Updated 5:30pm, Monday August 26: TasNetworks has received confirmation from the Communications, Electrical & Plumbing Union (CEPU) that workers can return to work after a severe weather event was declared.
Chief executive Sean McGoldrick said work will immediately start to clear a backlog of recent outages impacting hundreds of homes and businesses across the state.
“I sincerely thank the CEPU for joining us in putting Tasmanians first in coming days,” he said.
The reversal from the union came 30 minutes before they were due to appear in an emergency Fair Work Commission hearing.
“I’m convinced that most striking workers want to pressure TasNetworks to the utmost lawful extent,” McGoldrick said.
“And they’ll be free to resume that once this weather event’s passed and resulting outages have been resolved.”
“But I’m equally convinced that most of our people want to serve and support Tasmanians in times of need and feel a great sense of pride and duty in doing so.”
The emergency event declaration will come to an end after all repair and reconnection work needed as a result of imminent storms has been completed.
Earlier: TasNetworks is taking the Communications, Electrical & Plumbing Union (CEPU) to the Fair Work Commission, accusing union officials of breaching an industrial action agreement.
The company says the union made a written commitment on August 14 that CEO Sean McGoldrick could call a declared incident in the event of emergency situations and they would stop strike action.
McGoldrick made such a declaration on Sunday evening ahead of impending strong winds and wet weather forecast for Tuesday.
However, the union reportedly instructed members to ignore the declaration and continue industrial action rather than return to work.
“If the union breaks its earlier commitment and defies our declaration, it’s condemning and abandoning potentially thousands of Tasmanians to the misery of long outages,” McGoldrick said.
“Common decency dictates that you keep your word … and compassion dictates that you don’t leave innocent Tasmanians at the mercy of storm damage and resulting outages.”
Minister Eric Abetz said the action by the CEPU seeking a 35% wage increase “will leave most Tasmanians scratching their heads”.
“An old man falling over with no lights on in his house because of their action. Cows dying as I understand it because of equipment not working on farms,” he said.
“There are consequences for individuals and small businesses.”
A hearing before the Fair Work Commission is scheduled for 5pm on Monday.
CEPU offical Chris Clark on Saturday said the issue of pay has been ‘boiling away’ for over 20 years.
“If the board, the CEO and the Minister and the Premier want to come to the table with a pay parity deal, we’re more tham happy to look at it [and] take it back to our members,” he said.
