New CFMEU campaign push for Aussie workers to down tools in hot weather

Australian employers fear a CFMEU-backed, hot-weather policy that gets workers to stop work will cause a “nightmare”. VOTE, HAVE YOUR SAY

Employers fear a CFMEU-backed, hot-weather policy that allows workers to down tools will cause a “health and safety nightmare”.

Brisbane tradies would be able to stop work when the mercury hits 28C and humidity reaches 75 per cent, The Australian reports.

Some say the move shows the “stronghold” the Construction Forestry Maritime Mining and Energy Union has on Queensland’s construction industry. More than 100 commercial contractors and subcontractors have agrees to apply the new policy across southeast Queensland, including the major $3.6 billion Queens Wharf project in Brisbane.

An agreement between Multiplex and four unions including the CFMEU mean Queen’s Wharf workers can stop work temporarily if the temperature climbs to 28C and humidity is 75 per cent or higher three hours or more before a shift begins.

There were 13 days across the past year when these weather conditions applied, according the Bureau of Meteorology.

The work site at the Queen’s Wharf development in Brisbane. Picture: Lyndon Mechielsen/The Australian

The details come after the Fair Work Commission approved the Queen’s Wharf agreement, with industry figures saying the four-year deal was based on the CFMEU’s Queensland pattern agreement “but with steroids”.

Estimates by employers show traffic controllers will earn $194,302 a year if they work 10 hours overtime a week on top of the standard 36-hour week. And as well as a $20,800 site allowance, employees can earn $78000 in productivity payments.

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They’re also entitled to 10 days paid family violence leave, 26 rostered days off an 12 per cent superannuation.

Casual employees will be paid a 40 per cent penalty if they are refused a permanent role after six weeks. Pay rises of five per cent a year are also included under the deal.

Employers fear a CFMEU-backed, hot-weather policy that allows workers to down tools will cause a “health and safety nightmare”. Picture: Annette Dew

Master Builders Queensland chief executive Grant Galvin said the hot-weather policy was “ripe for exploitation” by the CFMEU.

“This will create an occupational health and safety nightmare,’’ Mr Galvin said. “It absolutely has the potential to cause more stoppages in Brisbane throughout next year.

“If you applied this provision outside of southeast Queensland, it’s likely that no construction work would get done in a year as Queensland is by nature, hot and humid. If you applied this provision to Darwin in the NT, you wouldn’t work one day in a year.

“When we questioned the logic of limiting this provision to SEQ if it was a genuine health and safety issue, the answer we were given was ‘the workers ­outside SEQ are more used to the higher temperatures and ­humidity, therefore they are at less risk as they know how to manage it’.”

He declined to comment on the Queen’s Wharf agreement.

A senior industry figure, who asked to remain anonymous, told The Australian the agreement showed the “absolute stronghold” the CFMEU had over industry in Queensland.

“Nobody has a problem paying staff well, but no company would willingly pay over $250,000 a year for a carpenter on a 50-hour week with 26 rostered days off every year without being forced to do so with a very big stick, and that stick is the threat of unlawful industrial action.”

Read more at The Australian.

Originally published as New CFMEU campaign push for Aussie workers to down tools in hot weather