Aurizon welcomes decision on Staff Enterprise Agreement
Aurizon has welcomed a favourable decision by the Fair Work Commission (FWC) late yesterday regarding its Staff Enterprise Agreement (EA).
Approximately 1400 Aurizon employees will receive a 4% pay rise annually for three years along with more contemporary employment conditions that will help deliver significant productivity and efficiency improvements.
The Staff Enterprise Agreement covers employees in the Network Control Centre, the National Operations Service Centre, the administrative stream, professional/technical stream as well as some team leaders and technical specialists.
Aurizon received a positive vote by employees on the Staff EA in October 2014. However, execution of the Agreement had been delayed by the unions' challenging the outcome through FWC.
Aurizon Managing Director & CEO Lance Hockridge said the finalisation of the Staff EA was an important step towards achieving the change and reform that would sustain and grow Aurizon into the future.
"The approval of the Staff agreement demonstrates employee support for more modern EAs that provide flexibility to improve our service to customers," he said.
The agreement will come into effect in six days on Wednesday 28 January 2015.
'Aurizon continues to bargain in good faith with the hope of reaching agreement with other unions on enterprise agreements covering train crew, operators, construction and maintenance staff.
"Aurizon looks forward to continued bargaining with unions on the remaining agreements," Mr Hockridge said
"As evidenced by the positive outcome on the Staff Enterprise Agreement there is a very fair deal on the table.
"Aurizon is simply seeking workplace agreements that are comparable to our competitors.
"The current agreements contain a range of legacy provisions that are not reflective of modern Australian workplace agreements and are not sustainable in a highly-competitive transport sector."