The 170 union and nonunion workers walked out February 21 over the company's contract demands. These included extending the current eight-hour shift to 10 hours with rotating days off instead of weekends, replacing paid breaks with unpaid ones, instituting a piece-rate system that would mean workers not getting paid for the first half hour of any breakdown, and cutting staff in some areas where new machinery is being installed.

To counter the company's current complicated and divisive skill and productivity-based pay system, the workers are demanding a pay raise of 80 cents an hour on their hourly base rate of NZ$10 (NZ$1.00=US 48 cents). The company is refusing to negotiate while workers are still on strike.

At a union meeting March 11, workers voted to continue the strike until their demands are met. They are picketing the plant five days a week from 6:00 a.m. until late afternoon. The early start is to coincide with the arrival of a trickle of workers who have crossed the picket line since the strike began--about 15 in all. The company is attempting to run the plant with these workers and management staff. Picketers reported that the company boasted that one week 600 lambs had been processed--only about one-tenth of normal production. They also reported an episode where meat inspectors rejected products processed by management staff because of poor hygiene levels.

The company has made a number of attempts to undermine the strike, such as calling workers at home to encourage them to return to work and organizing separate departmental meetings to pressure the workers. A number of employees refused to attend these, while others walked out of them. Strikers on the picket line comment that workers are feeling more united and determined as the strike goes on, and that this was reflected in the mood at the last meeting. One of the picketers, who was previously a representative elected by the nonunion workers, explained that he had rejoined the union as a result of the strike, as had a number of others.

Many workers now have other jobs, picking fruit or working in other local meat works, but drop by on breaks or before or after work.

Picketers have been struck by the breadth of support from motorists, bicyclists, and pedestrians passing on the busy highway out of town. Some have stopped to donate money, including a truck driver who contributed $40.

Robert, an experienced meat worker who had started at Progressive only four weeks before the strike, said, "The reason we're getting such a lot of support is that other people are being ripped off too. And we're getting support from a lot of women. Attitudes are changing. When others see people striking they say, 'I wish I could get a little bit back from my employer too.'"

The strike has also begun to attract more organized solidarity. Workers at Advanced Foods Ltd. in Waipukurau, an hour's drive away, threatened to strike when asked to process some of Progressive's meat. After two meetings failed to persuade them otherwise, the company decided not to process it.

Wharfies (longshoremen) are considering refusing to handle Progressive products destined for export if the company does not begin negotiations with the workers.

The strike at Progressive follows the fight by 1,000 meat workers at the Alliance Group's Lorneville plant in the South Island in January that pushed back some of the company's demands for shift work, speedup, and pay cuts, and strengthened the union. Over recent weeks government-employed meat inspectors have been working shorter hours to press their claim for a 12 percent pay increase.

Over the last two decades meat workers have faced substantial cuts in wages and conditions. Many large plants closed and layoffs and speedup have occurred in those remaining open. More nonunion plants have been opened and shift work now exists in a number of places. One Progressive striker--like many who work there a veteran of one of the large nearby plants that has closed and an experienced lamb boner--explained that he used to earn $22 an hour in the mid-1980s. Now he earns just over $12 an hour for the same work.

Further job losses were foreshadowed when the Alliance Group announced March 17 the closure of the sheep meat processing chain at its Sockburn plant in Christchurch later this year. Up to 200 of the 290 union members at the plant will lose their jobs as part of the company's restructuring. [As we go to press the meat workers have returned to the job under terms of a proposed new contract.]

Felicity Coggan is a member of the National Distribution Union  
 
 
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