FENZ Threatens More Strike Action if Negotiations Unsuccessful

Retired firefighters, existing firefighters, ambulance staff and children came out in force on Friday to support the Southern FENZ strike in Invercargill.

Organiser Aaron Ramsey said he was humbled by the amount of support they received, and thankfully there were no incidents or callouts during the hour-long strike.

He said it had been a hard decision to walk off the job and many career firefighters were not comfortable doing it, but they felt it was the only avenue they had left.

Some Southern career firefighters had worked 3300 hours last year, which equated to an extra 29 weeks in the year, just to cover all of the seats in the trucks.

Aaron said nationally there had been a high turnover of staff and he was hoping the Government would now listen, and step in.

“We’re not asking for the world,” he told Mike and About on Friday.

FENZ has applied for facilitation now in an attempt to stall proceedings, but he said at this stage they will be taking the same strike action this coming Friday.

“I understand that there may be further talks this week, and we hope that this leads to some progress.”