Rio Brief 1 - Sth Africa conf.

Construction, Forestry, Mining & Energy Union

Briefing Paper No 1 - for South Africa Conference February 1998

RIO TINTO - AUSTRALIAN WORKERS

Rio Tinto is the world's largest private mining company operating over sixty mines and plants in more than forty countries. Within Australia, its activities involve coal, diamond, bauxite and iron ore and alumiminium smelting.

In recent years Rio Tinto has promoted an aggressive `de-unionisation' policy across all its operations. In Australia it has been successful in implementing this policy in some of its operations, as at the Hammersley iron ore mine in WA. However, this policy is meeting with strong resistance in the coal mines where the CFMEU and other unions are campaigning to keep the right of workers to belong to unions - and their right to collective bargaining - intact.

Rio Tinto has employed a number of tactics to force workers onto individual contracts, rather than having them covered by awards or enterprise agreements. Having workers on individual contracts gives the company total control over the pay and working conditions and the right to hire and fire at will without recourse to negotiation. Without union cover, those workers on individual contracts are on their own in negotiating their pay and conditions with a major multinational corporation - a patently unequal and unfair situation.

In an effort to implement its agenda, Rio Tinto has attempted to force through redundancies and overturn enterprise agreements and agreed working arrangements in some coal mines, as has happened at the Hunter Valley No. 1 and Mt. Thorley mines in NSW. In the main, the company has claimed that it is seeking change in order to improve productivity and profits. However, Rio Tinto has also conceded that many of the changes it is making are not related to improving performance but simply an `exercise' in management prerogative. Such actions do not recognise the workers rights or needs as key stakeholders in the company's operations, but instead treat them like any other `resource.'

The CMFEU and other unions in the mining sector enjoy more stable and productive relationships with other companies. At the Blackwater mine in Queensland, the union has successfully negotiated changed working conditions with BHP - a move which met the needs of the company and the workers - and has increased productivity. Rio Tinto has shown no interest in forming a cooperative and productive relationship with the unions representing its workforce.

The need for workers to be in a union is recognised and promoted in an number of international conventions, to which Australia is a signatory. The charter and the convention of the UN's International Labour Organisation both recognise this right. Indeed, the Universal Declaration of Human Rights states “Everyone has the right to form and to join trade unions for the protection of his/her interests.” (Article 23).

The trade union movement in Australia is not alone in condemning Rio Tinto. The company has been criticised by human rights groups, aid agencies, community and environmental organisations over its neglect of human rights and environmental protection at many of its operations within Australia and overseas.

Further information: Peter Colley (+61) 0417 992 995