The Maritime Union of Australia (MUA) has indication 10 Australian ports will be engaged in industrial action by Christmas time following a breakdown in talks with Qube Ports.
MUA officials and Qube have been discussing a bargaining process since April 2024, however the parties failed to reach a successful negotiation prior to the expiry of 19 agreements in June.
The MUA says the principal claims it is making are:
- Pay rises to catch up with inflation and protect wharfies’ purchasing power on a ‘same job same pay’ principle.
- Fatigue management rules to prevent the allocation of dangerous work patterns by company managers.
- Roster allocations provided by 12pm the day before a shift instead of the current 4pm allocation.
Deputy National Secretary of the MUA Warren Smith has accused Qube of dragging out the process to trigger intractable bargaining provisions.
“Qube has one clear objective here, which is to trigger intractable bargaining provisions within the industrial relations laws,” Smith says.
“Their end goal is to get an arbitrated outcome which they believe will be better than what they can manage with their own negotiators around the bargaining table.”
The MUA has also said Qube’s profits have increased by 148 per cent during the last four-year employment agreement, however the value of wages paid to the company’s wharf workers has dropped 14 per cent in the same period.
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