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23 August, 2005ICEM News release No. 43/1999
Rio Tinto, the world's biggest mining company, has suffered a major set-back in its efforts to remove trade unions and union-negotiated agreements from its Australian workplaces.
The Australian Industrial Relations Commission yesterday turned down the company's application to terminate a certified collective agreement with the Australian miners' union, the CFMEU, at its Mount Thorley mine.
Rio Tinto wanted to scrap the agreement so that it could force wages and conditions down to the level of the "safety net award". It would then have been in a stronger position to oblige the workers to accept increases in working hours and loss of conditions if they wanted to get back to anything like their previous wage levels.
In this case, the commission said that it was not in the public interest to allow the company to act in such a unilateral manner, and that the parties should bargain cooperatively.
This is an implied criticism of legislative changes brought in recently by Australia's right-wing federal government. The amendments enable employers to terminate expired agreements unilaterally.
But if justice has been served in the Mount Thorley case, the law is looking more and more of an ass over another flashpoint within Rio Tinto's troubled Australian operations.
On 2 August, the Industrial Relations Commission refused to correct a legal error in its previous ruling on a dispute at Rio Tinto's Gordonstone mine.
The Australian Federal Court had found that the commission erred in law in denying the illegally sacked Gordonstone miners preference of employment. But the commission has now rejected the CFMEU's appeal that it undo the damage its error created. To correct its own mistake would, the commission ruled, be "against the public interest".
"This is a staggering claim," the CFMEU commented. "How can it be 'against the public interest' to right a wrong?"
A valid question, because the commission's refusal means that Rio Tinto will still not have to reinstate the miners who were illegally dismissed by the mine's previous owners and were never rehired by Rio Tinto. Nonetheless, the CFMEU will be continuing to press for the sacked miners to be given first option on jobs that become available at Gordonstone from now on.
But in the meantime, Gordonstone is worth just one Australian dollar.
On paper, at least.
As the CFMEU revealed on 28 July, Rio Tinto is now operating the $ 400 million Gordonstone mine through a "shelf company" registered as Kestrel Coal Pty Ltd. Kestrel is a $1 company with just one share, held by a certain Erin Feros in Brisbane.
The shareholder is outnumbered two to one by Kestrel's directors, Brian Frederick Horwood and Colin Stuart Marshall. They are both also directors of Pacific Coal Pty Ltd, which is a Rio Tinto subsidiary.
Pacific Coal is the real operator of Gordonstone. Or, as Rio Tinto would now say, of Kestrel. For good measure, the company has also renamed the mine.
So what prompted these bizarre changes?
"This one-dollar company is the employer of the workforce," explains CFMEU National Vice-President Reg Coates. "The whole scheme has been structured so that Rio Tinto will have no liability in the event of any problems.
"Rio Tinto is pulling a fast one here," Coates says. "The Federal Government has promised to clamp down on shonky corporate business practices - now what is it going to do about Rio Tinto?"
The Australian Industrial Relations Commission yesterday turned down the company's application to terminate a certified collective agreement with the Australian miners' union, the CFMEU, at its Mount Thorley mine.
Rio Tinto wanted to scrap the agreement so that it could force wages and conditions down to the level of the "safety net award". It would then have been in a stronger position to oblige the workers to accept increases in working hours and loss of conditions if they wanted to get back to anything like their previous wage levels.
In this case, the commission said that it was not in the public interest to allow the company to act in such a unilateral manner, and that the parties should bargain cooperatively.
This is an implied criticism of legislative changes brought in recently by Australia's right-wing federal government. The amendments enable employers to terminate expired agreements unilaterally.
But if justice has been served in the Mount Thorley case, the law is looking more and more of an ass over another flashpoint within Rio Tinto's troubled Australian operations.
On 2 August, the Industrial Relations Commission refused to correct a legal error in its previous ruling on a dispute at Rio Tinto's Gordonstone mine.
The Australian Federal Court had found that the commission erred in law in denying the illegally sacked Gordonstone miners preference of employment. But the commission has now rejected the CFMEU's appeal that it undo the damage its error created. To correct its own mistake would, the commission ruled, be "against the public interest".
"This is a staggering claim," the CFMEU commented. "How can it be 'against the public interest' to right a wrong?"
A valid question, because the commission's refusal means that Rio Tinto will still not have to reinstate the miners who were illegally dismissed by the mine's previous owners and were never rehired by Rio Tinto. Nonetheless, the CFMEU will be continuing to press for the sacked miners to be given first option on jobs that become available at Gordonstone from now on.
But in the meantime, Gordonstone is worth just one Australian dollar.
On paper, at least.
As the CFMEU revealed on 28 July, Rio Tinto is now operating the $ 400 million Gordonstone mine through a "shelf company" registered as Kestrel Coal Pty Ltd. Kestrel is a $1 company with just one share, held by a certain Erin Feros in Brisbane.
The shareholder is outnumbered two to one by Kestrel's directors, Brian Frederick Horwood and Colin Stuart Marshall. They are both also directors of Pacific Coal Pty Ltd, which is a Rio Tinto subsidiary.
Pacific Coal is the real operator of Gordonstone. Or, as Rio Tinto would now say, of Kestrel. For good measure, the company has also renamed the mine.
So what prompted these bizarre changes?
"This one-dollar company is the employer of the workforce," explains CFMEU National Vice-President Reg Coates. "The whole scheme has been structured so that Rio Tinto will have no liability in the event of any problems.
"Rio Tinto is pulling a fast one here," Coates says. "The Federal Government has promised to clamp down on shonky corporate business practices - now what is it going to do about Rio Tinto?"