Hundreds of maintenance workers at submarine builder ASC have walked off the job in Adelaide for the rest of the week, escalating industrial action over a pay dispute.
About 350 trades and operator support workers stopped work at noon on Wednesday, the Australian Manufacturing Workers Union said, halting maintenance work on the Navy's Collins Class submarines at the government-operated ASC maintenance and sustainment facility.
The protected action at the Osborne Naval Shipyard will continue until next Monday, when union workers will meet to discuss further action.
The union said ASC workers in Western Australia are paid an average 17.5 per cent more than ASC workers in South Australia.
It says the disparity has been ignored during enterprise bargaining negotiations and the latest offer from ASC was seven per cent short of parity, which members of the AMWU and two other unions had rejected.
The unions say they have offered offsets, productivity improvements and cost-saving measures, but they have been ignored by ASC.
Workers were frustrated, AMWU SA assistant state secretary Stuart Gordon said.
“ASC can afford to pay its workers. It just doesn’t want to,” he said.
“The argument it presents about economic and environmental factors is redundant given how the cost of living is affecting South Australians and the essential skills the SA team provides to ASC.”
The federal government has signed a $2.2 billion, four-year deal with ASC to ensure the Collins submarines are operational into the 2030s and beyond, until their replacement by second-hand nuclear-powered Virginia Class submarines purchased from the US under the AUKUS partnership.
The AMWU said the SA workforce would be “critical to the future AUKUS fleet”, with many of the workers seconded to the US for training on the new technology.
The navy has only half its submarines at its disposal with HMAS Sheehan, HMAS Rankin and HMAS Farncomb out of action for the rest of 2024.
Mr Gordon said ASC chief executive Stuart Whiley was “incompetent”.
“He has told the government that there will not be any delays in the boats’ schedule, but those boats are stranded due to the stoppages. Clearly this will continue until workers are paid fairly,” he said.
ASC acknowledged the protected industrial action but said the unions and their members had not informed the company of the duration of the walkout.
"To date, multiple offers have been presented to the unions and their members by ASC to achieve a resolution to their ongoing protected industrial action, including to defer to the Fair Work Commission for a judgment," the company said in a statement.
"However, to date, these offers have been rejected. ASC will continue to negotiate with the unions and its workforce in good faith."
