Living Costs A Killer In Port Hedland!

• General News
• 15th March 2012

Where Linfox pays $2,500 a week to rent a three bedroom house for drivers

To the average person who hasn't worked in Port Hedland in recent years the earning of Linfox fuel carters will look quite attractive.

The drivers are paid a flate rate of $43.81 per hour for all hours worked.

They service Linfox's contract with BHP and the mining giant's fatigue rules prohibit them from working more than 56 hours per week but BHP pay for extra hours.

Sound great doesn't it, but living and working in Port Hedland is a far different kettle of fish than working in Perth and sleeping in your own bed every night.

Linfox pays $2,500 a week to rent a three bedroom Linfox house for two drivers. And they were considering turning the lounge room into a bedroom and putting two more drivers in the house.

Four blokes in on tiny house adds up to a lot of smelly socks but housing is as rare as rocking horse manure in Hedland.

We will soon begin talks with Linfox on a new three year agreement for the tanker drivers.

Peter Bruce has been elected as our delegate and some of the improvements we will be chasing include:

• A significant increase in the flat hourly rate.
• BHP's extra paid hours to be written into the agreement.
• Income protection insurance.
• An increase in the overnight allowance from $56 per night to $80 for when drivers are away and have to sleep in their trucks.
• Unused sick leave to be accrued. At present if the drivers don't use it they lose it and that is not good.
• Annual leave to be paid on average earnings.

There are some big ticket items in there and we've got some hard work ahead. But we will certainly be giving the negotiations our best shot.