BHP finally discovers direct employment works

The Mining and Energy Union says it is ready and willing to support BHP making the same application in Queensland after the company successfully applied to the Fair Work Commission to directly employ almost 140 Operations Services workers at Olympic Dam in South Australia, effectively admitting its Operations Services labour hire rort is finally over. 

Queensland MEU President Mitch Hughes said the union would be more than happy to support BHP finally doing what workers had been calling for from the beginning.

“For as long as Operations Services has existed, we’ve been saying: directly employ the workers doing the job,” Mr Hughes said.

“They built Operations Services specifically to get around established site agreements and drive down standards,” Mr Hughes said.

“For years they told everyone this model was essential to their business.

“Now suddenly they’re in the Fair Work Commission claiming they need relief from the ‘complexity’ of having workers on different agreements and the ‘disharmony’ caused by people doing the same job on different pay.

“Well, we are more than happy to help get that same application rolling in Queensland.”

BHP’s application comes after years of union campaigns, court battles and Same Job Same Pay orders that exposed the company’s labour hire structure for exactly what it was.

“They are trying to pretend this is some administrative clean-up exercise instead of the direct result of workers fighting back and winning,” Mr Hughes said.

“Operations Services was a disgraceful wage theft model from day one.

“They never should have created it.”

Mr Hughes said Queensland OS workers should be directly employed without further delay.

“If BHP now admits having workers doing the same job on different wages creates problems, then stop wasting everyone’s time and directly employ Queensland OS workers too,” he said.

“If they’re prepared to get that application in soon, we promise not to even mention that it took the High Court throwing out their appeal before they decided that maybe they’d try just doing the right thing.”