Patrick Terminals has confirmed that an agreement has been reached with the Maritime Union of Australia (MUA) for a new 4-year enterprise agreement, ending two years of fraught negotiations and waterfront disruption.
The workplace deal ends a two-year saga between the MUA and Australia’s four major terminal operators and follows deals already agreed with VICT, Hutchison and DP World.
Patrick chief executive Michael Jovicic and MUA national secretary Paddy Crumlin reached the 11th hour deal just days before the stevedore’s application to terminate the union’s old agreement and send workers back to the award minimum was due to be heard on Monday.
According to the Australian Financial Review, Patrick was able to end the MUA’s “friends and family” hiring veto, allowing it to hire without approval from the union. However, MUA national assistant secretary Jamie Newlyn said the new agreement would deliver pay increases above industry standards, job security assurances and “fairness and dignity for hard-working members”.
The agreement features a 4% rise in the first year, followed by pay rises of 2.5% a year or CPI, whichever is higher, for the next three years until 2025. The CPI-linked pay rise will probably result in annual pay rises climbing further, given the Reserve Bank forecasts inflation to reach 3.25% at the end of this year and 2.75% for the next three years.
Prior to negotiation, Patrick could not recruit new employees unless it had the union’s agreement. Under the in-principle deal, Patrick says all employment is now fully at its discretion, and it can recruit when it wants as per business needs without any approval by the union.
The in-principle agreement will now need to be voted on by the MUA members before being ratified by the Fair Work Commission. In a statement yesterday, Patrick Terminals said it looks forward to the endorsement of the agreement by the MUA members and four years of industrial stability on our waterfront.
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