Two dozen workers at Auckland Airport’s foodcourt staged a lightening strike on Saturday June 7 in protest about their working conditions. The strikers marched through the foodcourt demanding workplace rights and were applauded by many members of the public. Employers and security staff tried unsuccessfully to silence the upbeat strikers.

The workers are employed by a company which is a joint venture between HMSC, a mega-corporation with businesses around the world, and Auckland International Airport. Mike Treen, an organiser from the Unite Union who represent the workers, said that the workers had the worst employment contract the union had come across.

The workers have a start time but no finish time. They may work for one hour or for 10 hours at the whim of the company. Unite has succeeded in getting breaks established for staff who earlier were working up to 7 hours with no breaks. Most of the workers are on the minimum wage or only slightly above and have no security of hours. Some have worked 38 to 40 hours a week for several years but are denied permanent positions. The strikers are calling for a pay increase, security of hours for long serving staff and for improved breaks.

The Socialist Party wishes them well!

Click here to see a photo of the workers picket outside the airport.

This entry was posted on Monday, June 9th, 2008 at 8:01 am and is filed under Regional news and analysis. You can follow any responses to this entry through the RSS 2.0 feed. Both comments and pings are currently closed.