Queensland District

The Mining and Energy Union remains determined to give members a say on their future in the Construction Forestry Maritime Mining and Energy Union despite a Federal Court decision today disallowing an initial application for a demerger ballot on technical grounds.

In the July 2022 issue of Common Cause:

Permanent jobs win at Grosvenor

Raw chicken, green calamari and mouldy sandwiches?

Queensland’s new coal royalty regime will not affect international mining investment but will make sure current record prices deliver better returns to regional communities, the Miners Union said today.

Mining and Energy Union President Tony Maher said it was disappointing to see the Japanese Government weigh in on royalties when Japanese mining companies have been profiting from Queensland resources for decades.

Analysis of five coal mining electorates has found a stunning $989 million has been lost from local economic activity due to aggressive wage cutting-strategies by mining companies.

Assertions made by the Minerals Council of Australia this week about rates of permanent mining jobs are misleading and cover up the rampant use of insecure labour hire across the industry, the Mining and Energy Union said today.

ABS figures on rates of casualisation in the mining industry don’t tell the full story because they exclude the large proportion of the workforce employed through labour hire companies.

Mineworkers at AngloAmerican’s Grosvenor underground coal mine are infuriated by the company’s latest tactics to avoid giving them job security, including a Hunger Games-style competition for permanent shirts.

In February, Anglo announced a review of its fully outsourced workforce model at the mine which has recently re-started production after a horror underground explosion. The production workforce at Grosvenor is fully outsourced to labour hire company One Key, leading to a focus on insecure work arrangements at the subsequent inquiry.

Workers at the Kestrel Coal mine near Emerald are urging bosses back to the table to talk fair pay and conditions after voting down a substandard offer that does not secure important conditions in their Enterprise Agreement and locks in pay inequities.

In an overwhelming rejection of the company’s agenda, 97% of employees voted NO to an offer by Kestrel Coal Resources (KCR) for a proposed new Enterprise Agreement (EA).