There is Blood in the water

international and local solidarity with the Wharfies has helped to defeat the Bosses at the Port

With the decision by Ports of Auckland management to reverse their plans to subcontract out the jobs of nearly 300 sacked workers, the Wharfies are on the edge of a major victory with historic consequences for the Union movement in New Zealand.

Despite a massive assault on their union by management, right wing media and traitorous politicians, the Wharfies have stood their ground, stayed staunch on their picketlines, and defeated the attempts to replace their jobs with scab labour.

There is blood in the water now, and its time for unions to sharpen our teeth.

The turning point for this dispute was the magnificent rally of support for the Wharfies, that saw over 5,000 unionists from over 40 unions pour onto the streets of Auckland's CBD, and down to the waterfront. Socialists on this rally argued for the tactic of a mass community blockade to shut down the port if the plans for scab labour went ahead. This idea was subsequently picked up by other unionists and commentators of the left.

There is no doubt that if the plans to use scab labour had gone ahead, the port would have been shut down by picket lines of thousands of workers at each gate. These were the tactics that saw Patricks stevedores successfully defeated by the Maritime Union of Australia in 1998.

There is blood in the water now, and its time for unions to sharpen our teeth.

Millions of dollars of ratepayers money has been spent by Ports Management in a failed attempt to break the Wharfies. Whole pages of expensive advertisements have been bought in the NZ Herald, by a CEO who is paid twice as much as the Prime Minister. The bureaucrats and managers who wasted this public money should now be held to account, and those responsible should be sacked by the Council.

The bureaucrats, advisers and politicians who attacked Council workers should also be named and deposed. These fat ass, soft handed enemies of the working class should have their offices picketed until they resign in shame. And traitors like Len Brown, of the so called "Labour" Party, should be royally kicked up the arse in the Mayoral elections next year. The rest of this pompous, lame duck, sad bastard's reign in Auckland will be a joke, and real friends of the working class such as Mike Lee, Cathy Casey, Hone Harawira, Matt McCarten and Willy Jackson should seriously consider an honest, pro worker, left wing slate to replace Brown and his cringers next year. The plans for privatisation- the agenda to sell off public assets such as the Ports, should now be truly scuppered.

There is blood in the water now, and its time for unions to sharpen our teeth.

Our meatworkers in AFFCO are being starved by the roadside. If it were not for the intervention of local Iwi in many areas such as Horotiu, their children would be suffering third world malnutrition at this rate. The Talleys family is Public Enemy Number One of the working class of Aotearoa and should be smashed. If the Wharfies are victorious, then the full firepower of our 400,000 unionists organised by the CTU must be brought to bare on these Croatian gangsters. The mass pickets planned for the waterfront must now be organised at all meatworks up and down the length of the Motu, and the scabs who keep Talleys running must be physically stopped from working.

If the Wharfies are victorious, then the war against casualisation in Aotearoa has truly begun. Fastfood workers and cinema workers will be campaigning in May for guaranteed hours- the fight against the crime of insecurity and underemployment is a cause the CTU as a whole must support.

And if the Wharfies are victorious, then the Union movement is reborn, and workers in every store, site and shop should take heart, unionise and strike out for higher pay, secure hours and better conditions.

This ain't 1951, this is 2012. There is blood in the water- let the bosses of New Zealand tremble in fear.