Fair Work Commission Rejects Inpex Bid to Halt Strikes at Ichthys Facilities

The Fair Work Commission on Saturday afternoon rejected Inpex's application for orders to stop industrial action at its Ichthys onshore and offshore facilities in Darwin. Deputy president Michael Easton said he was satisfied the strikes and worker bans, particularly on loading and offloading LNG, threaten to cause a full production stoppage for at least a week from Tuesday.

He added that Inpex's evidence that lost production would damage the Australian or Northern Territory economy was not compelling.

More than 400 workers have been escalating industrial action since the start of June. Workers rejected Inpex's latest offer on Friday night and scaled back proposed eight-hour strikes to two separate two-hour stoppages each day. Inpex applied for urgent orders late last week after unions representing the workers, the Offshore Alliance, threatened eight-hour strikes and disruptive work bans.

An expedited hearing was held on Saturday. Richard Dalton KC told the commission that the industrial action posed a serious risk of shutting down facilities within days and threatened to cause significant damage to Australia's export LNG market. He said the action also threatened the reliability of LNG supply to Asian customers.

Easton assumed the value of Inpex's gas production was in the vicinity of $15 million to $22 million per day because the company did not disclose the value. He said planned and unplanned production stoppages occur relatively frequently and lost production time can be made up.

The company's lawyers also argued that a complete curtailment of gas supply to the Northern Territory's Power and Water Corporation would create significant threats to public safety.