Brisbane Cross River Rail CFMEU workers strike in bid for $240k entry-level pay

Worksites across Brisbane ground to a halt today as CFMEU workers walked off the job over unmet demands for huge pay rises. HAVE YOUR SAY

• Editor’s view: Holding us to ransom

CFMEU workers on Brisbane’s $6.2bn Cross River Rail project are walking off the job over unmet demands for huge pay rises that would see an entry-level construction worker earn $240,000.

Six months of negotiations between the militant union and major contractor CPB Contractors are tipped to reach a climax as CFMEU workers launch four days of protected industrial action, with workers seen lining the streets at key sites well before 7am on Tuesday.

‘SACK THEM ALL’: FIERCE BACKLASH OVER CFMEU STANCE

Queensland Police are on scene at seven CFMEU protest sites, with the biggest group seen at Roma St.

Brisbane Cross River Rail workers outside the Albert Street worksite. Picture: Richard Walker

Protests have also popped up at Yeerongpilly, Dutton Park, Rocklea, Spring Hill, the CFMEU branch at Bowen Hills, and Albert St in the CBD.

It’s understood workers started gathering at the sites from about 3.45am.

Police crews are at the scene of most sites to monitor activity, but it’s understood the crowds are contained and peaceful.

Some of the protests were unfolding near busy train stations, but a Queensland Rail spokeswoman said there were no disruptions or delays to services across Brisbane this morning.

However, at least one site in the city, multiple vehicles have been seen parked in bays in lanes used as clearways during peak hour.

Up to 30 union workers were gathered outside the Exhibition Station Cross River Rail site by 7am, with vehicles parked along a restricted lane of O’Connell Tce.

Multiple written signs have been draped over nearby fences.

“CPB choo choo chewed up by the govt budget,” said one reference to the contractors managing the project.

Another said “CFMEU here for the blue,” and “never cross a picket line.”

Workers outside the Roma Street Cross River Rail site early on Tuesday morning. Picture: Richard Walker

There were members standing at multiple site entrances including one down Lanham St where there were up to a dozen.

WHAT THE UNION IS DEMANDING

The union had demanded some workers receive pay rise of about $2000 a week – despite the taxpayer-funded Cross River Rail already blowing out by $1bn.

Details of the stoppage, including the expected six underground, station and rail sites affected, have not been revealed.

Sources familiar with the CFMEU’s demands said the proposal would deliver wages higher than those on sites covered by the controversial Best Practice Industry Conditions policy.

CFMEU and other unions have shutdown Cross River rail sites all over Brisbane preventing other workers from doing their job, protesters pictured at the Boggo Road Cross River Rail Site.

They said, under the proposal for Cross River Rail, an entry-level worker with no experience could earn more than more than $240,000 each year, about $15,000 higher than currently.

It’s understood the union has also demanded an extra 20 rostered days off each year.

The union on Tuesday said months have passed since it served the contractor with the workers’ log of claims and that CPB Contractors would not “budge” on multiple key issues.

This included a heat policy, a subcontractors clause to improve job security, and the inclusion of traffic controllers and cleaners in the agreement.

The union said the action came after years of chaos and mismanagement by CPB and the Queensland Labor Government.

Up to 30 union workers were gathered outside the Exhibition Station Cross River Rail site by 7am, with vehicles parked along a restricted lane of O’Connell Tce.

Sources familiar with the industrial action prepared for sites to be blocked, affecting the ability of non-CFMEU workers to gain access.

CFMEU Assistant State Secretary Jade Ingham described Cross River Rail workers as “slaving” under a substandard Australian Workers Union agreement for more than four years.

“The seeds of this dispute were planted back in 2019, when the Queensland Labor Government did a dirty deal with the AWU that denied Cross River Rail workers a say in their Enterprise Bargaining Agreement,” he said.

“Since then, workers have suffered under CPB’s woeful mismanagement and corporate bastardry.”

He said workers were standing against CPB’s “grubby divide-and-rule tactics” to prevent any more workers being maimed and killed on the job.

“This summer, more than 30 workers have been hospitalised and one labour-hire worker has died of heat stress, yet CPB refuses to agree to workers’ requests for an effective heat policy,” he said.

“Cross River Rail workers have joined the CFMEU in droves because CPB will not listen, the AWU will not speak up for them and the Queensland Government only cares about staged photo ops and spin.

“This democratic action is about giving the workers a voice and raising conditions on Queensland’s biggest infrastructure project to industry standard.”

CFMEU and other unions have shutdown Cross River rail sites all over Brisbane.

He claimed the multinational CPB was refusing to budge in the negotiations.

“Civil construction workers are not second-class citizens, and for the first time they have an opportunity to have a say in their future. The CFMEU will back them all the way.”

Mr Ingham said he expected CPB to play victim after the “protected action” but was adamant workers safety and conditions were the unions priority.

“For them to play martyr and victim, it’s insulting to the workers … who have had to live and breathe the terrible safety conditions on this project and be treated like second class citizens just because they work in civil construction,” he said.

“What you’ve got here is a multinational corporation that treats these workers like they are numbers on a spreadsheet, insulting the men and women who build this important infrastructure.”

He said there was no work occurring on any of the Cross River Rail site and that members congregating in front of sites were there to ‘talk’.

”Workers will talk to workers on the project about what they’re doing and ask for their support, that’s what a picket line is,” he said.

CFMEU’s Jade Ingham during a media conference amid mass worker strikes in Brisbane. Picture: Liam Kidston

“That’s their democratic right to participate in this action and to ask for support from other workers.”

He denied entry level workers were making a $240,000 salary and said they were making less than two-thirds of that amount.

“But whatever it is … we work in a tough industry, it’s dangerous, it’s hot, dirty, people have got their lives in their hands just by going to work every day.”

“We don’t have a lot of job security, it’s not a permanent job.”

Mr Ingham said there had been 32 workers on the project hospitalised since the start of 2024, and that one worker had died in December.

“That is the track record in just one summer alone on one safety issue, which is the inadequate management of the risk of heat and heat stress, enough is enough,” he said.

“This is not all about money, by no stretch of the imagination, it’s about workers rights, it’s about dignity.”

CFMEU Assistant State Secretary Jade Ingham. Picture: Liam Kidston

Mr Ingham said their demands for an increase in RDO’s from six, would bring the projects workers in line with the rest of the industry.

“The entire rest of the building industry operates under a calendar with 26 RDO’s in it,” he said.

“The reality is workers don’t get RDO’s on this project, the agreement might say six but there is total flexibility at the employer’s discretion to take RDO’s.”

“RDO’s are workers time that they’ve worked, they haven’t yet been paid for, they’re not free days.”

In October, The Courier-Mail revealed the CFMEU wanted top tunnel and shaft night shift workers – paid $5319 a week – to be bumped up to $7451 pre-tax for a 50-hour week, an extra $2132 or an average annual salary of about $387,000.

The CFMEU this month voted to undertake the protected industrial action after months of negotiation with CPB Contractors to strike an new enterprise bargaining agreement. Picture: David Clark

The union was also pushing for day workers doing 58-hour weeks both on tunnel and shaft, and civil and surface, to receive significant pay bumps of between $1220 and $1486 a week – rises of about 30 per cent.

The previous EBA struck between the union and major contractor in 2019 expired at the end of last year.

A spokeswoman for CPB Contractors said it had attempted to negotiate a “fair and reasonable work agreement” with the CFMEU and Australian Workers’ Union.

“While these meetings were productive, an agreement has not yet been reached between the parties,” she said.

Under protected industrial action, the CFMEU delegates can elect when to stop work and for how long.

A spokesman for Cross River Rail Delivery Authority said it was a matter between the union and major contractor.

“We encourage all parties involved to continue to bargain in good faith and to reach a resolution, so we can continue to deliver this transformational project,” he said.