Are the Howard Government days of overseas trained security guards in balaclavas with snarling rottweilers likely to return to the Australian waterfront if the Coalition wins the election? It would seem so going on the hardline action taken by a stevedoring giant against members of the Maritime Union who walked off the job and held nationwide memorial services to coincide with the funeral of a member, Stephen Piper, 41, father of two children , who was crushed to death at Melbourne’s Appleton Dock, on July 14. He was the third person killed on the waterfront in the past five months.
P & O Automotive and General Stevedoring (POAGS) , chairman of which is Chris Corrigan , former managing director of Patrick Corporation , issued please explain letters, with an implied punitive threat, to those who participated in the services. The letters, sent to MUA members throughout the nation , including here in Darwin , demanded a response within a short span of time.
NSW Premier Kristina Keneally attended one of the memorial services , also held in Melbourne, Brisbane, Fremantle,Adelaide, Hobart , Port Kembla,Townsville , Newcastle , Darwin and Devonport. It seems no member of the NT Government attended the memorial service held at Stokes Hill Wharf. In Tasmania , Chaplain John McMath , spoke out about the heartlessness of POAGS and the lack of feeling expressed by wanting to punish those who attended memorial services .
He pointed out that the nation had rightly honoured a soldier who had been killed in Afghan during July , his mates attending the funeral service . However, in the case of deceased waterfront worker , Stephen Piper, the comparison had been stark and confronting, his colleagues penalised for supporting the dead.
MUA national secretary, Paddy Crumlin, was reported as saying the walk off on the day of the memorial service was not a strike. He said there was a yawning gap and inadequacies in state and federal safety legislation covering the nation's wharves, especially in bulk and general operations, after years of neglect and deregulation under the Howard Government years. "We're not copping inaction," he said. "The industry's safety record is appalling. We need national legislation. We need regulation that establishes a robust compliance and enforcement regime, supported by guidance material covering the full range of stevedoring hazards. We need the Federal Government to intervene."
P & O Automotive and General Stevedoring (POAGS) , chairman of which is Chris Corrigan , former managing director of Patrick Corporation , issued please explain letters, with an implied punitive threat, to those who participated in the services. The letters, sent to MUA members throughout the nation , including here in Darwin , demanded a response within a short span of time.
NSW Premier Kristina Keneally attended one of the memorial services , also held in Melbourne, Brisbane, Fremantle,Adelaide, Hobart , Port Kembla,Townsville , Newcastle , Darwin and Devonport. It seems no member of the NT Government attended the memorial service held at Stokes Hill Wharf. In Tasmania , Chaplain John McMath , spoke out about the heartlessness of POAGS and the lack of feeling expressed by wanting to punish those who attended memorial services .
He pointed out that the nation had rightly honoured a soldier who had been killed in Afghan during July , his mates attending the funeral service . However, in the case of deceased waterfront worker , Stephen Piper, the comparison had been stark and confronting, his colleagues penalised for supporting the dead.
MUA national secretary, Paddy Crumlin, was reported as saying the walk off on the day of the memorial service was not a strike. He said there was a yawning gap and inadequacies in state and federal safety legislation covering the nation's wharves, especially in bulk and general operations, after years of neglect and deregulation under the Howard Government years. "We're not copping inaction," he said. "The industry's safety record is appalling. We need national legislation. We need regulation that establishes a robust compliance and enforcement regime, supported by guidance material covering the full range of stevedoring hazards. We need the Federal Government to intervene."
Since the previous two deaths, the union had held national stevedoring conferences of workers to examine the safety issues and lobbied the government for national regulations.
