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QANTAS
hole, Elizabeth Street, Sydney, 1970
Commonwealth
Conciliation and Arbitration Commission, Transcript, No. 2067 of 1970,
pp. 56-7.
Hickey
from the ASC&J gave evidence about the conditions on site. A sewer
was leaking from one side of the excavation; no sun got down to the 30m
level, which was seven stories below the street. There were no lifts to
get them up or down. Because the block was wedge-shaped block, men were
working cramped into corners.
One
of the claims that we have made is the type of skilled tradesmen we
want on this job. For instance, we are at a stage now where we are
doing form work which is normally done by what we would call
tradesmen, as probably people who have come into the trade through
various channels but have never served an apprenticeship. We are
required to do that kind of work at the moment plus when the building
does take its rise we will be asked to do first-class fixing which we
are supposed to be qualified to do. Already Dillinghams have put off
this site people they have thought would not come up to this standard.
That is one of the claims. (56)
Another
claim is that three of our members who have been employed on this
project have not been able to negotiate the descent and ascent of this
particular site, henceforth, they had to leave the site. That means
that although there was work available on the site for them they were
not able in actual fact to work on the site. (56)
Now,
your honour, I am speaking facts when I say that no man on that site
has been paid the full amount of special rates that he thought he was
entitled to at any one stage. [The
site foreman] has authorised the payment of these rates and I am sure
that he thinks they have been rightly paid but in the time I have been
on the site I have never as yet been paid the full amount of money I
thought I was entitled to. We have continually had to badger and
pester foremen and leading hands to have our correct payments made on
this site. (56)
In
all our meetings with commissioners and judges nobody has yet visited
the site to see what kind of conditions exists there. We are expected
as carpenters to allow these tremendous panels to swing over our heads
and they are made of plywood and steel. Some of these are in the
region of 12 square feet, some 15 x 12, and they are a pretty deadly
kind of instrument to be hanging over your head. We are in the
position that we have to stand under these things as they are coming
across us and fix them in position. The crane cannot let go these
panels until such time as we have fixed them, so in actual fact we are
depending on the crane driver’s accuracy to hold the panel tight so
that we can get it fixed before he can let go. There have been a
couple of narrow escapes on the job. Fortunately, the management is
concerned about the safety on the job and have been very much with it
as regards our point with the meetings and having site inspections.
This is not to say you do not get the panic merchant on the job. We
have come across this on the site where it is a little bit pushy at
times but not all the time, I would say.
These
are some of the things I wanted to put to your Honour as a
representative of the union.
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