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15 November, 2010
ICEM Australian affiliate Construction, Forestry, Mining, and Construction Union (CFMEU) won a precedent-setting case last week before the full judicial panel of Fair Work Australia. The matter involves global mining house Xstrata’s redundancies at the Ulan coal mine near Mudgee, New South Wales, and whether or not those sackings were “genuine redundancies,” or if the employer had first to deliver alternative jobs at other company enterprises.
On 12 November, the full bench of Fair Work Australia rejected an Xstrata appeal and ruled that the company had an obligation not just to make vacancies at other company enterprises known to the dismissed workers, but to offer positions and facilitate transfer to those worksites.
In effect, the ruling establishes concise guidelines regarding “genuine redundancies” and ensures that employers can be held liable if they do not fully offer and then redeploy sacked workers in all reasonable circumstances.
In 2009, Xstrata Coal Pty. Ltd. made redundant over 100 workers at its 500-worker Ulan mine. The CFMEU claimed the company would replace many of those workers with contract employees. Last week’s ruling covers six of ten miners whose rights, under Australia’s new labour statute, were violated because the dismissals were not “genuine redundancies” since their jobs were still being performed.
The other four were found not to have reasonable redeployment options due to light-work injury status or unwillingness to travel.
Last week’s full bench ruling stated: “Where an employer decides that, rather than fill a vacancy by redeploying an employee into a suitable job in its own enterprise, it will advertise the vacancy and require the employee to compete with other applicants, it might subsequently be found that the resulting dismissal is not a case of genuine redundancy. This is because it would have been reasonable to redeploy the employee into the vacancy.”