November 9, 2012
The Electrical Trades Union believes recent comments by Premier Campbell Newman at a business lunch show that the State Government plans to “outsource” electricity workers’ jobs to the private sector.
The union believes recent redundancies in the electricity industry – including those at Stanwell and Ergon Energy – are just a precursor to “wholesale contracting out” of electricity jobs.
The union has again called on the State Government to “come clean” about plans for its State-owned assets.
ETU State Assistant Secretary Keith McKenzie said Premier Newman’s comments at a business lunch showed “a complete disrespect for the men and women who work in the electricity industry as well as the public service in general”.
“To say he wants to keep the assets but ‘should the people who do all the work be government employees, that’s a different matter totally’ shows clearly that workers in Queensland are not who the LNP care about,” he said.
“He wants to outsource state electricity jobs. This is SEQEB all over again, he is already sacking over 1800 workers with more to come. This is a disgraceful, ideological attack on hard-working electricity workers – he wants to sell their jobs.
“It is beyond belief that this government wants to outsource jobs that have been performed professionally and proficiently for years to his mates’ companies whose only motivation is profit. It’s a disgrace.
“We can show quite clearly that the cost to the consumer will increase exponentially if private companies are used. We already have evidence of wastage and double-dipping by contractors.”
Footnote: During the 1985 SEQEB dispute, 1100 electricity workers, all members of the ETU employed by the then-South East Queensland Electricity Board, were sacked by the Bjelke-Petersen government and their jobs privatised during a bitter industrial dispute.
