Bush Summit: Miners wary of threat from multi-employer bargaining deal
Minerals Council of Australia boss Tania Constable said an IR ruling threatened to set a precedent which could be applied across the Pilbara’s powerhouse iron ore operations.
Heavyweight iron ore miners, including BHP and Rio Tinto, risk having their Pilbara operations roped into multi-employer bargaining, the mining lobby has warned, after the industrial umpire backed a union bid to negotiate an agreement across three NSW coal mines.
On August 23, the Fair Work Commission ordered Peabody Energy, Glencore subsidiary Ulan Coal and Whitehaven into a collective bargaining process with the Collieries’ Staff and Officials Association for at least 12 months.
Defying strong employer objections, the commission’s decision represents the first time that multi-employer bargaining – which enables unions to negotiate workplace agreements across multiple businesses and rope in others once a deal is struck – has affected the sector since Labor legislated the changes in late 2022.
Even as the landmark union application covers less than 50 employees, shift supervisors required to be present onsite to oversee safety are included, therefore meaning all three sites could be forced to temporarily shut should those workers choose to take protected industrial action.
Speaking at The Australian’s Bush Summit event in Port Hedland on Friday, Minerals Council of Australia chief executive Tania Constable said the ruling threatened to set a precedent which could be applied across the Pilbara’s powerhouse iron ore operations.
“That’s very, very dangerous because what it means is that it’s not just about coal mines, think of the Pilbara and iron ore,” she said.
“We’ve got all of the big miners that are subject to multi-employer bargaining, we’ve got a Roy Hill, we’ve got a Rio Tinto, we’ve got a BHP, we’ve got a Fortescue, amongst others, that are at risk now of having to come together as a single enterprise.”
Ms Constable argued the ruling, which she claimed risked granting unions “unfettered access” to the mining sector, would intensify cost pressures.
“This is about unions getting power over our workforces,” she said. “That’s what this is really about, and the legislation as it stands, offers a whole range of opportunities to do that.
“That’s a really bad thing for Australia when we’re already seeing major costs being put to this particular industry,” she said, pointing to increased energy prices and carbon abatement costs.
Strongly supporting the miners’ application in the commission, the MCA argued the sites should not be grouped under the union’s multi-employer bargaining application as they employed different mining processes, with the coal exported to different export markets.
However, in its judgment, the commission’s full bench found the three sites – at Narrabri, UIan and Wambo – were “reasonably comparable”, noting that all were underground and exported to China, thus enabling the union to progress its bid.
A separate miner, Delta Coal, was excluded from the order after the commission found its Central Coast site was not similar enough to the others included in the application as the Chain Valley colliery was its sole customer.
The commission’s order comes despite assurances from Labor that the mining industry would not be affected by the IR shake-up, arguing that the measure was instead focused on low-paid industries.
Speaking in November 2022, then-workplace relations minister Tony Burke said neither east nor west coast mining operations would be “significantly impacted” by the legislation.
While the former had existing enterprise agreements in place which could not be overruled by a multi-employer deal, the latter was dominated by individual contracts and majority support for collective agreements had previously been difficult to reach, Mr Burke argued.
BHP warned on Tuesday that Australia’s international competitiveness would drop as labour costs increased under the “same job, same pay” industrial relations changes set to wash through the mining sector this year.
The Albanese government’s Same Job, Same Pay laws passed federal parliament late last year, and unions are now organising to ensure their effect is felt at mining sites.
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