The (Un)Fair Treatment System

The RIO TINTO Campaign site

The (Un)Fair Treatment System

6 August 1999: Rio Tinto claims that one of the reasons it doesn't need (or want) trade unions in its workplaces is that all workers are treated fairly through its Fair Treatment System.

The following is reproduced from the Australian industrial relations newsletter Workforce, (Issue 1226, 10 September 1999)

IRC finds flaws in Rio Tinto's "fair treatment"

The WA IRC (Western Australian Industrial Relations Commission) has criticised Rio Tinto for the way it applied its Fair Treatment dispute resolution system at Hamersley Iron to a fitter who complained about his pay. The man, who was on a WA workplace agreement (individual contract), maintained that rostering changes the company introduced early last year (12 hour shifts and an annualised salary) didn't adequately compensate him for working on public holidays. While he didn't convince the IRC this was the case, he did won sympathy for the way the company handled his grievance. the Fair Treatment System at Hamersley Iron has four stages. Under the first, the employee raises the matter with his/her superintendent; the second involves referring the complaint to the employee's unit manager; the third putting the complaint in writing to the employee's manager; and the final stage taking the complaint to the general manager. If there is still no resolution, the employee can request external arbitration, which happened in this case. Commissioner Sally Cawley had three criticisms of the way the company applied its policy. First, she said, it was only at the final stage that Hamersley "discovered" A$1,500 in the man's pay that related to public holidays worked, suggesting that "management handling the complaint were either ignorant, misled or did not give the issue the attention it deserved". Second, it was "unacceptable" that the man got a variety of answers, some quite irrelevant, at each stage of the process as to why the company considered the system fair. Third, the length of time involved in the internal system - it took almost 11 months to get to the final stage - was "inordinate".

(Text in brackets added.)