Unions slam BHP chairman’s pay rise days after announcing Pilbara job cuts

Mining giant BHP has come under fire from one of the workers associations it is currently in an industrial relations dispute with after the Electrical Trade Union accused the Big Australian of endorsing a board pay rise days after announcing job cuts at its Pilbara iron ore sites.

This week BHP held its annual general meeting where shareholders voted for several resolutions, including the adoption of the company’s remuneration report, which passed with a majority of more than 98 per cent.

Included in the report was a recommendation to increase the base payments for the group chair to US$1,058,200 and for board members to US$193,000.

It comes after the miner announced last week that as many as 300 jobs will be impacted by a round of redundancies at BHP’s Pilbara mine sites.

Last week a BHP spokesperson confirmed the job cuts at its South Flank, Mining Area C, Newman and Jimblebar operations, and said the company regularly reviewed how it could operate “safely, effectively and productively”.

ETU WA secretary Adam Woodage said the decision to inflate board pay packets only days after announcing a decision to eliminate 300 positions in mining operations was an affront to decency.

“People working on the ground in the Pilbara made a sizable chunk of BHP’s $15 billion dollar profit last year,” he said.

“The company has decided it will reward 300 of them with unemployment.

“Members of the board of directors moved a total of zero tonnes of iron ore last year.

“The company has decided they need a 10 per cent increase – one that puts the chair of the board on more than $1.5 million as a base.”

A BHP spokesperson said the company regularly reviews how it works to ensure it can operate safely, effectively and productively.

“We are making some changes to ensure our WA iron ore business can continue to make a significant contribution to the Pilbara and WA and continue to be a major employer in the State,” the spokesperson said.

“As we always do, we will seek to redeploy people into other roles elsewhere in the business where possible. We will be working directly with our people on what this change means for them.”

Woodage said wages and conditions at BHP’s iron ore operations have gone backwards against CPI and against the market for more than a decade.

“Electricians can make more working in construction in Perth and see their family every night,” he said.

“It seems like in BHP-land, there is one rule for board directors, and another for working people.

“This is further evidence of a company that has lost its way, forgotten its values and abandoned the workers who have delivered it record profits.”

The iron ore company and workers from the Combined Ports Unions, made up of members from the Electrical Trades Union, the Australian Manufacturing Workers’ Union and the Western Mine Workers Alliance, are currently involved in a pay dispute that led to multiple strike action in Port Hedland earlier this year.

The historic action centres around wage discrepancies among the current workforce, with the unions voting for protected industrial action.