Coastal Shipping Campaign

On Thursday 24 August a Parliamentary meeting with Damian O’Conner MP was held to continue lobbying in regard our Coastal Shipping campaign. The meeting was organized by our National Secretary.

I was unable to attend as away at sea so organized Wellington Rank and File seafarer Jack Thomason to attend on behalf of the Branch.

He reported it was a well delivered message and worthwhile discussion that appeared to be positive.

It is vital that we make the most of any opportunity to keep our Campaign alive.

Many will say that nothing much comes from any of the meetings or lobbying over the years. I will remind that continuing dialogue in any form keeps our message alive.

Every MUNZ member needs to play their part for their industry’s future.

Our electronic petition had a disappointing set back at the start but it was corrected and successfully restored although it is still taking a long time to reach our target figure.

This can only be done with full membership involvement and given total membership numbers should have been achieved quickly.

As an example, Wellington has over 500 employed in the two ferry companies alone along with a couple of hundred employed in the Ports which would be an automatic 700+ signatures.

These 700 only needed to get three more signatures each for our Branch alone to have met the required target instantly.

If every member in every Branch did the same a respectable total would already have been submitted. Instead we are struggling to achieve 1000 at the time of writing.

This and any other form of action needs the membership’s 100% commitment for a positive result that our industry can only benefit from.

Every member needs to think of the legacy we are leaving for those coming in behind us, just as those before us did by leaving us the conditions we are lucky enough to enjoy today.

As a Branch we need to see larger attendance at future rallies and by simply attending your SWMs.

Finally, a thank you goes to Jack for standing up and representing the Branch and our Union.