ACTU’s Sally McManus says workers not to blame for energy price spike

A key union leader has knocked back claims that workers are responsible for skyrocketing energy prices. 

Woodside Energy workers threatening to strike at the gas company’s North West Shelf Project will abandon strike plans if “a fair agreement” is struck, amid fears that Australia’s LNG exports could be stalled.

Speaking on RN Breakfast on Friday morning, ACTU secretary Sally McManus said 150 workers at the facility had proposed to strike in a bid for higher pay and improved conditions.

“These offshore platforms are isolated, so they’re in the middle of the ocean. You’re living on there all the time, there are long rosters, and this is actually the first collective agreement that these workers are fighting for,” Ms McManus said.

Woodside has been negotiating a new collective bargaining agreement with unions at the facility located off the coast of Karratha, Western Australia, since earlier this year.

Proposed strike action at Woodside’s North West Shelf Project has sent the European gas price soaring. Picture: NCA NewsWire / Sharon Smith

Questioned over how proposed industrial action had caused gas prices to soar, Ms McManus said it was Woodside, not the workers, who were to blame.

“We’ve got to remember that the people responsible for that are actually the company Woodside,” she said.

“These workers have been literally trying to negotiate with them for years.”

The Offshore Alliance – a partnership between the Australian Workers Union and the Maritime Union of Australia – received permission from the workplace umpire for the workers at the Woodside facility to take protected industrial action.

Protected industrial action, including strikes or work stoppages, cannot occur without approval from the Fair Work Commission before going to members for a vote.

Workers would back down on proposed strike action under a ‘fair agreement’, ACTU secretary Sally McManus said. Picture: NCA NewsWire / Nikki Short

On Wednesday, it was revealed that 99 per cent of Woodside’s workforce at the North West Shelf facility voted in favour of industrial action.

Markets reacted sharply to news over concerns that gas production could be crimped if workers walked off the job.

On Wednesday, European LNG prices skyrocketed to their highest levels in nearly two months.

The form of industrial action that workers may take is not yet known.

Options could range from a minor pause to an all-out strike.

Originally published as ACTU’s Sally McManus says workers not to blame for energy price spike