Container Port Strike Continues

On March 28, 2013, the Union of Hong Kong Dockers (UHKD) called a labour strike of 450 crane operatiors and stevedores at the Kwai Tsing Container Terminal, a 20% increase in pay, to bring the daily wage up to $1,600 (or an average monthly salary of $24,000) as well as improved working conditions. Dockers lamented that they have had minimal raises over the past 10 years and that fringe benefits are nearly non-existent, and one crane operator commented, “We are overworked, not given enough rest time, and we don't have proper toilet breaks. We have to [relieve ourselves] in newspapers in our cranes.”

The situation is complicated by the fact that the workers are actually employed by a number of different contractors, to whom management services have been outsourced. Hong Kong International Terminals (HIT), the port operator, is refusing to intervene as such matters were the responsibilities of the contractors, while the union insisted that it would not negotiate with individual contractors and that they would only talk if all the contractors were present.

Tension has steadily built over the past month, first with a court order which banned unionists from entering the container terminal grounds, forcing their strike outside the port. After a 4th round of negotiations failed, the union escalated their industrial action by setting up camp outside the Cheung Kong Center, where the Hutchinson Whampoa Group, the ultimate parent company of HIT, is headquartered.

Earlier this month, both sides have taken to the press by placing advertisements in mainstream newspapers, and 4,000 protestors also marched from Victoria Park to Central with placards demonising Li Ka-Shing. The striking workers account for 30-40% of dock employees and it is estimated that the strike is causing $5 million in daily losses. As the strike reaches the one month mark, there is no indication that the end is in sight.