The Offshore Alliance and the ETU have notified Chevron that it will hit its Gorgon and Wheatstone LNG facilities with rolling stoppages and work bans from next Thursday, with the unions deriding its decision to put an unsupported deal to a vote tomorrow.
Woodside has narrowly averted impending industrial action at its North West Shelf gas platforms after reaching an in-principle deal endorsed by Offshore Alliance and ETU members this morning, while protected action ballots at Chevron are set to close today.
The Offshore Alliance and the ETU say they will hit Woodside's North West Shelf gas platforms with industrial action as early as Saturday if a bargaining meeting this week disappoints workers, as the threat of broader strikes loom.
Unions are calling on Chevron's Gorgon and Wheatstone workers to again reject a unilateral agreement offer and instead "lock in behind a 100% 'yes' vote" for industrial action, as offshore workers join their onshore colleagues in considering strikes at key LNG facilities.
Workers employed by major hydrocarbons producer Woodside have overwhelmingly endorsed protected action at three key gas platforms off WA's north-west coast.
Chevron's directly-employed workforce on its Wheatstone offshore LNG platforms has overwhelmingly rejected a non-union deal in a ballot that closed last week, according to the Offshore Alliance.
The FWC has refused to suspend engineers' industrial action at a Virgin Australia subsidiary while their employer pursues an intractable bargaining declaration, in an early test of the new Secure Jobs provision.
The MUA says crew working on ships servicing key offshore gas operations have stopped protected action over their workplace compensation arrangements, but maritime employers have warned the struggle to find insurers is an industry-wide problem.
A leading labour law academic has told an IR conference that expanding the FWC's power to arbitrate agreement negotiations will be "the single biggest challenge" posed by the Secure Jobs changes, while the head of a peak state employer group's law firm says it is the "Damoclesean threat of the sword" that will bring people to the table.
Tugboat operator Svitzer Australia has withdrawn its long-running application to terminate its national enterprise agreement, saying it will focus instead on continuing negotiations with three maritime unions on a new deal.
