SYDNEY — Striking workers on the picket line at Etex in Matraville in eastern Sydney told the Militant Aug. 30 they had voted overwhelmingly to reject the company’s new contract offer. The workers, members of the Construction, Forestry and Maritime Employees Union, had been picketing since Aug. 12, alongside electricians at the plant, in the Electrical Trades Union.
Firdous Hameed, one of the CFMEU delegates at Etex, had told this reporter during an earlier visit to the picket line the company wanted “to get rid of the union.” They work in four crews of seven doing 12-hour shifts processing raw gypsum into a powder to make plasterboard. They have a union delegate on each crew, and another in the warehouse. Without the union “it won’t be safe,” he said. Recently workers had suffered three serious hand injuries, all on the night shift.
The company was pushing a two-year deal with wage increases of 4.5% and 4%, Hameed said, while workers want a 6% increase each year for three years to offset the effects of high prices. They also want a “clarification on manning levels.” They currently work on skeleton crews, with workers called in from other shifts on overtime to cover absences.
The Etex strikers also joined thousands of workers protesting in the downtown business district here Aug. 27 over government moves to take over their union.