Airport authority violates peaceful assembly rights

Peaceful Assembly

In July, New Zealand's Civil Aviation Authority tried to prevent strike actions by airport workers. When the airport security guards' union Avsec announced a series of three-hour strikes and a ban on overtime and extra hours, authorities reacted by denying striking workers a place to conduct their protest, threatening to lock them out of the airport. As union representatives pointed out, the prevention of workers from assembling in order to defy a union decision constitutes an unwarranted restriction on citizens' right to freedom of assembly and association. Although the strike was eventually called off, union representatives held the view that the authority's actions made it guilty of agitating workers through a denial of their basic rights.