FED: Widespread compliance with coal strike

AAP General News (Australia)
08-13-1999
FED: Widespread compliance with coal strike

SYDNEY, Aug 13 AAP - There is widespread compliance with a 24-hour national coal strike
which started at midnight, employers and unions said today.

The coalminers' union called the strike to protest against the federal government's failure
to bail out the financially stranded Oakdale coal mine workers.

Supreme Court injunctions urging the strikers to return to work were granted late last
night in Queensland and NSW but have failed to have an impact.

Reports this morning indicated most mines in NSW and Queensland had closed, although
several managed to maintain some production.

The biggest employer on the Queensland coalfields, BHP Coal, said production had stopped at
seven central Queensland mines - Blackwater, Goonyella/Riverside, Peak Downs, Saraji, Norwich
Park, Gregory and Crinum.

Production was continuing at South Walker Creek, where staff were employed by contractor
Thiess, and at Moura, which is soon to be sold.

"Moura is in the last weeks of sale to Peabody and as a sign of good faith they may have
decided to go back," spokesman Ian Dymock said.

Mr Dymock said BHP's five mines in the Illawarra region of NSW were shut.

CFMEU mining NSW southern district secretary Ken Harris said all 10 mines of the Illawarra
fields, employing about 1,800 miners, had ceased production from midnight.

"The southern coalfields are in stoppage," he said.

A Rio Tinto spokesman said there was at least some production at all its mines in the two
states.

"All our Hunter Valley mines are operating at reduced production," he said.

"I can't tell you what percentages but we moving coal and washing coal."

Rio Tinto has three mines in NSW - Hunter Valley No 1, Howick and Mt Thorley - and three in
Queensland - Kestrel Coal, Blair Athol and Tarong.

"In Queensland, we are still working. I understand that production at Blair Athol and
Kestrel that production is running reasonably normally. I don't know the situation at Tarong
as well.

"There were some people who didn't show but that hasn't prevented us from operating fairly
normally," the spokesman said.

Queensland Mining Council chief executive Michael Pinnock said news was slow to filter
through from the coalfields.

He said coal production in Queensland ground to a halt overnight with Shell and BHP
completely shut down and MIM mines yet to report progress.

He said if the strike continued for 24 hours as planned, it would cost Queensland coal
mining companies $11 million in lost production.

"The strike itself is futile. It does not help those (Oakdale) guys in NSW. It's just a
political statement," he said.

Mount Isa Mines Ltd spokesman Colin Myers said he was unsure how many had started the
scheduled morning shifts at MIM's three central Queensland coal mines.

AAP dep/ah/de

KEYWORD: OAKDALE SECOND DAYLEAD

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