Home

End-date error prompts new enterprise agreement vote for Gold Fields workers

Headshot of Elena Morabito
Elena MorabitoKalgoorlie Miner
Australian Workers’ Union State secretary Brad Gandy.
Camera IconAustralian Workers’ Union State secretary Brad Gandy. Credit: Amber Lilley/Kalgoorlie Miner

A date error in a new enterprise agreement has prompted mining company Gold Fields to conduct a second vote starting on Friday.

The agreement had an erroneous end date — April 30, 2022 instead of April 30, 2026.

The mistake originated from a “copy and paste” error, with elements of the 2018 agreement used as a basis to draft the 2022 version.

“This error was a result of the 2018 agreement being used as a template for the 2022 agreement so that we would retain the form of the wording of the 2018 agreement in order to ensure employees were familiar and comfortable,” a Gold Fields memorandum read.

Get in front of tomorrow's news for FREE

Journalism for the curious Australian across politics, business, culture and opinion.

READ NOW

Gold Fields said a change to the expiry date was “inadvertently overlooked despite being reviewed by numerous people”, but the “good news” was the agreement could be easily fixed by conducting a second employee vote.

The second voting period starts at 7am on Friday and concludes at 7am on Saturday.

The company had previously announced 82 per cent of its workers had taken part in the vote for the new enterprise agreement, with 87 per cent of those employees voting in favour of the deal.

A Gold Fields spokesperson on Thursday told the Kalgoorlie Miner the company was confident the typo would be “swiftly resolved” and the new agreement would be approved.

“We are seeking the support for the change in end-date from our employees as part of this process,” the spokesperson said.

“This is the only clause that needs to be voted on, given the overwhelming vote in support of the new enterprise agreement last month.”

Australian Workers Union State secretary Brad Gandy said in the 22 years he had been working for a union he had never seen a company “make so many mistakes”.

Mr Gandy said the Fair Work Commission should not approve the agreement, with the union arguing the company had not bargained with its employees in good faith.

He said most industrial agreements included an annual cost of living/CPI increase, but the Gold Fields’ agreement did not include set pay increases and would be distributed at the company’s discretion.

“So they want to be the ones to pick and choose who gets what they want. They want to pick and choose what pay procedures goes to what work group, how they’re paid, and when they’re paid,” Mr Gandy said.

He said as Australia’s inflation rate went up by 5.1 per cent, a Gold Fields Australia worker’s wage would potentially go backwards by 5 per cent this year.

“What members are saying is that GFA, which announced a $621 million net profit earlier this year, just isn’t listening to them.”

The Fair Work Commission is set to review the agreement and either give the green light to the mining company or reject the new enterprise agreement.

Get the latest news from thewest.com.au in your inbox.

Sign up for our emails