Hi all
Haven't posted on forum for a while - but enjoyed catching up on everyone's thoughts/posts from time to time.
Thought I'd share this one from today's AFR - while sounds quite innocuous at first pass, I think this could actually have significant positive ramifications from MRM both immediately and going forwards.
http://www.copyright link/news/poli...tback-for-turnbull-government-20160831-gr5oab
Keep in mind one of MRM's biggest issues is it plays all above board using all Australian MUA crew on its boats in Australian waters & surrounds, who are quite expensive relative by global standards & compared to labour from other countries . Number of competitors use foreign labour, have been ordered to cease immediately, or pay them the full Australian awards.
This could be a huge for MRM in the short-medium term.
Interesting times - life on the high seas.
- Aug 31 2016 at 5:59 PM
- Updated Aug 31 2016 at 6:36 PM
High Court ruling 'first setback' for Turnbull government
- A High Court ruling to invalidate an exemption of non-Australian workers from the visa zone will affect the offshore resources sector, including Chevron's Wheatstone LNG project. Supplied
The High Court has delivered what the maritime union is calling the "first big setback" for the Turnbull government since the election, ruling that foreign workers in the offshore resources industry are not excluded from visa requirements and minimum work conditions.
The unanimous ruling, which immediately affects crews supplying billion-dollar LNG projects Ichthys, Wheatstone and Browse, reverses what business says is a long-term and standard practice of excluding non-citizens on vessels in the sector from the migration zone.
The High Court on Wednesday found then Immigration Minister Michaelia Cash exceeded her powers when in 2015 she issued a determination negating the visa regimen for vessels supplying the projects, contradicting Labor's laws passed in 2013.
The Maritime Union of Australia says the ruling will protect local jobs and deliver "certainty" to the future of its members.
"Up until this point in time, industry had the ability to pay visa workers on anything they like, which in the domestic blue industry has been $2 an hour," MUA deputy national secretary Will Tracey said.
"If we had lost this, in 12 to 18 months there wouldn't be any Australian seafarers working in the industry."
Projects and service providers must now urgently obtain visas for their non-Australian nationals before they can start work.
Australian Mines and Metals Association executive director Scott Barklamb said the immediate impact was not as widespread as it would have been two years ago given that most of Australia's offshore resource projects had moved beyond peak construction.
However, he said the specialised non-Australian crews affected played a "small but critical part of building offshore resources projects".
"Making the employment of such workers more regulated, more costly and more difficult in Australia than it is in competing resource economies will have consequences and will make it even harder to bring future resource investment to Australia."
Immigration Minister Peter Dutton said the decision was "disappointing" and will "add red tape, add costs to industry and reduce the competitiveness of what is one of Australia's biggest export earners".
He said many of the affected vessels operate in international waters and never enter an Australian port.
