The Electrical Trades Union – currently involved in enterprise bargaining negotiations for its members – has released figures which it claims reveal “obscene” payrises for the CEOs of public electricity companies.
According to the ETU, Ergon CEO Ian McLeod received a 10 per cent payrise between 2013 and 2014, taking his annual salary to $895,000.
Energex CEO Terry Effeney received a 19 per cent increase, from $665,000 to $791,000; while Powerlink CEO Merryn York’s salary rose 7 per cent to $711,000.
ETU State Organiser Stuart Traill said his members would be seething.
“Workers across the industry have offered to accept a zero per cent pay increase in exchange for no loss of conditions; this offer was rejected by the companies,” he said.
“Instead each company is proposing to slash conditions and entitlements which will see their 3 per cent pay offers in reality mean a massive loss of real wages and no job security.
“The real workers who are there in the field reconnecting communities and maintaining our essential electricity network are being told they have to tighten their belts and take real cuts to their wages and entitlements.
“Then you see this sort of blatant extravagance.”
