Rio Tinto coughs up big time

The Mining and Energy Division of the CFMEU has welcomed the settlement 
last week of two long-running unfair dismissal cases against mining giant 
Rio Tinto. At $25 million, the settlement is the largest in Australia's 
history.

It will apply to 108 coal mineworkers who were unfairly dismissed at the 
Hunter Valley No 1 mine on October 20, 1998, and 82 coal mineworkers 
unfairly dismissed at the Mount Thorley mine on November 17, 1999.

Last week's settlement follows another win by the workers at Blair Athol 
where the Australian Industrial Relations Commission found that in August 
1998 the company used a blacklist to target employees who were union 
officials and activists.

The company had been ordered to reinstate 16 Blair Athol workers and to pay 
them wages for the last three and a half years. It appealed against the 
decision.

The settlement follows sustained industrial action and international 
campaigning by the union.

"It's a great result for the mineworkers and their families who have 
endured years of stress and hardship fighting for their rights", said the 
union's General President Tony Maher.

Mr Maher condemned the Federal Government's industrial laws that make it 
possible for workers to be denied justice for so long.

"Some of these miners and their families have waited over three-and-a-half 
years for justice because of the Howard Government's refusal to introduce 
decent unfair dismissal laws.

In all three cases the workers faced an employer determined to implement 
the changes wrought by the Howard Government's Workplace Relations Act.

The award simplification provisions of the legislation stripped seniority 
clauses covering retrenchments from the award. These award provisions 
reflected over 100 years of the industrial practice of "first to come, last 
to go".

Within weeks of the award changing the company sacked the first group of 
workers at the Blair Athol Mine with little consultation and no agreement.

When the union offered to enter into an agreed procedure for retrenchment 
on a fair and objective basis the company told the union that they could do 
as they wished, because the laws were on their side. Mr Maher said.

The other impact of the legislation was the removal of the capacity for the 
union to bring a mass claim on behalf of its members (s170EA(2)) of the 
Industrial Relations Act 1998).

The union was forced into bringing individual claims for all workers at the 
three sites. That meant 206 cases instead of three.

This made the task of seeking justice all the more difficult when 
considering the filing fees alone were $10,300.

"No other Australian should be put through what these Hunter Valley No 1 
and Mount Thorley workers and their families have had to endure. The Howard 
Government should fix it right now", Mr Maher said.

The win comes as the Government pushes on with its attempts to exempt small 
businesses from unfair dismissal laws. It argues that workers' rights in 
regard to unfair dismissal hinder job growth.

Less than 0.3 percent of small businesses have to deal with unfair 
dismissal claims under federal awards each year. Removing the rights of 
small business employees would affect 3.12 million workers.