Fortescue Metals has warned it could cut jobs if a threatened strike at Port Headland goes ahead. Source: AAP
AUSTRALIA'S biggest iron ore miners and the federal government have stepped up pressure to prevent a strike at Australia's largest export port.
Tugboat workers are threatening to strike at Port Hedland for up to a week over pay and leave entitlements, a move mining giant BHP Billiton says could force it to halt production and cost up to $700 million.
Talks between the Maritime Union of Australia (MUA) and tug operator Teekay Shipping are deadlocked following 11 months of discussions over pay and leave entitlements.
BHP has flagged that it may use national interest laws to prevent the strike while Fortescue Metals Group, another port user, could also intervene.
It comes as the federal government sent officials to Port Hedland to monitor the situation in a bid to protect Australia's most valuable export industry.
Employment Minister Eric Abetz would not say at what point the government would intervene in the matter, but called on opposition leader Bill Shorten to step in and speak to the MUA.
"To prejudice the goose that is laying the golden egg for us would be economic vandalism at its worst and that is why Bill Shorten needs to intervene," Mr Abetz told reporters in Perth on Thursday.
Mr Abetz said Chinese steel mills did not have to take iron ore from Australia and would look elsewhere if supply became unreliable.
Mr Shorten said the worst news for the dispute was that the minister would not act.
"Minister Abetz seems to have forgotten that he's the minister and this is his responsibility," Mr Shorten said.
Meanwhile, Fortescue Metals has threatened to stand down workers if the strike goes ahead.
Chief executive Nev Power said the industrial action would threaten the livelihoods of thousands of Australians and cost millions of dollars in lost government royalties and tax revenues.
MUA WA Assistant Secretary Will Tracey says he cannot understand why the industry is prepared to lose $100 million a day when the whole Enterprise Bargaining Agreement would be worth less than $1 million.
"Both industry and the government are trying to create the impression that these deckhands work only a fraction of the year, in an attempt to portray the MUA as unreasonable and justify a political attack on the union and Australia's industrial relations laws," Mr Tracey said.
Morningstar analyst Mark Taylor added that Fortescue workers would still need to be paid if they were stood down and job cuts were unlikely.
"Perhaps Fortescue doesn't want to say how much it's going to cost them per day because they're obviously in much tighter financial circumstances than BHP or Rio Tinto and it's probably partly political," he said.
A strike would mean lost sales for BHP, Fortescue and Atlas Iron which are already under pressure with iron ore prices slumping to 20-month lows and below $US100 a tonne.
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