By Jonathan Strauss
and Geoff Spencer
PERTH — Unions in WA face further attacks on their rights and membership and the threat of a $48 million damages claim following the recent strike by 2200 workers at Hamersley Iron sites in the Pilbara.
After the workers returned to work, non-unionists and strikebreakers remained on the sites, and the company issued writs against the four unions, four union officials and 10 union conveners.
Green Left spoke to Neil Flynn, the acting state secretary of the Construction, Mining and Energy Union in WA, and Dave McIntyre, assistant secretary of the CMEU's mining division, about the union's concerns.
McIntyre explained that the dispute started when a non-unionist was found to be working in the mine at Tom Price.
He thought that the company had not conspired to start the dispute. But once it began, it "offered overtime in order to entice people to work ... It sent a clear message to us that the company was out to give us a rough time."
Support for the action was strong. "Given that the issue was the closed shop, I was surprised to see the level of support", McIntyre said. "We also had meetings of wives across the three sites.A resolution was put of support for the striking workers, and there was only one who voted against."
Workers were conscious of the importance of strong union organisation. The example of Robe River, where wage increases continually lag behind other Pilbara mine sites, "was raised at a number of
meetings by the rank and file, who have seen what happens to a work force that doesn't speak with one voice", McIntyre said.
After the return to work, the company mobilised the courts against the unions and advised the strikebreakers, members of the AWU, on resigning from the union. The issuing of writs against union conveners on the work sites particularly incensed the members. Workers were willing to move into action again on this, McIntyre suggested.
This is despite a Supreme Court injunction preventing industrial action on the closed shop. Mass meetings have been held to discuss the injunctions.
Unions involved in the dispute want the Industrial Relations Act changed. McIntyre pointed out that it meant that anyone with grudge could cause a dispute by refusing to join a union where a closed shop was maintained.
Flynn identified isolation, politically and in the union movement, as the main problem for unions which sought to campaign in defence of members' interest.
The WA CMEU earlier this year disaffiliated from the ALP. "There needs to be a new political voice for workers. The ALP isn't this and it can't be reformed", said Flynn.
The refusal of the WA Labor government to act during the dispute (which may be compared with Tasmanian Liberal Premier Ray Groom's expressions of opposition to company tactics in the APPM dispute) or to amend the Industrial Relations Act was a further example of this.
The CMEU had a role to play in forming a new political voice for workers, he said, but he was not optimistic about the immediate prospects,
because it needed "a catalyst for workers to rally around".
Peak union bodies such as the WA TLC and the ACTU were too closely tied to ALP governments, he explained. "The ACTU is central to making the system run", Flynn said.
Its leadership dampened down struggle and made out that there was nothing wrong. It censored views in the union movement opposed to its Accord politics, did not speak in terms of class politics and isolated and attacked any union that attempted to break out of this regime.
Flynn suggested that conditions for union struggles might change under a Liberal government, though, because its attacks would be more direct than those of the ALP, and it would not have the ACTU acting as managers of the system. "The ACTU will present itself as an opposition. There will be some attempt at organised resistance."
The activities of unions themselves were vital to breaking isolation. "I see unions and the way they organise themselves as an issue ... They've never been active in terms of reaching out to people. We just don't touch the community in the way we should. We should accept some of the responsibility", Flynn said.