Cde Alfred freed

Last year TGWU signed the first recognition agreement in South Africa for African seaman with Unicorn Line. In the past T&G signed agreements with shipping companies but these agreements covered shore workers and not workers at sea. Unicorn Line is a big national shipping company in the Grinrod Group of companies with 11 ships carrying cargo up and down the coast. Seamen work under dangerous and bad conditions with low pay. Seamen are out at sea for long periods away from their homes and families. Unicorn Line contracts out seamen to do work for a British company called Cu- nard. Cunard pay Unicorn Rl,729 a month for the seaman and Unicorn only pay the seamen R675 a month! It is also unjust because shore- based Unicorn workers earn R879 a month. Now we are negotiating wages for the first time for these seamen. The bosses gave the union a 20% increase on the minimum wage of R675. The union is also demanding a 25% increase for all workers, and the bosses are offering between 15% and 17% The bosses say that workers do not need a higher wage because they can do a lot of overtime and earn good wages! Seaman often have to work 176 hours overtime a month