By Anthony Benbow and Andy Gianniotis
Hundreds of BHP iron ore workers in Western Australia's Pilbara region are to strike for four days in their fight for a collective agreement on wages and working conditions. Workers at Mount Newman voted at a mass meeting on January 12 to strike from January 17 and Port Hedland workers voted on January 13 to stop work from January 19.
BHP has refused to negotiate a new enterprise agreement with the unions, which approached the company in September. In November, BHP announced that individual contracts "were available" and offered bonuses to workers who signed up before the end of the year.
No warning of the contract offers was given. Ten thousand workers from the six unions in BHP's iron ore and steel divisions — the Australian Workers Union (AWU), Australian Manufacturing Workers Union, the Communications, Electrical and Plumbing Union, Construction, Forestry, Mining and Energy Union (CFMEU), Maritime Union of Australia and Transport Workers Union — have since held mass meetings and one-day stoppages in support of the Pilbara workers and against the threat of a similar attack against them. BHP coalminers have discussed similar action.
In the largest single strike, more than 5000 NSW south coast steelworkers and wharfies downed tools on January 13 in defiance of a NSW Industrial Relations Commission order. An Australian IRC strike ban issued on the same day applied from January 18, after strikes in BHP plants at Rooty Hill in Sydney and Westernport in Victoria.
AWU Port Kembla branch president Andrew Whiley told Â鶹´«Ã½ Weekly that the union wanted to send a clear message to BHP that its attack on the right to collectively bargain will be fought. Whiley is worried that if BHP is successful, the government will go further to implement anti-worker legislation and entrench individual contracts.
Whiley acknowledged the AWU's actions contravened secondary boycott legislation prohibiting solidarity action. "We want to show leadership to other labour organisations about how to defend a basic trade union principle", he said.
Pilbara
The unions acknowledge that at least 400 of the 1000 Pilbara BHP workers have signed individual contracts. They argue, however, that this number is not so significant because it includes apprentices forced by the company to sign and workers hoping to boost their pay rate before taking voluntary redundancy.
The contracts offer a significant boost in superannuation and minor improvements in overtime payments, but little immediate gain other than cash payouts for accumulated sick leave. The sting for workers is the contracts' failure to detail work conditions; the agreement says it "is to be read in conjunction with BHP company policy". Workers signing these agreements are signing away their rights to the whims of company management.
That workers have signed the contracts illustrates their inexperience in industrial campaigns — the last major campaign involving the Pilbara BHP workers was more than a decade ago — and the consequences of union defeats at the other Pilbara iron ore mines at Hammersley and Robe River. BHP is trying to exploit divisions among the workers, some of whom have been seeking coverage by the more militant CFMEU, rather than the AWU.
The unions accuse BHP of harassing workers to sign the contracts. The CFMEU's mining division WA district secretary, Gary Wood, told the January 15 Sydney Morning Herald, "Some have been approached eight [to] 12 times about signing an agreement".
The unions have prepared cards for workers to hand to management advising that they only want to be part of the unions' negotiations. BHP has threatened disciplinary action for distribution of the cards and the local radio station has been shut down by BHP for running negative stories about the company.
BHP workers in the Pilbara also fear job cuts. The number of workers at other mines has been cut by as much as half since the mid-1980s.
Support
BHP is certain to continue cost-cutting and the only way workers can ensure job security is by taking united action. A majority of BHP's Pilbara workers remain committed to achieving a collective agreement, and they are getting industrial and legal support from the unions and the ACTU. Wood told Â鶹´«Ã½ Weekly, "If the company does not back down, action is expected to continue".
On December 2, several hundred union members rallied outside BHP's head office in Melbourne, although ACTU senior industrial officer Tony Morison told Â鶹´«Ã½ Weekly the peak body is not calling for such actions. He said messages of support should be sent to the Pilbara workers by fax to (08) 9177 8107, or e-mail <troyburton@hotmail.com>.
Whiley said that the AWU has called for community groups to target the corporate offices of BHP with demonstrations.
The NSW South Coast Labor Council strongly supported the Port Kembla stoppage. The Illawarra Council of Trade Unions secretary, Arthur Rorris, said, "The oldest trick in the book is to convince local workers to stand aside while the company whacks their brothers and sisters everywhere else, before turning to them".