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Buenos Aires floating casino was immersed in a serious crisis until January, which was made even worse by the decision of a small group of former shop stewards who objected to the leadership of ALEARA (Argentina’s Trade Union of Gaming Employees), representative of most of the casino’s employees. Now their powers of representation have been terminated and they currently have no ties with the gaming trade.



Quite a lot of employees and gamblers were prevented from entering the casino via the usual means and had to reach the ship on a riverboat. Eventually, the situation came to a happy end in January, when employees and gamblers were able to get into the casino unhindered and after the former representatives were terminated and all their ties with ALEARA and the Casino were severed.



The dispute was born back on 9 November, in the course of a meeting called by these shop stewards on the floating casino (still in full enjoyment of their representation powers). A fight broke out with a gang of unidentified bullies, and some workers destroyed and plundered the casino, causing extensive material damage. On account of this, a Federal Court of Justice initiated legal actions against 69 employees, who were subsequently fired by the company.



A few days later, when the gaming hall resumed its normal business, the rebellious shop stewards decided, without any warning, to take industrial action for an indefinite period of time, which was not approved by the trade union. Such action led to a harsh clash with the Coast Guard (responsible for the area’s safety), a member of which was seriously injured when hit in the head by a flying stone and was subsequently hospitalized in an ICU.



As a consequence, the National Ministry of Labour decided to intervene and ordered a mandatory conciliation whereby no more employees could be terminated, which expired on 12 December, the day when the casino was supposed to reopen and over 2,000 employees – except the 69 workers against whom the Federal Court had instituted legal proceedings on the grounds of the rampage and plunder perpetrated a month earlier – were supposed to resume their duties.



But the shop stewards, backed by left-wing political parties and militant supporters of “picketers’ organizations” alien to our industry, decided to stand at the casino entrance doors and prevented employees from entering the casino to work. The trade union, in its turn, made endless calls to find a compromise and asked employees to resume their jobs, thus trying to maintain social peace in light of a deepening conflict.



Fearing new incidents, the Federal Court closed down the casino, a decision repealed a month later on 10 January 2008. The court mandated that the Coast Guard should take measures to allow employees to enter the casino safely and to keep picketers out of the establishment, at a reasonably safe distance.



However, some former employees, six shop stewards whose powers of representation had been suspended by the Court of Appeals in Labour Matters, and demonstrators from political organizations returned to the area surrounding the casino and assailed and threw stones at the casino employees that were trying to get to work on the staff bus (for the exclusive use of employees, as granted by their collective agreement). In the course of these incidents, six employees were injured and one demonstrator was arrested.



However, the employees were finally able to enter the casino by another means – on the catamarans departing from neighbouring La Boca district. Nevertheless, this very small group of former employees, backed by militants from different political parties and social organizations from opposing factions, kept holding pickets in the vicinity of the casino during a few weeks, with a view to keep preventing employees and gamblers from getting into the casino. But eventually they left the area for good when their protest grew unsupported and lacked any consensus, and at present the whole situation is back to normal.