Rail strike: More industrial action likely

  • 16/11/2017

The rail workers' union has been accused of being "disingenuous in the extreme" as a strike cripples Wellington's transport network.

Employees at Transdev Wellington and Hyundai Rotem, which operate the city's rail, are striking over what they say is an erosion of their conditions and pay packets.

"They want to take money out of our members' pay packets and transfer it to the balance sheet in Paris and in Seoul, Korea," Rail and Maritime Transport Union secretary Wayne Butson.

"Our terms and conditions are not for sale, and to date it appears they just will not deviate one iota."

Transdev runs the trains with around 360 employees , while Hyundai Rotem's 40 staff look after the network's maintenance.

Mr Butson told The AM Show on Thursday Transdev got the contract to run Wellington's network last year with a "low-ball" offer, and now they're trying to keep costs down by cutting staff pay.

"They want to take away our penalty rates, they want to take away the choice of the workers to work statutory days - they want to make it a requirement.

"When employers talk about the staff being their greatest asset, that is the only asset that these foreign multinationals actually own is their staff. They're glorified labour hire agencies. The simple fact they put in a low-balled tender to win the contract, doesn't mean to say they expect my members, New Zealand working people, to pay the cost of that low-ball tender."

Transdev manager of people and culture David Gould says none of the Transdev employees will lose their penalty rates at all, and the only change to Hyundai Rotem's penalty rates is changing Sundays from double-time to time-and-a-half.

The catch is, because of the cost, Hyundai Rotem hasn't been rostering people on to work on Sundays. Under the new offer, workers will be able to choose to work on Sundays if they wish, for time-and-a-half.

"All Transdev employees will continue to enjoy the penalty rates they enjoy currently - time-and-a-half on Saturdays, double-time on Sundays. None of that changes," he told The AM Show.

Thursday's strike is the first carried out by rail workers in Wellington since 1994. Mr Butson warns more will follow if Transdev and Hyundai Rotem don't give in to the union's demands.

"We actually don't like inconveniencing Wellingtonians. We've been driven to this by rapacious foreign-owned multinationals."

Mr Gould says the "take-it-or-leave-it" strategy employed by the union was "tried and failed in the 1950s", and wants to get back to the bargaining table.

Transdev has a 15-year contract to run Metlink's trains in Wellington.

Newshub.