Answer extracted from the Creatures of the Industry podcast — listen to the full episode below.
How were workers organized on a 2,000-person industrial site in Port Hedland?
The Port Hedland project in the late 1990s had virtually no union representation or organizational structure—no shop committees, no delegate committees, and almost no worker voice despite employing 2,000 people. Workers faced a casualized, de-unionized environment with half a dozen different pay rates, with some receiving cash bonuses collected before leave periods, while scaffolders were among the few who maintained any autonomy within their crews.
A fragmented workforce with no collective voice
On a site of that scale, the absence of formal worker organization was striking. Riggs describes the Port Hedland project as heavily casualized, meaning workers were hired on temporary, short-term contracts with minimal job security. There was no union solidarity whatsoever, even as workers came from all backgrounds—Italian, Greek, Spanish, Irish, English, and Fijian origins all represented on the same job.
The pay structure itself reinforced fragmentation. With workers receiving multiple rates across the workforce, there was no unified wage baseline. Some workers collected cash payments per hour directly before their roster leave—what Riggs describes as informal bonus arrangements rather than transparent contractual conditions. This system made it nearly impossible for workers to organize collectively around pay and conditions, as no two workers necessarily shared the same deal.
As discussed in detail in this episode of Creatures of the Industry, the roster itself created additional isolation: workers operated on a seven-weeks-on, one-week-off cycle, rotating through remote Western Australia's Northwest Shelf region. This pattern limited face-to-face organizing time and reinforced geographic distance from union support networks.
Scaffolders: the only exception to powerlessness
While most trades had no meaningful representation, scaffolders maintained some operational autonomy within their crews—a small but significant difference. This wasn't formal union power; it was practical craft control. Scaffolders could exercise judgment about how work was done within their gangs, though even this was constrained by the broader casualized structure of the site.
Riggs, working as a rigger with decades of health and safety experience, found himself operating without institutional backing. The 1985 Occupational Health and Safety Act had equipped workers like him with legal rights to raise safety issues, yet the Port Hedland site's lack of delegate structures meant individual safety representatives worked largely in isolation, unable to mobilize collective enforcement.
"The majority of a construction worker's wage isn't his hourly rate. It's his overtime and other conditions. That's what I missed."
Terry Riggs — Scaffolder and Health and Safety Representative, with over three decades of experience in heavy industry across Victoria and Western Australia. Riggs trained in occupational health and safety through an associate diploma at Holmesglen TAFE and worked on major projects including Shell refinery upgrades and Transfield operations before his current role at the Metro Tunnel in Melbourne. His career spans from the 1980s to the present, with significant time in the Northwest Shelf industrial region.
To understand how this casualization of 2,000 workers differed from unionized sites, Riggs also discusses the contrast with earlier Shell Refinery work in the early 1990s, where IR representatives and formal structures existed—a world completely absent at Port Hedland.
See also
How did WorkCover compensation address the lost income and social isolation experienced by construction workers during extended work-related injuries?
According to Riggs, while WorkCover paid enough to live on, the compensation could not replace the majority of a construction worker's wage, which comes from overtime and other conditions beyond the hourly rate.
What impact did the Occupational Health and Safety Act introduced in 1985 have on workplace practices in Australian heavy industry?
Terry Riggs, working as a health and safety representative at Shell Refinery under the new legislation, wrote 12 pin notices on the job, and all but one were upheld by WorkSafe, demonstrating the Act's real enforceability.
Key takeaways
- Port Hedland's 2,000-person industrial site had virtually no union organization, shop committees, or formal worker representation structures.
- Workers were paid at multiple rates with informal cash bonuses, fragmenting the workforce and preventing collective wage bargaining.
- Casualized employment and remote rosters (seven weeks on, one week off) isolated workers from union support networks and limited organizing opportunities.
- Scaffolders retained limited autonomy within their crews, making them exceptional compared to other trades on the site.