- President Biden’s acting Secretary of Labor, Julie Su, was previously the secretary of the California Labor and Workforce Development Agency and has long-standing relationships with both the workforce and management in the state.
- CNBC has confirmed that it is currently in contact with officials from the ILWU union and the PMA Port Authority to help negotiate a deal as tensions have risen in West Coast ports.
- Greater engagement from the Biden administration, which the industry has been pushing for, has been hailed as a welcome development by logistics executives, but supply chain conditions remain under pressure.
Julie Su testifies before a Senate Health, Education, Labor and Pensions Committee hearing on her nomination as Secretary of Labor on April 20, 2023 on Capitol Hill in Washington, United States.
Amanda Andrade-rhoades | Portal
President Biden’s acting Secretary of Labor, Julie Su, is currently in contact with officials from the Labor and Port Administrations to help negotiate a settlement at a time of rising tensions in ports along the west coast.
Su, who served as Secretary of the California Labor and Workforce Development Agency until 2021, has longstanding relationships with both sides, helping to maintain communication at the negotiating table and work towards a final agreement between the International Longshore & Warehouse Union and Pacific Maritime Association .
The Labor Ministry confirmed Acting Minister Su’s involvement but declined to comment further.
President Biden on February 28 named Acting Secretary Su to succeed Labor Secretary Marty Walsh, who resigned in March. Su enjoys the support of many unions, including United Mine Workers, NABTU, LiUNA, IBEW and AFL-CIO, but also received support from business leaders, including a group of 250 executives who sent a letter to the Senate supporting her nomination and the Los Angeles Chamber of Commerce. She was already confirmed by the Senate as Deputy Secretary of Labor on July 13, 2021.
Industry calls for Biden administration intervention in the West Coast port situation are mounting, from the National Retail Federation to the National Association of Manufacturers and the U.S. Chamber of Commerce, which in a statement last Friday expressed concerns about a ” Serious Situation” expressed “work stoppages” at the ports of Los Angeles and Long Beach that would likely cost the US economy nearly half a billion dollars a day. It has been estimated that a more widespread strike along the west coast could cost about $1 billion a day.
“The best outcome is a voluntary agreement between the negotiating parties. However, we are concerned that the current sticking point — a wage and benefits impasse — cannot be resolved,” Suzanne Clark, CEO of the U.S. Chamber of Commerce, wrote in a letter to President Biden.
Concerns are high in the supply chain, from trucking to rail to ocean carriers. Billions of dollars in cargo were being held up at ports, container jams and delays resulting in longer service and turnaround times. Contingency planning for logistics companies was further complicated by a landslide vote by ILWU-Canada workers to authorize a strike at Canada’s west coast ports, as well as low water levels at the Panama Canal, allowing alternative trade routes on both the west coast and ports at the east coast more difficult.
Logistics managers trying to manage growing port congestion said the Biden administration’s involvement is welcome news, but the situation on the ground at the ports remains tense and financial consequences, such as burglaries, are still looming. B. late penalties, would become increasingly likely.
“We’re not getting our drivers’ effective turns,” said Paul Brashier, vice president of drayage and intermodal at ITS Logistics. “Even if a terminal says it’s operational and it’s that slow, we can be billed for demurrage.”
According to a statement released June 10, the Pacific Maritime Association claimed that the ILWU’s “deliberate” slowdowns continued.
The ILWU declined to comment.
Negotiations between the PMA and the ILWU on issues such as wages and automation have reportedly stalled. While both parties announced major advances in the spring, the ILWU described the recent actions as “the expression of displeasure by rank and file union members”.
“We will not settle for an economic package that fails to recognize the heroic efforts and personal sacrifices of the ILWU workforce that have propelled the shipping industry to record profits,” said Willie Adams, president of ILWU International, in a recent statement.
The ILWU has pointed out that shipping lines and terminal operators have made $500 billion in profits over the past two years. However, as supply chain prices have fallen, these profits have fallen.
While ports along the West Coast have been troubled, including California’s largest ports of Los Angeles, Long Beach and Oakland, the Port of Seattle tops the list of congestion. The SSA terminal let workers go home for lunch Monday through Friday last week due to slow work. On Saturday, the entire port was closed due to unmanned labor.
The lack of manpower to move containers on and off ships has caused delays for container ships as the ships remain at berth – at a dock – in the Port of Seattle. The Maersk Cairo has been at the berth since June 3; the APL La Havre since June 5th and the Maersk Cardiff and Etoile both docked since June 8th.
According to MarineTraffic, six container ships were currently at anchor as of Monday afternoon, with four container ships arriving by sea and expected to arrive within the next seven to nine days. Ships are parked in all terminals and there is no new space.
“Seattle has been hit the hardest,” said Captain Adil Ashiq, head of MarineTraffic North America. According to MarineTraffic, the average turnaround time for container ships in Seattle in recent months has been up to 2.5 days, almost four times the average. According to Ashiq, this “poses a significant threat to imports waiting to be unloaded and go where they need to be.”
The Port of Tacoma, which makes up the other half of the Northwest Seaport, faces similar backlogs. Nine ships are en route from the sea, five ships will arrive in the next four days. Two ships remain at berth, one of which is the YM Totality, which has been at berth since June 8th. The container terminal at the Port of Tacoma is still operational, albeit at 50 percent.
“We’re afraid of ships and ocean freighters damming up and ports going out,” Brashier said. “We have customers who want an East Coast and Gulf booking instead of the West Coast. Tons of cargo will be piling up at the Panama Canal over the next four to six weeks.”
Securing ships in the ports of Oakland, Long Beach and Los Angeles continues, with four ships waiting offshore 70 nautical miles from the Port of Oakland and a total of nine ships en route to Oakland from the sea.
There are currently 19 container ships en route to the Port of Long Beach, four of which are expected to arrive within the next two days. According to MarineTraffic, a larger wave of five ships is expected to arrive at the same time on June 19th. There are currently 37 container ships en route to the Port of Los Angeles, seven of which will arrive near the anchorage within the next 12 hours and eight will arrive from the sea within the next 5 days.
“We can see the impact of recent events on ship schedules, as ships are still at berth that arrived four days ago, almost at the peak of the maximum turnaround time,” Ashiq said. He cited one ship, the Maersk Antares, which arrived eight days ago and spent almost twice as long in berth as the average.
For the first time in months, Captain J. Kipling (Kip) Louttit, executive director of the Marine Exchange of Southern California, reported delays in the schedule. “The YM uniform was scheduled to depart at 04:00 today and then shifted 48 hours to 04:00 on Wednesday 14 June. We’ll update you as we learn more,” he wrote in an email. Later on Monday he sent another update with three more ship delays. “We have no certainty about sanity,” he explained.