Rio Tinto's brutal pedigree
By Mick Watson
It is no coincidence that the onslaught on Australian coal miners' rights and conditions is being led by the multinational Rio Tinto.
Rio Tinto is demanding that its unionised work force surrender security of employment and anti-victimisation provisions fought for by generations of mineworkers.
But the Hunter Valley mineworkers can't be bought. Out of a production and engineering work force of 420, only seven have sold out to Rio Tinto.
Historically, Rio Tinto is not used to well-organised and determined workers, like those standing in its way at Hunter Valley No. 1, Vickery and Weipa.
Rio Tinto has dealt with some of the most vicious dictatorships in history. In 1937, during the Spanish Civil War, when Hitler and Mussolini were in an alliance with General Franco to overthrow the democratically elected government, Rio Tinto had mining interests in Spain.
Rio Tinto's chief, Sir Auckland Geddes, made it very clear which side the company was on when he told its 1937 annual general meeting in London: "Since the mining region was occupied by General Franco's forces, there have been no further labour problems ... Miners found guilty of troublemaking are court-martialled and shot."
Rio Tinto prospered from the misery of apartheid in South Africa and moved into Chile in the 1980s after the brutal dictator General Pinochet had overthrown the democratically elected Allende government.
In more recent times, Rio Tinto's involvement in Bougainville has cast a darker shadow over the company. When the PNG government tried to hire foreign mercenaries to retake Rio Tinto's mine from Bougainville separatists, Peter Robinson wrote in his April 6 Sun-Herald column, "And where does CRA-RTZ (now Rio Tinto) ... stand on the whole affair? This is emerging as a deep multinational imbroglio of plot, counterplot and doublecross."
Rio Tinto is obsessed with breaking the Australian trade union movement. It has the Howard government's support in this, but it will find Australian unionists a harder nut to crack than many of its other unfortunate workers who have been brutally subdued by a shameful assortment of dictators.
[Mick Watson is northern district president of the United Mineworkers Federation (CFMEU Mining and Energy Division) in Aberdare, NSW.]