Much of the Icelandic fleet sailed on Sunday night as soon as the announcement had been made that the seamen’s strike had been called off.
The strike has been in progress for ten weeks, during which there have been turbulent scenes as seamen’s unions walked away from the negotiating table at one point. As the state arbitrator brought the seamen’s unions and vessel operators’ federation SFS back to the table, both sides were requested to observe media silence and not discuss the issues at stake in the media.
Terms were finally hammered out after a session that lasted well into the night, and agreements signed early on Saturday morning between the unions and SFS.
There was no guarantee that the unions’ memberships would accept the terms of the agreement, having twice previously voted to reject agreements union negotiators had reached with SFS. The union memberships were balloted over the weekend and the result was a narrow vote in favour of accepting the deal.
Union leaders had made it clear to members that this was the best deal they could get – and that rejecting it would simply result in the legislation already prepared by the Ministry of Fisheries to end the strike being triggered, forcing the fleet back to sea with no agreements in place and with little likelihood of the two sides coming together to re-start the process in the immediate future.
52.4% of members who voted were in favour of accepting the deal, while 46.9% voted to reject it, with the results announced and the strike called off at 2100 last night. Many crews had already been given notice earlier in the day to be on board, and many fishing vessels had left the quaysides within minutes of the announcement.
