Aurizon NSW Coal Enterprise Agreement 2025

Your negotiation team met with Aurizon’s negotiating team at Hunter Workers for three days over 11 – 13 November. Progress was made on restrictions around car driving and discussions continued around important items such as Rosters, Grain, and wages.

Car Driving

Your negotiating team proposed a new clause to protect employees who are required to drive cars alone, particularly during the highest-risk times of the day. While we acknowledge that car driving is a necessary part of our work, members’ safety must not be compromised. Aurizon has a responsibility to properly plan and manage car balancing between depots at safe and reasonable times.

After lengthy and robust discussions, we secured an agreement that delivers meaningful protection for members while having minimal operational impact, provided Aurizon manages its workforce responsibly.

Grain

Aurizon was presented with an updated grain proposal, one that remains a reflective of how grain currently operates. Aurizon has repeatedly stated that their grain operation is profitable as it currently operates, so why not enshrine it in the EA? The simple answer is greed.

Your negotiating team initially asked Aurizon to outline what they believed was needed to make grain sustainable long-term and improve Aurizon’s competitiveness in contract negotiation. Your team then took these suggestions to the members who work grain, where it was agreed that limited concessions could be made, so long as long as there were strong protections to stop Aurizon from exploiting the situation.

As reported in the last newsflash, Aurizon’s response was completely out of touch and is a glimpse into a world where Aurizon alone dictates working conditions. Locomotive Division members have a long and proud history of improving working conditions and will not accept any proposal that takes conditions back decades. Hopefully they return with a realistic, good-faith proposal that can actually be discussed.

Wages

Whilst Aurizon has recently acknowledged their 5/4/3/3 wage offer includes an element of wage repair, your representatives feel that this doesn’t even come close to repairing the financial impacts members have endured throughout the life of this agreement. We remain determined to reach an agreement that members deserve.

Aurizon’s attempt to leverage the financial pressure many employees feel at Christmas is a deliberate tactic to push a substandard offer. If Aurizon genuinely cared about employees at Christmas time, theywould have put this cash in members pockets years ago. Your representatives raised the issue of the rising cost of living with Aurizon at numerous consultative committee meetings over the last 4 years and at times were met with actual laughter from management.

Make no mistake, Aurizon is not concerned about helping members at Christmas. They are attempting to manufacture urgency and pressure in the hope that workers will accept less: less pay, less security, and worse conditions. Your negotiating team will not support any offer that leaves members worse off.

Rosters

Towards the end of the final day, Aurizon presented your negotiating team with a response to a proposal put to them earlier in the week. This response will need to be carefully reviewed as proposed improvements to the standard master roster have now been removed. However, Aurizon has finally agreed to end the long-standing injustice of the Wollongong roster by placing the depot onto the standard master roster, something that should have occurred years ago.

Next steps

The next negotiating meeting will be held at Hexham on 25–27 November. Your negotiating team will continue to press Aurizon on the importance of all proposed clauses, but agreement on key items remains unlikely.

To reinforce the importance of the wage position, your team and other union committees will be asking all members to complete a letter to Aurizon. This is your chance to make your voice heard. Please take the time to fill out the letter and return it to your delegates, ensuring your name is written on the back.

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