BY MELANIE SJOBERG
At an ACTU conference in April unions representing workers employed by BHP decided to put aside demarcation differences to "walk arm-in-arm" against the hard-line industrial moves of BHP.
On May 10 the Construction, Forestry, Mining and Energy Union (CFMEU), Australian Workers Union (AWU), Australian Manufacturing Workers Union (AMWU), Communications, Electrical and Plumbing Union (CEPU), Maritime Union of Australia (MUA) and the Association of Professional Engineers, Scientists and Managers, Australia (APESAMA) launched a "vote no" campaign in an attempt to convince BHP shareholders to oppose the Billiton-BHP merger.
BHP shareholders should vote against the merger with Billiton, argued the unions, in order to send a message that shareholders deserve full information on the merger, that BHP should not be undervalued and that shareholders should have a say over the size of executive salaries. To press their case to shareholders, the unions organised a 1000-strong rally of BHP workers outside the May 18 meeting in Melbourne where shareholders voted in favour of the merger.
The unions even prepared a document, which is littered with corporate accounting jargon, to persuade current BHP shareholders that the merger proposal is not in their best interests. In it, the unions argued that the merger proposal undervalued BHP assets in relation to Billiton and that stock owners' shares might trade at a lower level than Billiton shares after the merger.
A key argument raised by the unions is that there has not been an independent report evaluating the merger and that the new company board will not be adequately accountable for outcomes.
The merger deal also includes a bonus for key executives with some Billiton corporate chiefs being granted 㿞 million. BHP CEO Paul Anderson will reap $3.2 million from the deal and he'll be released from his contract a year early. The unions correctly point out that this is literally a case of running with the money and damn the consequences.
The unions claim that it was necessary for them to take a position on the merger because the BHP work force is a major stakeholder in the company, and therefore has an interest in knowing that any merger decisions are sound and in "Australia's national interest". Tony Maher, president of the CFMEU's mining and energy division, has also revealed that both the CFMEU and the construction workers' superannuation fund, CBUS, own shares in BHP.
However, the union "vote no" campaign fails to offer a solution that could achieve job security for workers. The combined unions proposal does not make any demands upon the existing BHP management or the newly merged BHP-Billiton to adhere to previously-agreed labour standards, collective bargaining or job security.
As a so-called Aussie icon, BHP has, for decades, conducted a systematic attack on working conditions and the right of its workers to bargain collectively through their unions. BHP has been striving to impose individual contracts on workers in the Pilbara region of Western Australia since early 2000. Mineworkers in Queensland and northern NSW have been battling against BHP's demand for new agreements that contain longer working hours and cuts in penalty rates. BHP workers in Newcastle were ruthlessly sacked when the company deemed the steel plant to be no longer profitable enough. In Wollongong, BHP maintenance workers are resisting the contracting out of their jobs.
Last July, BHP announced an enormous $2 billion profit. In May it announced yet another profit increase of $27 million (after tax) for the third quarter. BHP is in an expansionary phase despite the public perception that it closed its Newcastle steel plant and is getting out off steel production because it is in trouble. Financial reports for the May quarter indicate that BHP coal production increased by 25% in Queensland and iron ore production in WA was boosted by more than 10%.
What the unions' strategy fails to understand is that it is irrelevant whether a company is Australian-owned or not because all companies in a capitalist economy force down wages and conditions in order to maximise profits. This will not be countered by appealing to the interests of shareholders, who are among the beneficiaries of profit maximisation.
If the unions were really concerned to ensure that ownership of BHP serves the interests of working people, rather than capitalist shareholders, they should campaign for the company to be nationalised and run by a board made up of publicly elected officers.