Unions call for march in support of ferry workers

THE Waterford Council of Trade Unions is calling on workers from across the south-east to attend a protest march in support of Irish Ferries workers.

The south-east regional march will take place in Waterford this Friday.

The WCTU is asking workers in the IDA Industrial Estate to assemble at the AIB Bank on Paddy Brown’s Road at 1pm to march on the Cork Road and up the quay to the Glen where there will be a rally. Other workers are asked to join the march along the route.

The march is part of a national day of protest called by the Irish Congress of Trade Unions is response to the stance Irish Ferries has taken towards its employees.

The WCTU says it is imploring all workers to recognise the threat that the Irish Ferries situation represents to workers’ rights and to respond by bringing Waterford to a standstill on Friday afternoon, said Dick Roche, vice-president of the Waterford Council of Trade Unions. “Irish Ferries have resorted to tactics akin to the 1913 Dublin Lock-Out in order to force their workers to take redundancy to facilitate the employment of Eastern European workers,” he said.

Irish Ferries, if successful with their bully-boy tactics, will serve as a precedent for every unscrupulous employer to force down wages in a race to the bottom.

“In the next few months the EU Parliament will debate the Bolkenstein Initiative which will allow employers to pay workers according to ‘country of origin’ rules. This is a vicious attack on trade unionism which will affect every worker in the country,” added Mr Roche.