ABOUT US

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The New Zealand Meat Workers and Related Trades Union has a National Office in Christchurch and additional three branches.All branches fund the National Office on a capitation per member basis.

Other three branches are: whanganui branch|Canterbury Branch|Otago Branch New Zealand meat union deals with the meat industry of the country and its workers with all employment agreements , their health and safety issues and many other related issues such as industrial relations and social issues.

Meat Union Aotearoa Branch consists of 23,000 permanent and seasonal workers. This includes workers in freezing works, tanneries, fertiliser plants, halal operations, small meat processing plants, small goods processors etc.
 
Union undertakes to through its officials, a leadership role in the workplace by:
 
tick     Informing members of their rights and entitlements
tick     Informing members about industrial developments and campaigns and wider political & social issues
tick     Representing and assisting

We are in a new technological age where we are witnessing key interactions between the union movement and the New Right organisations that influence the conservative government agenda and their tactics to destroy unions.

Whilst industrial laws and social attitudes change from time to time, the basic principles of organising do not. The constant struggle for the union movement is how to deal with those changes by constantly looking at innovation and initiative, including the use of modern technology, which will maintain the interest of workers to continue the struggle for justice and safe healthy work place.

Our families and our quality of life is important and our union recognises that it is essential to raise issues that affect all of us like government funding for housing, health care, superannuation, education and the environment.

It is important that Union continues to work with community groups, political organisations and Iwi & Hapu, who have similar objectives to ours.

 PRESIDENT’S MESSAGE

Word from the President –Wayne Barham

"Firstly, a very warm welcome to all our new members; we hope that you enjoy being with us and have confidence that everything we do is with your best interest in mind.

We’ve had a ragged year so far starting with the CMP and AFFCO disputes. This knocked us back quite a bit financially as well as in numbers, but we’re steadily growing again.

Thank you to all our delegates and shed officials for stepping up to be on the front and sometimes wearing the brunt; and being the first port of call to our members. It is a very important job and I appreciate your efforts.

Silver Fern Farms, TeAroha, the plant that got burnt down last year, is now finally back up and running. New systems have to be implemented which is hard on everyone but results are showing now.

I would like to recognise Graham Cooke, who held the Aotearoa Branch Secretary position for 24 years and now has moved on to become National Secretary of the NZ Meat Workers Union. We wish him well in his new role.

All that remains to be said is to enjoy the new website. Check back here often for news and updates on what’s happening in the industry. We also welcome your contributions, so please email jo@meatunion.org.nz with your news and events; you would like us to upload on union website. NZMWU has recently launched an initiative to make the general public aware about the value of our workers jobs and the issues they are presently facing in the current climate. This initiative is called jobs that count