Christopher Back (WA, Liberal Party) Share this | Hansard source

On 2 and 3 September in this place, two Labor senators, both Western Australian senators, made speeches—or, should I say, the same speech, because each replicated the other and followed the other almost verbatim—highly critical of the Chevron company, and, in particular, the Gorgon project and, to a lesser extent, the Wheatstone project, off the Western Australian coast. I do not need to quote from both; I can just quote from one of them. One was Senator Lines and the other was Senator Sterle. They made reference to direct construction jobs—3,500 on Barrow Island where Gorgon is established; 10,000 direct or indirect jobs at the peak of construction; 300 direct jobs afterwards. That caused me to ask the question: why would two Western Australian senators stand in this place and be highly critical of projects that are bringing billions of dollars, millions and millions of dollars of employment, and hundreds of thousands of jobs, going over 30 or 40 years, and make allegations about mismanagement? They—I repeat, one or the other—were making allegations that:

The Gorgon project—

say both—

unfortunately—

says one, but now I am quoting from both:

… is quickly becoming synonymous—

each word the same—

with white elephant megaprojects. Some analysts show that it is the most delayed and over-budget LNG project in Australia.

Yet Chevron, each of them says, gave:

… its shareholders extremely rosy projections and has only … slowly revised cost and delay estimates.

Each of them went on to make disparaging comments about the occupational health and safety records on those particular projects, and called into question the actual undertakings of the Chevron company to the Western Australian and the Australian governments in relation to the size of these projects.

The speeches finished up slightly differently, I must say. One of them actually said:

So concerned am I about this project in Western [Australia] …

and the other said:

As a Western Australian senator, I am so concerned about the failure of Chevron to live up to its obligations—

I will come back to the other one—

to the people of Western Australia …

that one of them wrote to the US Securities and Exchange Commission asking for a full accounting of Gorgon's projects, risks and prospects, and the other wrote to Chevron in the USA:

… expressing my concerns about what I believe are Chevron's over promised and under delivered commitments …

It caused me to ask: what are Western Australian senators doing bucketing what is probably the largest oil and gas exploration and production project in our history? And of course I immediately came to an article in The Sydney Morning Herald of 28 August 2014—some four days before Senator Lines's contribution—in which the Maritime Union of Australia was said to be considering:

… legal action against US oil and gas giant Chevron …

with regard to breaching its obligations. Both of these speeches were clearly written by the MUA.

It causes you to ask: why would the MUA be wanting to go into bat against Chevron? That goes back even further. I will quote from another article, from The Australian on 16 August:

ENERGY giant Chevron is suing the militant Maritime Union of Australia for more than $20 million over an illegal strike the company says caused delays and cost blowouts at its $57 billion Gorgon gas project in Western Australia's Pilbara.

That goes back to 2012, when a strike took place at the Australian Marine Complex at Henderson south of Perth in Cockburn Sound in which there was clearly a slowing of project work, completion work, loading and transport up to Barrow Island for the Gorgon project. At that time, the company, Chevron, went to Fair Work Australia. Fair Work Australia ruled that the strike was illegal and that these people should return to work, but of course the company would say that they then went on a go-slow, costing them more than $20 million. It is a bit ironic that two colleagues in this place would actually then start complaining about the antics, apparently, of the Chevron company.

As a Western Australian senator, I was so concerned about these allegations by my colleagues that I actually made it my business to find out the truth. Senator Lines, I think, made the observation that these were claims by Chevron which cannot be easily validated or measured—these are the claims relating to construction jobs, completion jobs, operation jobs and the value of the project. Well, I did not find it all that hard to get the figures. I actually got in touch with the company—strangely enough, I did not have to do too much.

Let me tell you what the actual figures are. Remember the claim by Senators Lines and Sterle: 3,500 jobs in construction and 10,000 in direct or indirect jobs. Here are the figures: not 10,000 but 20,000 jobs; 7,000 on Barrow Island building Gorgon, which is now 80 per cent complete; 5,000 at Wheatstone, off Onslow, and nearly 40 per cent complete. The projects have injected over $30 billion in local content and jobs, and that will climb to $40 billion over the next couple of years. Six hundred Australian companies, over 90 per cent Western Australia, have been awarded contracts. These projects will go for 30 or 40 years.

Let me tell you a little about the salary levels of people on these projects. According to APPEA, the Australian Petroleum Production and Exploration Association, the barge welders are earning around $400,000 a year, and maritime workers covered by the federal offshore maritime agreements are paid over $200,000 for working five weeks on, five weeks off and they still get annual leave. Not a bad deal—none of us would mind it. The Prime Minister of Australia does not earn $400,000 for working half the year or less, yet these are the levels of the salaries about which my colleagues have been bitterly complaining and exercising criticism of this company.

Onslow, where the Wheatstone project is under construction, is the beneficiary of some $250 million of the social infrastructure funding—improvements to power and water, an extension to the hospital, a new community swimming pool, airports, roads, and $60 million awarded to Onslow based firms. Why would colleagues be complaining about a project of this scale when it is creating this level of employment and wealth in our state? There are 50 new homes. For those of you who do not know Onslow, it is a very small, humble, coastal location.

The second allegation for which I object most strongly and sought information on was an apparent claim of occupational health and safety so severe that the union was caused to make direct contact with Mr Roy Krzywosinski, the managing director of Chevron in WA. To my information, Mr Krzywosinski has had no contact from the MUA. Therefore, I sought the information. I seek leave to place on the record in Hansard graphs indicating the number of days away from work per 200,000 hours worked.