The National Labor Court will reportedly allow a strike at the seaports when it hears the Federation of Israeli Chambers of Commerce's motion for an injunction against a strike at Ashdod Port Company Ltd. and Haifa Port Company Ltd.. Although a strike can officially begin tomorrow, sources do not expect the Histadrut (General Federation of Labor in Israel) to declare a strike before Wednesday or Thursday, in order to prepare and to launch a PR campaign.
Hundreds of port workers today demonstrated outside the court building to protest the ports reform. The demonstrators wore shirts stating, "This port is my home", and denounced Minister of Transport Yisrael Katz, shouting, "Katz will feel blood and fire." The police closed adjacent side streets. Although the demonstrators prevented the court hearing from starting, they kept order.
National Labor Court Vice President Yigal Plitman is hearing the case, alongside Judge Amiram Rabinovich and Judge Ronit Rosenfeld.
On Sunday, Plitman summoned the parties' representatives for a closed hearing in chambers, where he tried to persuade them to reach a compromise that would include negotiations in good faith and avoiding unilateral measures. The Histadrut would not call a strike and the government would freeze the tenders for the construction of private ports. The government's representatives objected, saying that the government had the right to take the sovereign decision to build new ports without negotiations with the workers, and the meeting ended with no results.
Labor law experts affiliated with the Chambers of Commerce believe that the Labor Court will rule that the government has the authority to decide on the construction of new ports, but that there are reasonable grounds for concern that this will harm current workers, and that the state should hold negotiations with them. The court is expected to rule that this is not a "political strike", which is banned by law, but a strike on economic grounds, or at most "mixed grounds". In the event of a strike on mixed grounds, the workers will have the right to strike with restrictions.
Earlier today, in the case of the labor dispute at Israel Railways, Judge Plitman ruled that although the government decided to outsource rolling stock maintenance, this did not mean that the workers lost the right to strike. He ruled that the grounds for a strike were economic, and that no special restrictions apply to a strike except for proportionality.
Histadrut sources said that, before the labor dispute at Israel Railways, when Judge Steve Adler was President of the National Labor Court, the court froze the government plan for unilateral reform at the ports. The reference was mainly to what is known as the "landlord model", which considers Israel Ports Development & Assets Company Ltd. as possessing the exclusive authority to lease some piers in ports to private franchisees. The sources said that the government's ignoring of the prior rulings was bad faith, which strengthens the impression that the third Netanyahu government was deliberately inciting labor relations at the ports out of populist motives.
Manufacturers Association of Israel president Amir Hayek told "Globes" that top association officials have been holding talks with all the parties in an attempt to find a solution without a strike. "We want dialogue, not shooting off at the mouth and threats, because in the end, industry will be the only one, or the main party, which will pay the price," he said. "An importer hurt by the strike because of lost sales will continue to buy goods abroad and will continue to sell in the domestic market, but the importer's goods will not arrive on time, and there is no assurance that the customer in the target market will wait. This is irreversible harm, especially for small and mid-sized exporters."
Published by Globes [online], Israel business news - www.globes-online.com - on July 29, 2013
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