Patrick Terminals announced, in the early evening of Tuesday 26 October 2021, that it has lodged an application with the industrial umpire, the Fair Work Commission, to terminate its enterprise agreement with the Maritime Union of Australia.
The agreement is no longer fit for purpose, as it contains a number of operational restrictions that have limited the ability of Patrick to meet customer requirements at a time of congestion in global supply chains, the container terminal operator said.
Patrick has been negotiating with its employees and the MUA since February 2020 to seek to address these restrictions and has held more than 70 meetings in pursuit of a new enterprise agreement. The MUA has launched more than 220 industrial actions against Patrick Terminals nationally during the negotiation period. This has intensified recently with further action launched at all four of Patrick’s terminals in Sydney, Melbourne, Brisbane and Fremantle for the coming days and weeks.
Michael Jovicic, CEO Patrick Terminals said, “Enough is enough. We have presented the MUA with an attractive national offer on top of their already very generous agreement including a 10% pay increase across four years coupled with protections addressing concerns over the use of casuals and job security. Negotiations have been ongoing for close to two years and frankly there seems to be no agreement to be had, particularly in Sydney, where the union is still demanding we hire from a selected list of family and friends.
Terminating the agreement will allow Patrick to recruit and train employees without needing the agreement of the Union and remove any “friends and family” Union imposed restrictions, the company said in a statement.
Patrick Terminals has guaranteed not to change leave entitlements, salaries and other rates of pay that are applicable under the Enterprise Agreement for employees for a period of 6 months from the date of any termination order. It has also requested an expedited hearing from the Fair Work Commission.
Consequences of termination
- the Enterprise Agreement would cease to cover or apply to Patrick, and to 1081 stevedoring employees
- the Stevedoring Industry Award 2020 would apply to them instead
- Patrick would be able to
- hire additional employees without agreement from the union
- determine the composition of its workforce, with the agreement of the union
- make changes to rosters without the agreement of the union
- avoid a significant accumulation of unworked hours that have been paid for in annual salaries
- enable a “more effective” recovery of hours where unworked hours have been accumulated by e.g. requiring employees to work those hours
- recruiting a person for a job regardless of union affiliation or association
- select employees for training and promotion based on merit instead of using mechanistic selection criteria that focus on length of service
- being able to select for redundancy, where necessary, based on the needs of the business
- remove complex “order of pick” rules that restrict Patrick from allocating to meet operational needs
- remove minimum manning clauses, which the company says are really union vetos on headcount
- remove clauses that make the implementation of new technology and operational difficult or delayed
- choose a income protection insurance provider rather than being forced to use a union-affiliated and mandated provider
- remove from the enterprise agreement matters that should be subject to corporate policy for example, provision of Foxtel, gym allowances, tea and coffee, grills, lounges and recliner seats
Patrick argues that the termination would enable it to operate more efficiently, with benefits for all participants in the import / export supply chain that depend on container stevedoring.
As previously reported (see below), the average Patrick-employed wharfie works 179 days a year in return for an annual salary of $160,879. By way of comparison, a person who works 9-5 Monday to Friday in Australia will typically work 233 days a year. The median income from employment in Australia is just under AUD$51,000.
Patrick has offered the following to the MUA over the past 12 months:
• 2.5% year on year increase for four years
• Guaranteed job security with no forced redundancies
• Commitment to preserving jobs with a focus on permanent roles
• Caps on usage of casual labour
Further reading
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