LIMAN-IS UNION

A Brief History of Liman-Is

National Port and Land Stevedores Union of Turkey (Liman-Is) has been founded in 1963 as a result of the several unionization attempts of port workers in between 1947 and 1963. After its foundation, Liman-Is organized the dockers who were working in the ports operated by state. In 1965 Liman-Is became the single authorized union of port workers in the ports of Turkish State Railways (TCDD) and Turkish Maritime Enterprise (TDI) and started to sign collective agreements which cover the port workers in these ports. From 1963 to 2009, Liman-Is signed 22 collective agreements for the workers of ports operated by Turkish State Railway and Turkish Maritime Enterprise. Liman-Is has also started to organize port workers in the private sector. Liman-Is is affiliated to Confederation of Turkish Trade Unions (Türk-İş), European Transport Workers’ Federation (ETF) and International Transport Workers’ Federation (ITF)

The Legal Framework

Trade union rights are protected by the Constitution and relevant laws. According to the 51^st article of Turkish Constitution, to organize labour union is a constitutional right and employees have the right to form labour unions and they also possess the right to become a member of a labour union.

The 60^th article of Turkish Trade Union Law sets 28 different lines of business for trade unions which means that trade unions can only organize in the relevant line of business. The 22^nd line of business in this list is “Storage and Warehousing Business” which covers “all port services and loading, unloading and warehousing services in ports and wharfs and also storehouses, warehouses, cold storages and all kinds of storing, loading and unloading service in them” according to the Statute of Lines of Business. According to the 12^th article of Turkish Collective Agreement, Strike and Lock-Out Law, a trade union must have organized at least ten percent of the workers in the relevant line of business to be an “authorized trade union” and to be able to sing collective agreements.

Liman-Is is the single and authorized trade union in the 22^nd line of business. According to the statistics of the Ministry of Labor and Social Security (January, 2009), there are 32.932 workers in the 22^nd line of business and Liman-Is has 7.890 members in this line of business which means that 23, 95% of the workers are affiliated to Liman-Is.

In that sense Liman-Is is the single and officially authorized representative of land and port stevedores.