BY ALEX BAINBRIDGE
HOBART — Seventy of ship-builder Incat's 900 workers finished work on May 25 after accepting voluntary redundancies. The company extended an earlier deadline for workers to apply for redundancies but threatened forced sackings if there are insufficient applications to meet the company's "cost reduction targets".
The Australian Manufacturing Workers Union, which covers most workers at the ship-building company, criticised the redundancy package offered by management and vowed to win a better deal if forced redundancies are imposed. The redundancy package is capped at 12 weeks pay for more than five years work, disadvantaging long-term employees.
Calls for the government to provide assistance to Incat are mounting. State Labor premier Jim Bacon has called on the federal government to maintain its subsidies to the company and to direct the navy to recommission the wave-piercing catamaran used as a transport to East Timor.
State opposition leader Sue Napier called on the state government to direct the government-owned TT-line — operator of the ferry service to Victoria — to buy a catamaran outright or else pay lease fees in advance.
It is unclear whether the workers will support a militant campaign against the company. The union is not in an industrially strong position because the company has four unsold ships, two more are currently in production and the international market for wave-piercing catamarans (as for other ships) is weak.
Nevertheless, the small number of applicants for voluntary redundancy shows that, for most workers, it is not an attractive offer.