4 July, 2011
The Australian Workers’ Union (AWU) won a definitive judgment from Fair Work Australia on 24 June that grants the union right of entry to lunch rooms at Rio Tinto’s Alcan aluminum smelter in Bell Bay, Tasmania. The ruling ends months of legal wrangling and should serve as a precedent against employers from blocking legitimate union access to workers on job sites.
On 1 July, marking the second anniversary of the Fair Work Act of 2009, which makes such access legitimate, AWU National Secretary Paul Howes and three AWU organizers triumphantly met with AWU members in lunch rooms at Alcan’s Bell Bay smelter, breaking Rio Tinto’s claim that such meetings had to in administrative areas, generally parts of worksites where surveillance and management intimidation is greater.
The 550-worker Alcan smelter has been a test case in Australia over right of entry under a balanced Fair Work Act, a law that reversed many of the management rights provisions in the former Conservative government’s WorkChoices Act. (See prior ICEM Bell Bay article here.) It also stands as a major crossing of a threshold that will lead to full enterprise bargaining between AWU and Alcan.
The AWU, which counts a majority of Alcan workers at Bell Bay as members, also used this Fair Work Australia decision to re-boot an advertising campaign aimed at recruitment of non-union Rio workers to the union fold. The ad campaign, which first ran in March, states that process operators at other, unionized Australian aluminum plants, namely Alcoa’s, are paid up to A$20,000 per year more than operators at Bell Bay.
The AWU said it would use the decision to meet union members in similar surroundings at Alcan worksites in Gladstone (Boyne Island) and Yarwun, Queensland.
Paul Howes
“Make no mistake, the bullies at Rio Tinto are losing the stranglehold they once had over their workforce,” said Howes in an Australian newspaper report. “The decision is highly symbolic of that, and I know it will be a crushing embarrassment for the company.”
That decision, FWA Case 3878, found Alcan’s insistence on a conference room inside an administration building was not reasonable. It stated such meetings there meant workers had to travel 8-15 minutes longer from work stations, and this was insufficient time to meet with AWU representatives during average break times.
Fair Work Australia’s ruling also rejected Alcan’s claim that the meal rooms closer to work areas were too small for such lawful meetings under the Fair Work Act and that worker-union discussions would disrupt other workers in the break areas.
Rio Tinto Alcan said it disagrees with the decision, but this time will not appeal the Bell Bay right of entry ruling. The company said the AWU had made some 20 visits to meet with union members in conference rooms, and it made note of the fact that the 24 June ruling had found that the company did not intimidate or hinder workers from meeting with the AWU in the conference rooms.
Australian Council of Trade Unions (ACTU) Secretary Jeff Lawrence said the Bell Bay decision “sends a positive message to other employers that they must respect fundamental workers’ rights to collective bargaining and union membership.”