LOS ANGELES, Oct. 17 (UPI) -- Union longshoremen and the shipping companies were scheduled to resume contract talks next week for the first time since the 29 West Coast ports reopened earlier this month under the authority of the Taft-Hartley Act invoked by the Bush administration.
Peter Hurtgen, head of the Federal Mediation and Conciliation Service, planned to bring the two sides together next Thursday in an attempt to get the stalled negotiations back on track and moving toward a new three-year contract.
"Hurtgen stated that he has scheduled two days of negotiations for next week, but talks could be extended," the FMCS said in a statement released late Thursday.
A 10-day lockout of around 10,500 members of the International Longshore and Warehouse Union brought maritime commerce to a screeching halt at major ports such as Los Angeles, Long Beach, Seattle and Oakland. The work stoppage cost the U.S. economy an estimated $1 billion to $2 billion a day and created a backlog of ships and cargo that will take an estimated two months to clear out.
The lockout was ended Oct. 8 by the Bush administration, which went to court to have the 1947 Taft-Hartley Act invoked after deciding the work stoppage was a threat to the nation's trade and security.
"Even with the Taft-Hartley injunction in place, the early indications are that we have experienced an estimated 20-25 percent drop in productivity since the ports re-opened," Joe Miniace, president of the Pacific Maritime Association, said in a recent status report to the shipping companies that the organization represents in the dealings with the ILWU. "In several instances, the union continues to play games: workers with critical job functions are slow to be dispatched, causing shifts to begin up to 90 minutes behind schedule. In other cases, containers are being 'misplaced' or 'lost' in record numbers," Miniace added.
The PMA had locked the union out Sept. 27 after its members allegedly staged a selective work slowdown that slowed the movement of freight to a virtual crawl at some terminals -- an accusation the union vigorously denies.
U.S. District Judge William Alsup Wednesday granted the government's request for an injunction that provides for an 80-day cooling-off period and mediated contract talks. The San Francisco judge's written decision also emphasized that further lockouts, slowdowns and strikes would not be allowed for the duration of the cooling-off period.
Contract talks broke off Oct. 5 with the two sides at loggerheads over the issue of union representation in jobs created by the new cargo-tracking computers and other technology that the PMA says is critical to keeping the West Coast competitive with other areas. The PMA says no union members will lose their jobs, but technological upgrades will limit the number of plum clerk jobs that generally go to veteran longshoremen who have toiled for years in the physically demanding job of loading and unloading cargo.
"The significant job growth we project for the ILWU is in the longshore and foreman ranks," Miniace said. "Just as the modernization of trains eliminated the need for two firemen on each engine, so too, will the use of technology limit the number of new clerk jobs."
