UNION HISTORY BILL “PINCHER” MARTIN

Born 1923

Died 12 June 2007

President of the New Zealand Seamen’s Union (1964 – 1973.

BY MICK WILLIAMS MUNZ LIFE MEMBER

Pincher was the ultimate Kiwi union man – the sort of workers’ leader you aspired to be. He became one of those rare union officials who genuinely believed in flax roots democracy and did all he could to put it into practice.

He liked recounting his first big lesson in taking on a leadership role: he had disobeyed his wharfie father and gone to sea during the Second World War, and almost before he had gained his sea legs, he had been elected ship’s delegate.

When he returned, his father confronted him in the garden, briefly interrogated him and then knocked him over – not for running away to sea, but for taking on the delegate’s position before having mastered all the skills involved in being a seaman.

He would sling off at unions who had lawyers for presidents, or who ran to the law in any dispute. He couldn’t fathom why a union would willingly surrender authority over the lives of workers to “some bastard with a sheepskin on his swede.”

For him, the Labour Party, too, was part of the “bullshit brigade” and “Micky Savage was only a frontman for a bunch of turncoats”.

But, for me, it was not Bill the gladiator who was great, it was Bill the wise, practical leader, comrade, and friend, who was great.

He was great because he always inspired courage and commitment in the people around him. During the Walsh years, rank and file demands for major changes to the lives of seafarers had been building up like water behind a dam and so when the old despot died in 1963, a flood of democracy was released.

Within the union then there were powerful competing political factions, dominating and larger-than-life personalities, dangerous criminal elements, and tons of wild idealism all this in the context of the tumultuous sixties. The union needed someone like Pincher who could offer direction and discipline to the struggle as well as allow flax roots into flourish. He did this brilliantly.

For him, the union was not just another pressure group, it was a way of life, a way of struggle for a better world.

During his decade as President, a string of the most significant achievements in the union’s history were made. These included reorganising the port dominated and fractious structure into a nationally coordinated fighting force, laying the foundations for the state-owned New Zealand Shipping Corporation, the setting up of the Pension Fund and forcing the practice of equal time on and off.

These involved protracted campaigns against hostile governments and slave driving shipowners.

The union’s strength, as well as Bill’s personal power base, was established and continually bolstered at the regular stop work meetings up and down the country.

These packed meetings, where everyone could have their say, were often extremely heated and unruly and they didn’t all make the same decisions on important matters. But Bill had a way of weaving the strands together into a powerful movement.

He brushed aside the cowards who tried on the old bullying and stand over tactics, which had been such a curse through much of the union’s history.

As a result, the rank and file, supported by Bill’s bottom-up leadership style, were able to overthrow the old ‘auction block’ recruitment practice and replace it with a union-run roster system. The union had carved out a little bit of socialism in the maritime industry. Seamen were employed by the industry, not by the shipping companies.

On the international front, Bill put an enormous effort into the peace movement in New Zealand and the Pacific. He led protests against French nuclear testing and fought against the visits of American nuclear warships.

He developed strong solidarity links with black workers in South Africa during Apartheid, helped build up Fijian and other Pacific union movements and reopened close relations with the Maritime Union of Australia.

Bill left office in 1973 and went back to sea, continuing as a sea-going national councillor. He felt that his role as an official should come to an end. He couldn’t bear the thought of becoming a bureaucrat.

Modern unionism, he used to say, was becoming led by seat-warmers and intellectuals. “You don’t need a university degree to tell the boss he’s a bastard. But, at the same time he believed that all young seafarers should receive a good sound education. He used to insist that all members read ‘Against the Wind’, the history of the union, and learn about global issues, particularly international solidarity.

Later Bill would always say, “To be a delegate, you’ve got to be the hardest worker.” Another time he got sat on his arse was at his first negotiations after he had taken over as President of the union in 1964.

Before talks began, Bill launched into a speech about how the shipowners had paid for their wealth with the blood of generations of seamen. He ended his tirade with, “Nothing is too good for the workers!”, to which the bosses’ chief negotiator said, “Alright, Mr Martin, we’ll give the workers nothing.” That was Bill. With his strength went good humour and humility.

He despised people who tried to make big names for themselves and was not slow to show it. He confronted F.P. Walsh and survived, insulted Norman Kirk to his face and gave FOL leaders like Len Hadlee and Tom Skinner their pedigrees for collaborating with the government and accepting knighthoods.

My mentor Bill Martin R.I.P.