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Speaker 1: It is being reported that workers for the maintenance contractor

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Speaker 1: at Impex are striking. Joining us on the line right

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Speaker 1: now from the ETU.

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Speaker 2: Dave Hayes, also known as Strawbs Ghetto.

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Speaker 3: Strawbs, Good morning, Coatie, has things.

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Speaker 2: Not too bad? What's going on out there?

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Speaker 3: So o, Katie, Look, we've been negotiating an enterprise bargaining

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Speaker 3: agreement with Trace broad Spectrum, who are a contractor out

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Speaker 3: here that performed the majority of the maintenance works on

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Speaker 3: the Impex plant. We've been in negotiations for about ten

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Speaker 3: months now with the company and just in the last

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Speaker 3: few days these negotiations have stalled. So the workforce, as

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Speaker 3: they can as they can under the APP have decided

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Speaker 3: to take detective industrial action today to try and move

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Speaker 3: forward in the bargaining process.

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Speaker 1: And so what exactly are you concerned about or what

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Speaker 1: are you trying to bargain for?

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Speaker 3: So the enterprise, the original enterprise agreement in place on

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Speaker 3: this plant was done in two thousand and seven AM

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Speaker 3: for the maintenance contract. That we say that agreement did

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Speaker 3: not reflect the wages and additions and how people were

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Speaker 3: employed out here at the plant. So we've worked quite

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Speaker 3: extensively and amicably with the company for quite some time

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Speaker 3: to get an agreement together that actually reflects our everyone's employed,

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Speaker 3: that recognizes the skills and the responsibilities that the trades

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Speaker 3: people out here have working on a major hazard facility.

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Speaker 3: We've done quite well so far. We've had two the

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Speaker 3: agreement's gone out the vote twice, the proposed agreement which

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Speaker 3: has been unanically and knocked back by the workforce, and

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Speaker 3: we're at a stage where we're down to the final

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Speaker 3: few items that we're trying to negotiate to secure a package.

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Speaker 3: And obviously the final few items have costs that are

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Speaker 3: attracted to them, and these are the ones that are

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Speaker 3: seeming to be very hard to get over the line.

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Speaker 2: Are you able to tell us what those final few

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Speaker 2: items are.

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Speaker 3: Yeah, absolutely so. We're looking at things around the paid

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Speaker 3: breaks scenarios. So when you look at these gas plants

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Speaker 3: and how they're situated, people go out to work, they

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Speaker 3: stay there all day and work, and we believe they

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Speaker 3: should be paid for their time actually out on the facility. Currently,

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Speaker 3: they don't have their brakes paid and that's something that

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Speaker 3: is common in the industry and something we're trying to

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Speaker 3: achieve for this workforce. We've got annually even personal over

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Speaker 3: ceruls at the rostered rates to pay, which is something

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Speaker 3: that is also in a shift working industry, which is

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Speaker 3: quite common, which they don't receive. Now we've got a

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Speaker 3: number of different allowances that we're still trying to secure

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Speaker 3: in relation and that ties into the classifications for the

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Speaker 3: workforce and ensuring that they are paid and recognized for

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Speaker 3: what they do in their given roles. Got a couple

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Speaker 3: of smaller things but still important things that like pandemic

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Speaker 3: leave which is quite a hot topic at the moment,

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Speaker 3: rdos from Monday to Friday workers and a few other

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Speaker 3: bits and pieces. So we've come down to the the

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Speaker 3: business end of negotiations and we need the company to

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Speaker 3: come forward and you know, let's secure some conditions. We've

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Speaker 3: still got some room to move, we believe around some

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Speaker 3: items and we think we can we can get there

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Speaker 3: and get a good outcome for this entirely local workforce.

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Speaker 3: Get a four year agreement in place for them, which

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Speaker 3: both helps the company with their contract, which secures the

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Speaker 3: wages of conditions for the workforce for the next four

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Speaker 3: years out on the plant, and in so as we

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Speaker 3: keep these people in Darwin. This highly skilled labor, and

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Speaker 3: they don't head off to other gas plants to work

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Speaker 3: at which currently attract between ten and twenty percent higher

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Speaker 3: wages than the poor cousins here in Darwin.

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Speaker 1: I was going to say, Straves, I know that there'll

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Speaker 1: be some people listening, and I've got to ask you

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Speaker 1: know they'll be listening saying are you just being greedy here?

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Speaker 3: No, what we're looking at We've looked at the industry

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Speaker 3: as a whole. So if you take, for example, glad

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Speaker 3: them the gas plants over there Western Australia, the gas

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Speaker 3: plants over there industry which has absolutely developed over the

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Speaker 3: last ten or twelve years, and with this new facility

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Speaker 3: being operated here in Darwin. The original agreement was well

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Speaker 3: and truly substandard and the industry, the industry rates of

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Speaker 3: what we want to see afforded to these people here

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Speaker 3: who work on what is an absolutely dangerous environment and

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Speaker 3: the responsibilities they have on a daily basis to do

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Speaker 3: their job correctly to avoid any incidents out here. We

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Speaker 3: need that recognized and rewarded as it is in the

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Speaker 3: rest of the industry.

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Speaker 2: How many people have you got out there today striking?

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Speaker 3: So we've got a couple of shifts off this morning.

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Speaker 3: That this action affects one hundred and eighty odd employees

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Speaker 3: or the trace operation. There's three unions involved, which is

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Speaker 3: the ETU, the AMW and the AW. We have coverage

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Speaker 3: across all the different whether it be mechanical, electrical, crane

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Speaker 3: scaff oighting. So we've got a couple of shifts out

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Speaker 3: this morning. Obviously there's not one hundred and eighty people

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Speaker 3: working out here at one time, but we've had a

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Speaker 3: great turn up of close to one hundred of the

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Speaker 3: workforce this morning as some of the guys who are

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Speaker 3: on ship or sorry the workers who are on shift

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Speaker 3: have come out of the gate stop work this morning.

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Speaker 1: How long are you going to continue this stop work

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Speaker 1: action for?

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Speaker 3: Well, we're putting stoppages for today which will roll through

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Speaker 3: the day. We hope to speak to the company this afternoon.

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Speaker 3: We have got a planned bargaining meeting for tomorrow afternoon

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Speaker 3: which we want to get back to the table to

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Speaker 3: them with so we expect to have conversations with the

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Speaker 3: company in relation to that. We also have another quite

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Speaker 3: another array of options in relation to industrial action we

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Speaker 3: can take and some of them the people remain on

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Speaker 3: site and they can have bands on equipment that they

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Speaker 3: use and things like that. So at this point in time,

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Speaker 3: we just need to look at how the day plays out.

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Speaker 3: Hopefully get back to the table tomorrow and we'll see

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Speaker 3: how we go.

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Speaker 1: What impact is this having out there in terms of

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Speaker 1: you know, work being able to get underway or be underway.

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Speaker 1: Is it totally stopping things from happening?

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Speaker 3: So the impacts employees themselves would still be at work

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Speaker 3: operating the plant. This workforce, you know, substitute or probably

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Speaker 3: another full workforce that help impacts with anything. If there

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Speaker 3: was breakdowns or things like that that happened today that

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Speaker 3: would cause them a fair bit of drama or say,

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Speaker 3: but the plant can operate safely with the impacts employees

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Speaker 3: operating it. And part of our actions is to recognize

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Speaker 3: that if there is safety concerns that our workforce be

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Speaker 3: available if needed to keep the plant operating in a

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Speaker 3: stay with fashion.

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Speaker 1: Well strabes, we are going to have to leave it there.

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Speaker 1: Please let us know how things progress and no doubt

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Speaker 1: we'll talk to you a get in the near future.

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Speaker 3: Thanks for your interest, Coatie, Thank you.

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Speaker 2: That is the ETU there, Dave Hayes, and as

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Speaker 1: You've just heard close to one hundred employees have seen

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Speaker 1: out there striking at the moment or taking that stop

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Speaker 1: work action