White House uses courts to end dock strike

George Bush earned the wrath of America's trade unions and provided an opening to Democratic election campaigners yesterday when he became the first president in nearly 25 years to use the courts to end a labour dispute, in response to a strike that has paralysed West Coast ports.

Mr Bush said government lawyers would seek a court order to re-open some 30 Pacific ports, closed for 10 days after management locked out dock workers staging a slowdown.

With the dispute costing some $2bn a day, and about 200 ships stranded and waiting to be unloaded, Mr Bush appeared to acknowledge popular concerns about the fragile economy. Polls yesterday showed that Americans wanted to devote more attention to the economy than to Iraq.

However, commentators said the calculation could backfire on Mr Bush, with Democratic leaders - who are campaigning for midterm elections, now less than a month away - exploiting trade union anger at the decision.

It was the first use of the Taft-Hartley Act since 1978, and the first time any US president has invoked the legislation during a management lockout. The legislation calls for a return to work and an 80-day cooling-off period.

"This has never happened in the US before," said Richard Trumke, the secretary treasurer of the AFL-CIO union. "No president has ever been on the side of management so overtly."

Explaining his decision, Mr Bush said economic damage from the dispute had spread across the country and the economy, endangering the jobs of farmers, automotive workers and others.

He also said the dispute was endangering America's security. "These ports load the ships that carry supplies to our men and women in uniform. These ports also receive parts and materials used by our defence contractors to complete projects and maintain military equipment," he said.

But labour leaders accused Mr Bush of colluding with the port operators, who locked out some 10,000 dock workers on September 29 after a deadlock in negotiations on jobs and new technology.