“We have reached a limit. For over a month, the Port of Lisbon has been stopped in its tracks. We are going to advance with collective dismissal as we need to re-scale because we do not have the labour requirements,” Morais Rocha, president of the AOPL – the Lisbon Port Operators Association, told Lusa News Agency.
Rocha said that there was every legal justification for such a measure as the port was simply non-operational even though there were no details as to how many of the 320 dockers would be affected, stating only that analysis would be carried out “section by section.”
The trade union has been engaged in a work-to-rule or other form of industrial protest for over three-and-a-half years, over labour reforms put into practice within the scope of austerity era changes.
Last Friday saw a rejection of a binding arbitration proposal by the union with the operators now stating that they have no alternative but to advance with collective redundancy given the loss of traffic and sustained losses in revenues.
The redundancy announcement comes following comments from the Minister of the Sea, Ana Paula Vitorino, on Monday that called on both sides to reach an understanding as the economic viability of Lisbon Port is now being jeopardised.
“This is a situation that cannot continue as at this moment in time the very viability of the Port of Lisbon is coming under question” said Vitorino, before lamenting the knock-on effects for the national economy and job creation.
She added that there are many companies dependent on the Port of Lisbon “and even if they do all the logistics and transfer cargos, and with minimum service requirements and also shifting cargo through other ports, still nothing justifies this situation”.