The agreement in principle was announced publicly last night (14th June 2023) and comes after 13 months of negotiations and a timely intervention by the President’s Acting Labor Secretary, to end unofficial industrial actions over previous weeks.
After 13 months of sometimes fraught negotiation, the Pacific Maritime Association (PMA) and International Longshore and Warehouse Union (ILWU) announced agreement on a six-year contract covering workers at 29 West Coast ports.
The tentative deal is subject to ratification by the PMA and ILWU, who said they would not release any details of the agreement at this time.
The ILWU had been seeking to essentially double the hourly wage for general longshore workers, while the PMA had been offering significantly less.
Any deal agreed on the West Coast is likely to serve as a basis for upcoming talks with the International Longshoremen’s Association (ILA) on the East and Gulf coasts and will impact upcoming negotiations with the Office Clerical Union, which represents about 500 workers at 15 marine terminals and ocean carriers in and around Los Angeles-Long Beach.
Acting Labor Secretary Julie Su “played a key role” in reaching an agreement, having joined negotiators in San Francisco earlier this week after a series of disruptions affected port operations in early June.
“The tentative agreement delivers important stability for workers, for employers and for our country’s supply chain,” Su said in a statement.”
The tentative deal comes after more than 13 months of negotiations, one of the longest contract talks in recent memory and comes at a time when US importers would have been preparing for the traditional summer peak shipping season.
PMA President James McKenna and ILWU President Willie Adams in a joint statement. “We are also pleased to turn our full attention back to the operation of the West Coast Ports.”
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