Fremantle wharf workers have staged a four-day work stoppage over a pay dispute. The strike, planned by 24 vessel-traffic officers and pilot boat crews, began on Saturday.
The latest action follows a two-day strike at the port earlier this month, as workers push for a pay rise of six per cent annually over three years. Fremantle Ports had offered a 4.75 per cent annual increase over the same time period, a report in the West Australian noted.
On Thursday, prior to the weekend’s strike, Western Australia’s transport minister Troy Buswell told reporters: "If you applied what the union has asked for, it will potentially increase the port’s wage costs by about 53 per cent over the next three years and that’s not sustainable.”
Buswell insisted wharf workers should not have the right to shut down one of Australia’s busiest ports, according to a report published in the Sydney Morning Herald.
"I struggle to understand how the Commonwealth can oversee an industrial relations environment that legally sees 24 people shut down one of Australia’s 10 most busy ports for four days," he said.
Buswell said the problem with the current system is that it does not provide a formalised mechanism to get the independent umpire involved.
"The independent umpire is kept at arm’s length and the party with the greatest leverage can basically extort an outcome out of, in this case, the Fremantle Port Authority," he said.
Image: from an earlier protest at Fremantle Port – May 2011. Image credit: In My Community