ITF Miami conference report

The ITF Dockers' Section Conference was held in Miami on 9-10 June. At the 2nd International Dockers' Conference held in Montreal two weeks earlier, we agreed that a restricted committee from the Montreal meeting would attend the ITF event.

This committee's aim in Miami was to persuade the ITF to adopt the two stage plan of industrial action agreed in Montreal in support of the sacked Liverpool dockworkers.

Stage 1 is to be an international day of action up to and including 24 hour work stoppages.

Stage 2, to follow immediately after the international day, consists of continuous actions to be taken against the main shipping companies that use the Port of Liverpool (CAST, CanMar, ACL etc.)

The official delegates to the ITF conference who had also been in Montreal were Norman Parks and Tom Dufresne from the ILWU, Antonio Mariano from the National Federation of Portworkers Unions in Portugal, and Vladimir Vasiliev from the Dockers Union of Russia. Also in attendance from Montreal, but without official status in Miami, were Michel Murray, Philippe Gaudillot, and Daniel Ahern from the Syndicat des Débardeurs; Julian Gonzalez from the Coordinadora in Spain, and ourselves Jim Nolan and Terry Teague from the TGWU Merseyside Port Shop Stewards.

Approximately 120 official delegates from 50 countries attended the ITF conference, including friendly allies from the ILA, ILWU, Australia, New Zealand, Japan, Sri Lanka, India, Russia, Portugal, South Africa, Bermuda, Belgium; and official leadership delegates less friendly to the Liverpool struggle, from the big European ports in Germany (OTV), Holland (FNV), Denmark (SID) and Sweden (Transport Workers) - despite the tremendous support we've had from rank and file dockworkers in these countries.

The conference was hosted by the International Longshoremen's Association and chaired by ILA President John Bowers.

It was never going to be easy to get the ITF to adopt the Montreal decisions; in fact there was a lot of anti-Montreal feeling from a number of delegates. TGWU General Secretary Bill Morris had insisted to ITF General Secretary David Cockroft that only the TGWU constitutional delegates Graeme Stevenson (National Docks Officer) and Danny Maher (Gen. Exec. Council member for Docks and Waterways and convenor for the Liverpool tugboat crews) would be able to speak on the Liverpool situation.

We had initial problems getting agreement on observer status for the Montreal (SdD) delegation and the Spanish (Co-ordinadora) delegation.

The ILA objection to the SdD was cleared up following consultation between David Cockroft and John Bowers. Unfortunately we were unable to resolve the insistance by the Spanish delegations (ELA-STV and UGT) that Julian Gonzalez (Co-ordinadora) be removed from the conference.

In welcoming delegates to Miami, John Bowers asked that time used in speeches be restricted in order to concentrate on actions. He stated that dockworkers throughout the world are under attack from the common policies of privatisation and deregulation, and made special note of the need to do more to resolve the Liverpool dispute.

However, the main item on the first day of conference made many of us wonder whether we were in the right meeting. We had to sit through a two hour presentation by an advisor to the United Nations and World Bank, based purely on port reforms, the need for labour to start cooperating with capital, and the virtues of privatisation. Citing New Zealand where the port industry has come through horrendous changes, he argued that every job lost within the dock industry created 10 jobs outside.

We then got down to the real business. The European report was given by Bob Baete, head of the BTB port section in Belgium. Baete explained that employers throughout Europe are now on the offensive attacking dock labour schemes covering all European dockworkers. Rotterdam and Amsterdam are both threatened with job losses and casualisation.

Delegates from Asia and Africa reported major developments within their ports. The ITF had helped more ports become unionised but the biggest threat to this progress is coming from privatisation, Thulani Dlamini (TGWU South Africa) stressed. Nigeria had seen huge port development but the dangers and fears of privatisation were a major problem.

Reports from both Australia and New Zealand centred on new attacks on the rights of trade unionists from even more severe industrial legislation. Western Australia is bracing itself for the "third wave" of industrial legislation, but maritime workers firmly believe they can counter this through a joint front of dockworkers, seafarers, miners, and construction workers etc.

For the US East coast, Tommy Gleason (ILA) spoke of the future threats from the creation of "mega terminals", which would cause some small ports to disappear while others would be used purely for coastal traffic. He also warned of new supervessels currently coming on stream, which can carry up to 12,000 containers. They will be owned by one of the big five shipping consortiums but containers will be placed on board by other shippers using slot-sharing schemes. Because of the uncertain future for East coast dockworkers, the ILA had just concluded a 5 year contract with employers to safeguard the pay, conditions and jobs of their members.

Glen Ramiskey of the West coast ILWU (International Longshore and Warehousing Union) spoke briefly of concluding a 3 year contract for their members. Glen stated that 30% of the income coming into the international union went into organising for the future. The ILWU has a proud record of offering friendship to longshoremen in struggle the world over, and Ramiskey made special mention of what the union has done to help the Liverpool struggle, adding that "we actually need to be doing a lot more". The ILWU have their own industrial problems. He spoke of a coal terminal in Los Angeles being set up by LAXT where employers want to use non union labour, while in Hawaii the ILWU are being refused access to a steel terminal.

From the Chair John Bowers told delegates of the special relationship and bond the ILA has now formed with the ILWU so that both coasts are working in unison to defend and advance the welfare of all longshoremen.

A number of other delegates made special reference to Liverpool: Bob Baete (BTB) Belgium, Vladimir Vasiliev (Dockers Union of Russia), Bala Tampo (CMU) Sri Lanka, John Coombes (MUA) Australia, Thulani Dlamini (TGWU) South Africa, and Trevor Hanson (WWU) New Zealand.

As Jim Nolan and Terry Teague were not given leave to formally address conference the report we had all awaited was given by Graeme Stevenson, who spoke purely on the Liverpool situation.

The roots of the problem go back to 1989 when the National Dock Strike collapsed, Stevenson told delegates. All UK ports except Liverpool and Felixstowe later de-recognised the union, which remains the position today. He cited Associated British Ports (ABP) which owns 22 UK ports, not one of which recognises the union. TGWU port membership is now 5,000. Before 1989, membership fell from 80,000 to 10,000 within a 10 year span (1979-89). Out of the current membership 1,000 is in one port alone: Felixstowe.

Despite all those setbacks Liverpool had resisted, maintaining a strong union presence, good representation, and fighting to maintain all pre-1989 agreements. Stevenson and the TGWU had "only admiration for the way the Liverpool dockworkers had supported the young Torside workers". There was certainly "no question about the union fully supporting the Liverpool struggle". Stevenson spoke in admiration about the organisation of the shop stewards movement in Liverpool, and told conference that he believed the Liverpool dockworkers are "the cream of the working class", and in Jim Nolan, who is also the constitutional chairman of the Docks and Waterways committee, they "couldn't have a better leader". Despite criticism, the TGWU has "never shirked its responsibility to the Liverpool dockworkers" in trying to negotiate a just and long term solution to the dispute and with finances to alleviate the hardship the members are suffering. He has had a good liaison with the shop stewards movement, Stevenson told the ITF Conference.

Stevenson fully understands the stewards' mistrust regarding the latest round of negotiations, where a confidentiality clause has prevented them from being involved in tripartite talks between the TGWU, Mersey Docks, and their appointed business consultants KPMG. But he wanted to take this opportunity to "nail the myth that the shop stewards have refused to negotiate", and likewise the myth espoused by some European delegates that "the Liverpool dockworkers are happy to be classed as 'strike tourists'."

Stevenson then outlined the latest round of negotiations. Before Christmas, the company had made a formal offer with a 3 month period of reinstatement in which interviews for 41 ancillary jobs could be carried out with the offer of a £28,000 severance payment for those former direct employees of Mersey Docks who are not selected. The stumbling block to achieving the right type of settlement, he stated, was the company refusal to remove the strike breaking agency Drake International from the Container Terminal and other important areas of the port.

Since that formal offer the shop stewards and the union had both encouraged a new idea, forming their own Labour Supply company. One of the clauses in this proposal would bring "minimum standards" back to the Port of Liverpool, including trade union recognition. Stevenson believes this is an excellent idea, which could not only solve the Liverpool issue but could also serve as the foundation for organising the entire UK port industry.

Stevenson told conference that business consultants KPMG, appointed and funded jointly by the TGWU and Mersey Docks to evaluate the Labour Supply proposal, had "no links with Mersey Docks and were a totally independent company". Their consultancy report was based on speaking to 16 companies currently operating within the Port of Liverpool.

The KPMG final report is now in the hands of senior TGWU officers including Bill Morris. But, Stevenson stated, the consultants' report is not a business plan. It envisages only 30 to 40 dockers jobs being created within the Labour Supply company. Nevertheless, he believes that this offer along with the 41 ancillary jobs and guarantees concerning the former registered dockworkers pension benefits along with the £28,000 severance offer, will form the basis of a fresh offer from the Mersey Docks and Harbour Company.

Stevenson expects the company to contact the TGWU in the very near future to open talks on the fresh offer. Once those talks have been concluded, he believes the union will be in a position first to put the offer to the shop stewards, and then "as their duty to put it directly to the membership".

Stevenson accepts that these proposals fall well short of the sacked dockers' aspirations, and that the scabs of Drake International would be left in the key areas of the port, i.e. the Container Terminal. But he also believes that this process is "the only way forward for achieving increased national and international actions supported by the TGWU". He bases this belief on the offer going directly to the membership, the membership rejecting the offer, and this putting the union leadership in a position where "they would have to give their total backing for further international industrial actions".

Stevenson concluded that a victory for the Liverpool dockworkers would act as the model for the reconstruction of all British ports, that "now is the moment where we should consider the future and not the past," and that the next ITF meeting he attends will be one where "the Liverpool dockworkers have returned to their port and the rebuilding process for all UK ports will be firmly in place".

Danny Maher supplemented Graeme Stevenson's report, calling the employers criminals who for too long have been sheltered by the capitalist Conservative government. "It's nothing new for the Mersey Docks and Harbour Company to act in this way," said Maher. In the past Medway dockers had bought shares in Medway Ports valued at £2.50. When they were made redundant and Mersey Docks bought the company, the shares were valued at £37.50. (Mersey Docks' advisors on the share buyout of Medway were KPMG Peat Marwick, and a KPMG employee involved in the deal was given a high ranking position within Mersey Docks. A lawsuit against KPMG by the former Medway dockers was settled out of court by the TGWU last year.)

Danny Maher then touched on the latest talks between the TGWU, KPMG and Mersey Docks. In his view "no just solution can arise from these talks". The berths offered to the Labour Supply unit are classed as redundant berths within the Port of Liverpool at present. The operation will be purely general cargo, and he believes general cargo alone is not a viable proposition.

Maher concluded that "it needs more than words from the ITF, it's time for actions and the actions should be coordinated international actions". Although Danny himself and Graeme Stevenson were the constitutional delegates to the ITF, he requested delegates to stay behind at the end of the session and listen to the true version of events surrounding the Liverpool struggle from Jim Nolan and Terry Teague. This was agreed.

However when the debate took place, official delegates from Germany, Denmark, Sweden, and Spain walked out.

Speaking outside the normal business of the conference, both Jim Nolan and Terry Teague dismissed the proposals from the TGWU which had just been related by Graeme Stevenson as giving "no solution to the present conflict", as they fail to provide long term full reinstatement, the core issue of the 21 month dispute. The proposal does not deal with the removal of scabs from the port, and in fact leaves the most viable working areas i.e. the Container Terminal, the Timber Terminal, and the Grain Terminal, in the hands of strikebreakers.

Both spoke on the need to adopt the action plan agreed in Montreal, i.e. an international day of action of up to 24 hour stoppages, and more importantly a second phase of ongoing industrial actions against the ships and shipping companies that still use the Port of Liverpool.

Jimmy Nolan also stated that a lot of political work was being done to bring pressures from the new Labour Government to bear on the Mersey Docks and Harbour company, by using their 14% golden share to compel reinstatement. Terry Teague also made an urgent appeal for finances. He told conference that there was now a belief that in the very near future international actions and pressure would bring a victory and it would be tragic if whilst waiting for those actions to take place the dispute collapsed "because of the real hardship our families currently face".

At the end of this debate full support from all delegates in attendance was given to the Liverpool dockworkers, including statements from the ILA that urgent action is needed, but this time the actions should be coordinated to include all ports that trade with Liverpool.

Finally, the mission of the restricted committee from Montreal was to get the ITF to adopt the main resolutions of their conference. Unfortunately, those official delegates to the Miami conference who had attended Montreal were never going to be given the opportunity to move the Montreal resolutions in Miami. The only chance of putting forward the proposals formally was under the second to last item of business, namely "Motions".

The ITF planned to adopt a resolution brought forward from the European Dockers Regional Committee meeting in London on 5 September 1996, which expressed "its full support for the attempts of the TGWU to reach a final negotiated solution to the dispute and is prepared to take appropriate action in support of the TGWU's attempts".

Our view was that this resolution would have been meaningless if it was only to give ITF backing to the TGWU officials, and not to the body (the shop stewards movement) that has run the Liverpool docks dispute from Day 1. Our aims were given magnificent help from the ILWU delegation, in particular their leader Glen Ramiskey who was able to define what the September 1996 resolution meant to his union. Ramiskey told the full conference that "time has moved on since 5 Sept 1996, the Liverpool dockworkers cannot continue their struggle forever, and there is now an urgent need to achieve a just and long term settlement to their courageous fight".

Ramiskey recognised the legal restraints on the TGWU in calling for international actions to be intensified. But as far as the ILWU are concerned, they were "calling on ITF affiliates to support the call for a two staged industrial action plan, where legal and where possible".

Stage 1 would be the calling for another international Day of Action including work stoppages of up to 24 hours, and in Stage 2 again where legal and where possible, if the Liverpool dockworkers are not reinstated after the actions called for in Stage 1, then continuous actions should be planned against shipping companies servicing the Port of Liverpool, in particular targetting the main companies CAST, CanMar, and ACL.

There were no objections from the delegates to this definition being put on the resolution.

The final contribution to the ITF dockers section meeting came from our South African comrade Thulani Dlamini, who fully endorsed Glen Ramiskey's statements, and supported an international Day of Action not just for the Liverpool struggle but for all dockworkers who currently find themselves under attack.

No vote was taken.

John Bowers closed the meeting.

In informal talks between Jim Nolan, Terry Teague, Jim Coombes, John Bowers, and Glen Ramiskey it was agreed that this action plan would be put to the full Steering Committee meeting of the ITF, whose date is not yet known to us.

Finally, on hearing a report-back from the Miami ITF conference the Liverpool stewards have now fixed a date for actions to commence and further discussions are due to take place in Sête (France) on 21st June with European delegates who attended Montreal.

Liverpool dockworkers also express thanks to all those delegates whose continuing support was shown at the ITF conference in Miami.

ITF Dockers Section Steering Committee
London, 27 February 1997