BY PATRICK BROWN
AUCKLAND, New Zealand - Striking workers shut down the Godfrey Hirst carpet factory here for a week at the start of August, maintaining their picket line in spite of police action, including 20 arrests. On August 8 the 60 strikers won a victory when the company agreed to negotiate a collective contract.

"The workers currently are on individual contracts," explained a leaflet issued jointly by the National Distribution Union and the Engineers Union, the two unions present in the plant. These individual agreements contain "low pay rates, flat-rate overtime, no separate bereavement leave and no redundancy provisions. Furthermore, the employer now wants to make staff have their 10-minute morning and afternoon smoke breaks without leaving their machines!" This latter demand was featured in the considerable media coverage of the strike. Pickets told Militant reporters of other grievances, including over service pay, shift allowances, and safety issues.

The strike began August 1. The 60 Auckland workers quickly organized a 24-hour picket roster. With "Fort Knox," a converted bus provided by the unions, a tent, a 40-gallon drum for burning wood on the winter nights, and wooden chairs arranged across the driveway into the plant, the pickets were well set up to discourage drivers from entering the premises.

They held placards with slogans such as "Godfrey Hirst workers stand strong," "Godfrey Hirst, you don't scare us," and "Give us a break - two tea breaks." They sang songs to the accompaniment of a guitar and waved at the many drivers who tooted their horns in support at the busy industrial area.

A number of workers from other plants joined the picket line. They came from carpet factory Bremworth Cavalier, nearby cool stores for meat storage, the Yellow Bus company, the waterfront, and other workplaces.

Workers from Babcocks, a firm contracted to run the New Zealand Navy's dockyard in Auckland, visited the picket line and donated food left over from their own dispute. Some 272 tradespeople and laborers were locked out after 91 percent rejected company demands attacking their allowances and conditions. The workers, organized by the Public Service Association, the Engineers Union, and the Amalgamated Workers Union, started picketing on July 28 and organized a lunchtime march the following Friday through the nearby shopping center of Devonport. After 11 days Babcocks lifted the lockout and negotiations resumed.

On the sixth day of the strike at Godfrey Hirst, the cops blocked off the road, warned the workers to move, and then moved in without provocation. Fourteen were arrested, taken to the cells and released with a warning. A few hours later the police repeated the maneuver, this time arresting six strikers whom they held for three hours. One of the workers, a young woman who asked that her name not be used, told the Militant two days later that she still had swollen wrists after "they put handcuffs on us and strip-searched us. It was humiliating."

The arrests made the main television news. The workers' response to the assault was summed up in a new placard that appeared: "20 arrests and we're still here!"

Union officials called for reinforcements for the picket line two days later, expecting the police to break the line and allow trucks to deliver yarn and pick up carpet made before the strike. More than 50 strikers and supporters assembled in the morning. While Militant reporters were there, two trucks turned away when the drivers refused to cross the picket line. At around midday the company told union representatives that they would negotiate a collective contract. This announcement was greeted with loud cheers and singing by the picketers, who then voted to end the strike.  
 
 
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