THE AGE http://www.theage.com.au/daily/990507/news/news31.html Friday 7 May 1999 Dock workers still waiting for redundancy payments By ANDREA CARSON WORKPLACE REPORTER Waterfront supervisor Ron Kelly was made redundant last November after 17 years with stevedoring company Strang International. But despite taking a redundancy package, he has not yet been paid the more than $110,000 that he is owed. Mr Kelly and two of his colleagues had planned to use the money to set up a newsagency but because of the payout delay, they were forced to abandon their dream and look for other work. The Maritime Union of Australia has warned 500 dock workers who have volunteered for redundancy packages at P&O Ports not to leave their jobs until they have received their full payouts. The union's ultimatum follows a six-month dispute between a Federal Government agency and Strang International over the outstanding redundancy payments owed to six former Strang employees, including Mr Kelly. The redundancy money was to come from the Maritime Industry Finance Company's $250million fund that was set up last year by the Government to fund redundancies resulting from waterfront reform before 30April this year. The stevedoring companies will eventually repay the fund through levies on containers - a cost that is not to be passed on to the consumer. The general manager of operations at Strang, Mr Phillip Walsh, said talks with MIFCO about the payouts had been ``very frustrating''. MIFCO had argued that Strang should not have granted the redundancies until it had approved Strang's application for MIFCO funds. ``We are trying to resolve their interpretation of the regulations governing redundancies ... It seems that the smaller stevedoring companies are being treated differently from the bigger ones like Patrick,'' Mr Walsh said. The national secretary of the Maritime Union of Australia, Mr John Coombes, said Mr Kelly's situation was ``a bloody disgrace''. He said other dock workers at smaller stevedoring companies had also experienced delays getting their redundancy payments, but not as long as the Strang workers. ``Before any names for redundancies at P&O go anywhere, we will make sure all of the disputes about entitlements are resolved. And P&O have agreed to this,'' he said. A spokesman for the federal Minister for Transport and Regional Services, Mr John Anderson, said: ``MIFCO is not Mr Kelly's employer, his claim is against Strang, but of course it is MIFCO's responsibility to make sure the correct funding is available. ``I am told that MIFCO and Strang will finalise the agreement very shortly, and once that agreement is finalised the payments can be made,'' he said. ************************************************************************* This posting is provided to the individual members of this group without permission from the copyright owner for purposes of criticism, comment, scholarship and research under the "fair use" provisions of the Federal copyright laws and it may not be distributed further without permission of the copyright owner, except for "fair use." -- Leftlink - Australia's Broad Left Mailing List mailto:[EMAIL PROTECTED] http://www.alexia.net.au/~www/mhutton/index.html Sponsored by Melbourne's New International Bookshop Subscribe: mailto:[EMAIL PROTECTED]?Body=subscribe%20leftlink Unsubscribe: mailto:[EMAIL PROTECTED]?Body=unsubscribe%20leftlink
