Dock Workers Strike on Harbor Plans
Posted on: Wednesday, 11 January 2006, 12:00 CST
By RAF CASERT
BRUSSELS, Belgium - Tens of thousands of dock workers in several European Union nations went on strike Wednesday to protest plans to liberalize cargo handling at EU seaports, unions said.
The European Transport Workers' Federation said a total of about 40,000 people were participating in 12 countries to protest an EU bill that would open up cargo handling to competition, ending the situation in many European ports where loading and unloading is run by monopoly handlers.
Supporters say the bill is needed to cut costs, speed up deliveries and encourage investment in ports across the 25-nation bloc.
Dock workers' unions fear it would lead to lost jobs, lower wages and less safety. They want qualified stevedores to continue carrying out dock work, arguing the job is too specialized to leave to personnel on board the docking ships.
The European Parliament will discuss the issue at its meeting Monday in Strasbourg, when dockers planned a major demonstration in the French city.
Some 4,500 German port workers took part in Wednesday's strike, which paralyzed container terminals in the North Sea port of Hamburg where some 1,000 workers walked out, the service workers union ver.di said.
"Not one crane is moving," union spokesman Uwe Schroeder said.
In Bremen and Lower Saxony state, 1,600 workers took part in protests. Short strikes were also planned in Baltic Sea ports.
German Transport Minister Wolfgang Tiefensee joined the criticism, saying the plan could damage the ports and result in job losses.
"Port Package II will not lead to more competition and higher quality in the seaports," Tiefensee said. "We fear that it could come to job losses in the ports on a large scale."
In Rotterdam, only a few hundred dock workers were expected to stage a four-hour strike at the European Container Terminals, according to Port Authority spokesman Sjaak Poppe. With 58,000 employees working at Europe's largest port, however, operations would barely be affected, he said.
Workers planned to strike for four hours in Antwerp, Belgium, the EU's second biggest port. They were expected to be joined by colleagues in three other Belgian ports.
Dock workers in Finland also took part in the staggered strike, scheduled to last a few hours Wednesday, but it was not expected to halt passenger ferries between Finland, Sweden and Estonia, union officials said.
"We want to take our message to the European Parliament," said Juhani Koivunen, a Finnish union spokesman.
The EU's executive Commission redrafted the bill after the European Parliament rejected the last attempt to open up port services in 2003, following several dock workers' strikes.
Source: Associated Press/AP Online
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