as this.
"For around 18 months now, APPM has been planning this. They brought Yankee paper in to forestall industrial action and expected us to quake in our boots. They've used guards and their dogs to intimidate us, they've arrested our union representatives. But this is our livelihood and our town, not theirs.
"My father was a boilermaker here for 35 years, I served 29 years, and my son has had a job here for seven years. I'm here on the picket line to protect his rights."
The decision to strike was unanimous after APPM called police to have boilermakers arrested when they refused to work with staff who had not been properly trained to run boilers. The company wants to insure itself against union activity by having office staff do essential blue collar jobs.
With the boilers tended by inadequately trained personnel, the rest of the work force walked out and, in a mass meeting at Burnie Civic Centre, declared the site unsafe.
While community feeling is strongly against the company, federal Liberal leader John Hewson has come out in its support, in the process embarrassing Tasmanian Liberal Premier Ray Groom, who appealed for intervention by the federal Industrial Relations Commission.
The workers are unlikely to accept a ruling by the IRC's Paul Munro that he can't intervene until the picket is lifted and work resumed. "Why should we lose our right to bargain when Munro hasn't ordered the company to lift its ban on unions?", one picketer told Green Left.
Public support for the strike is strong. Wesley Vale pulp workers are considering industrial action and those at Triabunna have pledged support. The picketers are receiving donations of food, firewood and other supplies from local residents and businesses and messages from unionists around the country.