FIELD, Mr Jacob, National Secretary, Maritime Union of Australia [by video link] WRIGHT, Mr Michael, National Secretary, Electrical Trades Union [by video link] ACTING CHAIR: Welcome. I understand that information on parliamentary privilege and the protection of witnesses giving evidence to Senate committees has been provided to you. I invite you to make a short opening statement, if you have one, and at the conclusion of any remarks I'll invite members of the committee to ask questions. Mr Field : Thank you, senators, for this opportunity to appear before the select committee. We've submitted our opening statement, as procedure dictates. Normally I wouldn't go to this length, but I would like to read it directly because I think it's very important, particularly because it summarises the detail. I want to make it clear that waterfront workers—wharfies, maritime workers—are not a barrier to productivity; we're central to it. Our members have consistently delivered world-class performance at Australia's ports. With the right policy settings on skills and technology, and shipping in particular, we can do even more to support national productivity and economic resilience. Key for me, and in the submission, is the particular parts around skills and training that I want to directly reference. The foundation of port productivity is a skilled, secure workforce. Wharfies, seafarers and logistics workers operate in a complex, high-risk environment where mistakes cost lives and disrupt supply chains. The MUA's experience is that investing in training in particular and qualifications in career pathways yields higher box rates—which is the measure of productivity in container stevedoring—safer operations and more reliable services for importers and exporters. We'd urge the committee to recommend a number of measures, in particular expanded nationally consistent training frameworks for maritime and port workers, including appropriate high-risk work licences and accredited pathways into advanced equipment operation, safety and digital systems, along with long-term workforce planning and training programs with employer support, so that skill development keeps pace with changes in vessel size and technology. We already have four-year enterprise agreements that provide industrial stability with good working conditions, and as a direct result of that we don't experience labour shortages like other areas of transport—in particular, postal and warehousing. In shipping, labour shortages are driven more by the decimation of the Australian-flagged shipping capability, limiting the availability of sea time for trainees and the lack of career progression and opportunities. Alongside building our defence and supply chain resilience, it's why the MUA have fought for long-term investment in shipping—in particular the area around port productivity and Australia's container terminals, which are among the most scrutinised sectors in our economy, with detailed annual monitoring by regulators such as the ACCC, through their container stevedoring monitoring reports. Those reports show that human operated terminals have consistently achieved significant productivity gains over many years—particularly over ports that have introduced automation, despite intense commercial pressures and ongoing underinvestment in landside infrastructure by other parts of the logistics chain. The most recent report, in 2025, from the ACCC showed that the high prices currently charged by stevedoring companies to Australian importers and exporters are driven by landside charges, and they go directly to industry profits at higher rates than comparable transport and other industrial companies in the sector. Over the ACCC's time of reporting on container terminals, productivity, including labour productivity, has more than doubled. But, today, stevedoring companies' investment in automated machinery is reducing the speed at which boxes move through container terminals. Port productivity is also about a whole-of-supply chain performance: berth availability; landside connectivity; truck turnaround times, in particular; planning certainty for shippers; and safe continuous operations. When workers are properly consulted, adequately trained and given decent conditions, they deliver predictable, efficient outcomes that underpin national productivity. Automation and technology is an increasing feature across Australia's waterfront and globally. The MUA is not opposed to technology; in fact, our members welcome it. It's the basis that underpins the delivery of their productivity and the safety in their workplaces, and our members have worked with successive waves of mechanisation and digitalisation across the waterfront. However, we are opposed to technology, in particular automation, that is imposed without agreement and that undermines safety, jobs and actual operational performance. Recent international experience and our experience domestically across Australian terminals demonstrates to us that fully- and semi-automated systems often deliver lower productivity, higher costs and greater vulnerability to breakdowns and cyberattacks than well-run human operations. Our position is quite simple—that automation and AI should only be introduced where they demonstrably improve safety, efficiency and community outcomes, and by agreement with workers. Public money shouldn't subsidise automation projects that reduce employment and the tax base while delivering less-productive waterfronts. Where that new technology is introduced, it's got to come with comprehensive retraining, redeployment opportunities and protections for affected workers. We'd urge this committee to recognise that chasing productivity through job-destructive automation at ports is a false economy. Sustainable productivity is achieved by combining skilled workers, appropriate technology and a strong safety culture. Finally, in the area of Australian-flagged shipping, no discussion of national productivity can ignore our dependence on foreign-flagged vessels for coastal and critical supply chains. The COVID-19 pandemic emphasised that writ large, and the recent global disruptions have exposed how vulnerable Australia is when we lack a strong, regulated Australian-flagged fleet. Rebuilding Australian-flagged shipping with Australian crews—under Australian labour, safety and tax laws, importantly—would deliver substantial productivity and resilience benefits across our economy. It would improve reliability and security in domestic and regional trade, and reduce risk, delay and costs for industry. It anchors high-skilled maritime jobs in Australia, supports a pipeline of trained seafarers who can also serve defence and emergency needs, and ensures that value is created in our coastal trade and contributes to our tax base, our communities, rather than being siphoned to low-regulation jurisdictions. We'd encourage this committee to recommend policy measures including cabotage protections, targeted investment and training programs to build an Australian-flagged merchant fleet as a strategic productivity asset. The MUA stands ready to work with government, employers and the industry to lift productivity. But we insist that this can be done in a way that respects workers, enhances their safety and builds sovereign capability in shipping and across our ports. That's how we see long-term, secure, inclusive productivity gains for Australia. ACTING CHAIR: Thank you very much. Mr Wright, do you have an opening statement that you wish to make? We can't hear you. Why don't we start with some questions of the MUA, and maybe you can try and sort out your sound in the background. Senator McKenzie. Senator McKENZIE: Hopefully, we get the ETU on shortly. To the MUA: I understand the sovereign shipping fleet sovereign capability argument. It's the first time I've heard it's more productive. I am very happy for you to provide, on notice, data to that effect. You've publicly stated your priority, in the current AI and automation negotiations with DP World, for a 28-hour working week with no loss of pay. I'm just wanting to understand how the union believes this bargaining priority will move Australian ports up the ranking. You mentioned the ACCC reporting, but the World Bank says our ports aren't as productive as other ports globally. I just want to understand your perspective there—appreciating the challenges for your workforce in coming years with automation. Mr Field : I will take the first part of your question on notice; I'll come back to you as soon as I can, or back to this committee, with those answers from our perspective. In terms of DP World specifically, that is, again, representative of a port infrastructure and terminal equipment infrastructure investment strategy that has, in our minds, been lacking severely for generations. When we compare Australian terminals and Australian ports and their productivity and operations with global port productivity, we see, in Australia in particular, a real and fundamental lack of investment in capable technology. We're talking about terminals in Australia that are using 30- and 40-year-old cranes and equipment and expecting them to operate in a modern environment intersected with a modern transport logistics network that the actual human operated technology and the humans who operate them are driving and operating, if you like, to their excess and to the extreme limits of those pieces of equipment. Specifically around DP World, they have sought to introduce not new but automated technology, which we see operating very effectively at the VICT terminal in Victoria, at Webb Dock, with parts of that technology operating in other terminals around Australia. So I guess the impetus behind our push for a change to working hours and rosters in particular was to encompass the current workforce and the current high level of skill that DP World employ and to incorporate them into the new world of automated terminals. We currently have a 35-hour-week in terminal stevedoring, which was achieved back in the late 1960s or early 1970s out of containerisation and has stood as the working-hours framework for decades since. Part of the automation implementation at DP World removes the human-operated element from the large majority of its labour-intensive mode of operation, which is the horizontal transfer. So, in order to try to involve and continue to retain the skills that DP World will need and have identified to us that they will need in order to operate the terminal, the cranes, the other automated equipment and the landside features, along with the clerical work, we have reached the position in our minds with DP World where they understand that to incorporate all of those workers that they don't— Senator McKENZIE: Sorry to interrupt but, rather than going to the granular detail of EBA negotiations with DP World, my question was: how do these changes that you're putting forward lift our ranking with respect to, say, the World Bank saying that our productivity at ports leaves a little bit to be desired? I have other questions, so I might get you to answer that on notice and just go to my other questions, if you don't mind, because I know there are other senators who are desperate to ask questions of both of you. I want to go to diversity, equity and inclusion policies. Does the MUA have DEI policies? Mr Field : Absolutely. And they are well publicised and I guess demonstrated through, in particular, terminal operations, although not at the level the MUA would hope for, with about five per cent of participation being female employment across terminal stevedoring in Australia. But that has been a strong feature of the MUA's direction, along with our bargaining feature, to try to lift the participation across— Senator McKENZIE: And the CALD community? Workers from diverse backgrounds? What percentage of your workforce is from communities where English wouldn't be their first language at home? Mr Field : I'd have to take that on notice. I'd have to get that information for you. Senator McKENZIE: That's fine. Thank you. And Indigenous Australians? Perhaps I could understand the proportion of maritime workers who are Aboriginals or Torres Strait Islanders, if you don't have that with you. I'd also like to understand how many of the maritime workers employed have a disability. Is that something you promote as well? Mr Field : It's definitely something we promote. It's not something I've got on hand, in specific detail, but we'll take that on notice. Senator McKENZIE: I'll take that on notice. ETU, you can take that on notice, too. Thank you so much, MUA. I've got a couple of questions for the ETU— ACTING CHAIR: Senator, we'll throw to Mr Wright—if his sound is working—to do an opening statement quickly. That might answer some questions and put us on a path. Thanks. Mr Wright : Forgive me, am I audible now? ACTING CHAIR: Yes. Senator McKENZIE: Yes. Mr Wright : Thank you very much to the committee for allowing me to participate today. My apologies for the technical problems. The two topics that I wish to speak to the committee about today in the context of productivity are: first, energy; and second, skills and workforce. Senator McKenzie, it may be that I go to some response to your questions about the workforce piece. But I appreciate that you may desire a level of granularity that I don't have to hand. On the energy piece, earlier this year I did my first Press Club address. For those senators who have trouble getting off to sleep at night, please feel free to go and watch it! It was launching our 'Sovereign Power' campaign. Prior to the election of this government in 2022, no-one would accuse Australia of having had consistent energy policy over the preceding two or three decades. That lack of continuity in energy policy has played havoc with heavy industry in Australia. 'Sovereign Power' is a proposal for publicly owned renewables to provide a pathway forward for heavy industry in this country so that we can get off what often feels like the merry-go-round of bailouts and provide heavy industry—such as Tomago, such as Whyalla, such as Liberty Bell Bay, noting that that's an extreme distress at the moment—with a path forward. The path forward needs to be the cheap electricity. It is no tinfoil hat claim to say that the reason we have heavy industry where we have heavy industry is historically cheap power prices. That is not a theory. That is the contract that brought Tomago into the Hunter. The pathway forward is obviously with renewable energy—with firmed renewable energy. We say that government investment in this area needs to be additive and not substitute or displace existing investment. Obviously, the benefit for consumers—or, as I like to call them, people—is that, by having dedicated new energy resources for heavy industry, when someone at home flips on a light switch, they're no longer competing on the retail market with an aluminium smelter. The consequence of it is lower power prices for everyone while providing heavy industry the pathway forward. On the skills front, I'll endeavour to keep this short. I do like to talk about electricians a lot because they're the best. I'm sure Mr Field would agree! We have a forecast shortfall— Senator McKENZIE: I'm partial to sparkies. Mr Wright : of 42½ thousand electricians. We are going to be short 42½ thousand electricians by 2030. That comes from the 2023 report from Jobs and Skills Australia called The Clean Energy Generation. That's in appendix 1. The main body of the report says 32,000. When you go to the appendix, it's 42,000. Can explain why, but, in any event, that data comes from before the data centre boom really took off. As of today, 10 per cent of ETU members, give or take, are working in the construction of data centres. That's up from roughly zero per cent—and the data centre build is just getting under way. So we are facing a shortfall of tens of thousands of electrical workers by 2030. The consequence of that is that ETU members—my members—are working extreme overtime, over 100 hours in many instances. From a trade union point of view, from one view of the world, it's a good problem to have; it's better than dealing with redundancies. But it also poses long-term risks for ensuring that this work is getting done with high-quality, safe tradespeople. If we look at what is coming down the track, yes, we have an all-but-incalculable data centre build and the data centre build does skew more electrical than traditional construction. We also have the athletics carnival coming up in Brisbane in 2032 which is going to need a significant construction workforce to get the Olympics built. We have the Future Made in Australia agenda. We can already see in defence manufacturing that there is an additional drain. The consequence of all this is going to be skill shortages throughout the economy—I do like to say that it is not just electricians, but it is always electricians—but where that's really going to bite is in the housing sector because housing is the lowest paid. Nvidia and Microsoft can afford in a supply shortage to get electricians onto their projects. The Olympics will get their workforce. It's going to come at the expense of housing and productivity particularly in the housing sector. This is a very big concern of ours. Now, two things are true at the same time. No government has done more than this one for vocational education in my lifetime. What is also true is that apprenticeships are either declining or flatlining in my trades. Patently, the government has done more than anyone else I could point to, but much more needs to be done. If we countenance this as being an industrial revolution, the electrification of everything, it should come as no surprise that the electrification of everything needs a lot of electricians. We need to drastically increase the number of people commencing apprenticeships. When we see apprentice ads go up, particularly with good union employers, we will see a ratio of roughly 600 applicants per apprenticeship on offer. I don't want to overegg that. No doubt there is some tyre kicking in there. No doubt there are some people who are just not interested but just need to get an application in. But there is no shortage of young workers or of reskilling Australians who want to come into our trades. The notion that millennials or Gen Z are lazy and just want to be on their phone does not bear contact with reality. Where we see the impasse is with employers being able to take on—and there are reasons for that—and also in the capacity in our vocational education system. We see a 12- to 18-month wait to be able to get into TAFE. We have apprentices, when they do get into TAFE, having to bring their own conduit, their own material, in order to be trained. This is not reflective of the level of urgency or the level of import that these trades have to Australia's future. I would also— ACTING CHAIR: Are you close to wrapping up? We're short on time. Mr Wright : Very close. On the gender front, we have a significant and longstanding gender problem in the electrical trades. The census would tell you that slightly over two per cent of electricians are women. When you actually dig into it, sadly, the number of active licence holders in South Australia is closer to 1.1 per cent. I note also that Jobs and Skills Australia has research that says that occupations with massive gender disparity have lower productivity. We are actively trying to do to get more women into our trades. There is no good reason why a woman can't be an electrician, but there are plenty of bad reasons. We have active programs funded by the federal government in South Australia and Western Australia in partnership with our employer partners, NECA and ECAWA in particular, to redress this. But it is a central challenge that we have had a temporary shortage of electricians since 1981 and yet we have a spare gender that we are not drawing upon to solve the challenge. Sorry for being prolix. ACTING CHAIR: No, that's great. Senator Mckenzie, keep going. Senator McKENZIE: I love sparky apprentices, but there is an issue around small businesses, not the large employers, putting on apprentices. When small businesses are going backwards out of business and sacking their apprentices first, I think that can be a huge challenge. This morning we heard from organisations assisting with migrant intakes. Given the shortage of sparkies we have now and the growing needs of the workforce, recognition of skill sets was something witnesses have raised a lot. What is the ETU's perspective on having those skill sets on the migration skills list and quickly and safely recognising calls to actually get that untapped workforce into the system? Mr Wright : If I could just flag on the small-business front as well, a significant issue is with large employers coming through and poaching third- and fourth-year apprentices, because they are more productive, and that then kills the SME's desire to actually continue training. That is a live issue that we are trying to deal with. It creates a secondary market in apprentices, which is no good. On the skills recognition front, we currently have the trade recognition pathway. We have the OTSR. Please don't ask me what OTSR is; I think it's offshore technical skills recognition. Where we have existing pathways to get electricians into Australia, we, as a union, will not compromise on the safety standards, as you would expect, but anything that we can do to make the process more amenable, without compromising on safety, is something that we are currently and actively working on. The problem that we have is that, when the USA is forecast to need an extra million electricians over the next decade and when Germany seems quite keen to get off Russian gas, I don't know that there are tens of thousands of electricians or other electrical trades sitting around Manila, Johannesburg, Dublin or London, just waiting to get on a plane. Skilled migration is going to be a part of it, but it needs to be Australian led because this is a global shortage. Senator McKENZIE: Yes, but we want to be at the front of that queue, and Australia would have to be a preferred destination over somewhere like Russia. Just in terms of state based electrical licensing and how it fragments the labour market and creates duplication of fees and accreditation for businesses et cetera, do you actually have recommendations for us around how we can make that more productive for both employers and electricians? Mr Wright : People are going to talk, because that's the bit that I cut out of my opening comment. Senator McKENZIE: See? I knew this. Mr Wright : We've been pushing for national electrical licensing since back in March 1921. We are very hopeful. Senator McKENZIE: That and the standard-gauge railway! Mr Wright : You'd think this would be the easy one. It puts unnecessary burden and costs on both electrical workers and—even though it's not strictly my problem—electrical contractors as well. Senator McKENZIE: Well, someone's got to employ the workers. Mr Wright : Ohm's law is the same whether or not you're north or south of the Tweed. We take a lot of heart that the day after the last election the federal treasurer went on Insiders and said that, when he was doing his productivity bullet points, national electrical licensing was No. 1. We've been involved in a number of reviews since then, but we need this to happen. If it were easy, it would have already been done, but— Senator McKENZIE: But that's the great privilege of government. Come on, Jim. You're the Treasurer. Get it sorted. I'll cede the call; I know there are other questions. ACTING CHAIR: Senator Ananda-Rajah. Senator ANANDA-RAJAH: Mr Wright, I did actually watch that National Press Club speech that you and Alison gave. I can't say I understood all of it. I got the concept; it just sounded very expensive. Coming back to the skills shortages, honestly, these sound intractable. I don't know how we're going to get to 42,000 in the next few years. Now we have the gravitational pull of data centres, which are sucking up not just skills but also huge, vast amounts of capital along with a lot of other things: energy, water and so on and so forth. What should the committee be looking at? Is there any way we can leverage this data centre boom to our advantage as far as skills go and then the deployment of those skills into other sectors? Mr Wright : Absolutely. I'm a big fan of data centres. They employ 10 per cent of my members. Either they will aggravate our energy problems and our skills problems or they can be used to solve them. Now, a data centre is one of the most controlled construction environments you'll come across. It is the perfect opportunity to be getting thousands of first- and second-year apprentices on—the ones who are harder to place with other employers—to get them the base skills that you learn in your first and second years. If we can use data centres, data centres can be solving for the problem, because it's always going to be easier to get a bulk number of apprentices onto a data centre in a metro setting than it will be onto a wind farm or grid-scale solar somewhere west of Dubbo. That's a statement of fact. It is not to say that the renewables sector doesn't need to pull their weight—they do—but it is easier to get it and easier to solve for with data centres. So I think data centres present a massive opportunity. I'd also note that our completion rates in our trade are some of the highest—I believe the highest—of any trade, but 30 per cent of apprentices still drop out. The easiest way and the cheapest way of solving this crisis is by focusing on that non-complete rate at industry centres. Cards on table: we partner with our employers on some industry centres, but even on the ones that we don't, even where it's employer only, they get completion rates and we get completion rates that are above 88 and 90 per cent. Having the Apprentice Connect Australia Provider system, the ACAPs, in supporting and mentoring apprentices through, I think is the secret sauce and the low-hanging fruit. It doesn't get us to 42½ thousand, but, if we can get that 30 per cent non-complete rate down to a 10 per cent non complete rate, that is thousands upon thousands of extra electricians. It's also thousands and thousands of extra apprentices who have a better time. No-one's quitting because they're having too much fun. I talk too much. I'm sorry. Senator ANANDA-RAJAH: You really love this, don't you? I get it. With the mentors, I'm guessing that there is a retired workforce of sparkies as well. Could any of them be brought back in to at least mentor rather than doing this hands-on stuff that they would have to be recredentialed for? Mr Wright : This is something that we're working on increasing at the enterprise level. There are many electricians who hit 55 or 60 and find working six days a week is a bit much. However, all the data we see is that early retirement might be good for the bank balance but is not good for a person's mental health or wellbeing. So we're increasingly trying to connect our members who are considering either leaving the workforce or going part time with picking up mentoring, support or training roles as well. It just seems like the obvious solution. We are trying to do this via industry finance programs. In due course, I suspect it's something for which I'll be putting in a budget submission to states or territories asking for support, but we need to get it off the ground as a pilot first as an industry. Senator ANANDA-RAJAH: What would your recommendation be for us to consider? Mr Wright : I would recommend overhaul of the support services available to apprentices and investment in the industry and TAFE via the National Skills Agreement, which is certainly going to be renegotiated. I appreciate that everyone that comes and talks to you says that their case is different, but there does need to be prioritisation given we are going through an energy transition, building an ungodly amount of houses and doing an Olympics build, plus the manufacturing in defence and more generally. The clean energy trades need to have special attention given to them and additional resourcing around trade training. Senator ANANDA-RAJAH: This is very difficult, isn't it? We have a number of priorities. We have clean energy—it's a priority. Housing—it's a priority. Data centres—I guess they are a priority? But where in the hierarchy? Senator McKENZIE: I think your prime minister says they're a priority, mate. Senator ANANDA-RAJAH: Yes. We'll see. I mean, you need to house people first and foremost, right? Senator McKENZIE: Hear, hear! Senator ANANDA-RAJAH: And energy is an input into everything. These are significant pressures, really. I don't know how to solve this, but I think your ideas are very worthwhile. Mr Field, I have a question for you. From the MUA's perspective, what investments should businesses be making if they are serious about improving productivity on the wharves? We heard earlier from the other session how business investment in Australia has been declining for a long time. They're profitable businesses, but for whatever reason they're not investing in R&D, for example. I'm interested to know, with your workforce lens, what you think these businesses should be investing in. Mr Field : There's a specific need for investment in infrastructure around more efficient landside connections—rail, road, intermodal hubs. They're some of the major constraints on port productivity and are often greater than the stevedoring performance itself. Our people can move 35 boxes an hour across four cranes 24 hours a day, but, if there's no way of getting them out of the terminal or into the terminal, or placing them somewhere, storing them somewhere or connecting them to where they need to go through the road transport network, then it obviously makes it very difficult to then represent the productivity of a terminal, because at some point the bottleneck prevents those 35, 32 or 30 boxes—however many they may be, depending on the geography or the geographical location of the terminal—from actually going anywhere. So, at some point, it stops. For us, our key recommendation or point of review would be around those interconnected parts that actually facilitate the terminal delivering what it is effectively structured and located to do, which is probably why in our view the productivity of a terminal or across the waterfront should be measured across the whole of the supply chain, not just in crane moves per hour. There really has been an underinvestment in rail, road and particularly regional terminals that limits national productivity gains from ports. Senator ANANDA-RAJAH: Do the major ports have a rail link, like the ones in Melbourne, for example? Senator McKENZIE: No, they don't. Mr Field : Not every port has a rail siding. You see them through Sydney, in particular, which do, but not all of them do. They rely on the interconnectivity of road transport to get those containers out of the gate to where they need to go and back in again. That again is a critical area of underinvestment. It needs to be strategically reviewed to enable—that's what all of this is about. The terminal, the workers in those terminals and even automated equipment in those terminals can only do so much until they're prevented from distribution or the movement of those containers by the bottlenecks that are created in the other parts of the transport network. Senator ANANDA-RAJAH: Has there been a push from anyone, MUA or anyone else, to look at a rail link for these major ports like the one in Melbourne, for example—like a feasibility study? Have these things come and gone, or are they just regarded as too expensive and too hard? Senator McKENZIE: You could ask Jacinta Allan. Mr Field : I don't know that I could speak intelligently on strategic priorities or any reviews that have been done by state governments into greater investment and support for the movement of containers in and out of terminals. I could make some assumptions, but they haven't been delivered. I would then be forced to make further assumptions that they're not a strategic priority, otherwise they would exist. We can manifest nuclear submarines but not rail interconnectivity that moves the containers that we're so obsessed with. That would be my anecdotal perspective on that—probably not helpful. Senator ANANDA-RAJAH: No, you're the expert. We're here to listen here. That sounds like that could be perhaps a recommendation we look at. Thank you very much. ACTING CHAIR: Senator McKenzie. Senator McKENZIE: I think we could write to the state Labor government in Victoria to ask why there's no rail connection. I'm happy to co-sign that letter with you. I guess there's an obsession in our country around university graduates and what both the MUA and the ETU are doing to get kids excited about trades. To the ETU particularly, with the role of mathematics and competency in mathematics in the early years in primary school and early high school to really be ready to rock and roll into an apprenticeship pathway, what more can we do be doing about getting young Australians excited about being a tradie prior to turning 15? Mr Wright : If I can take that question— Senator McKENZIE: I would like both but, yes, go for it. Mr Wright : To respond to a comment earlier, yes, these problems are very hard, but, if we don't solve these problems, we are baking in low productivity and foreclosing opportunity to Australians in good, well-paying careers. On how we get people excited, it's about the pitch. Historically it's been—for want of a better word—a materialist pitch: 'Come and do a trade. In four years' time, you will get a Wildtrack.' The Americans call it the 'FBI'. You need to have a father, brother or in-law who's a tradie in order to get into the trade. Senator McKENZIE: I thought that was only the MUA! Mr Field : Sorry, you're on mute, Senator! Mr Wright : When I used to speak at the School Strike 4 Climate action rallies, I used to look out and think to myself, 'None of you people are going to be electricians,' and yet the actual job of getting to net zero is principally an electrical project. When we're involved with schools outreach, it is about making that pitch: 'Yes, come and do a trade. You will get that Wildtrack. It's a good career. There's a hell of a lot of work coming your way, but you are also contributing to the country. You are doing something that is of value.' Too often, university education gets held up as being culturally superior and it's just not. To deliver for our country, we need tradespeople. Senator McKENZIE: Absolutely. The MUA—is it Mr. Field? Mr Field : Yes. I note your facetious comments about the— Senator McKENZIE:   Oh, well, I just thought, you know, you have the tap-on-the-shoulder clause in a lot of your agreements. Mr Field : It's a relevant point because the port operators, the terminal operators, actually benefit tremendously from those practices. When it comes time, in the pinch points, they'll tell you that they're restrictive. They are indicative of an industry that is an incredibly complex, particularly around the labour and engagement models because shipping windows and shipping in general are so unpredictable. As much as they try to make it predictable to work on the waterfront, no matter how good the wages and conditions are—and we don't have a labour supply shortage because people want to be wharfies because it's well paid—to keep them there and to keep those skills is tremendously difficult because they are on call 24 hours a day, seven days a week across the three different shifts. Keeping them there is very difficult. Everyone wants to be a wharfie until they come and sit by the phone until 2 pm to know whether they're going to work that night, or 2 pm on a Friday to know whether they're going to work on a Saturday and Sunday. We do see a high attrition rate of workers from non-traditional backgrounds—and when I say 'non-traditional', I mean their father, brother or in-law wasn't a wharfie—because they're not attuned and not aware of the dynamics and the challenges of being in the industry. And yes, being well paid is tremendous. Senator McKENZIE: Of course. But Mr Field, can I just suggest it actually goes against your own DEI commitment if that's the focus, but I'll leave that argument aside. I just wanted a single answer from both of you around productivity clauses. This is a select Senate inquiry into how we can actually lift productivity. We've talked about a wide range of topics this morning with both of you, like the benefit or otherwise of productivity clauses in EBAs which give the win-win to both workers and the business itself going forward. That's it from me. Thank you to the ETU members in Victoria for the duck hunting. But yes, if I could have that the productivity clause piece from each of you. Mr Wright : To be perfectly frank, so long as we've got such extreme skill shortages, industrial relations can only do so much on the productivity front. When workers are working 100-hour weeks or more, you can only do so much with clause 32 and an enterprise agreement. So it is something that we continue to explore in enterprise bargaining, but we—both us and the employers—are playing with one hand tied behind our backs because the workers just aren't there. Senator CASH: Not the same problem, MUA? Mr Field : No, we don't see the same problem with the workers not being there. I would say that the entirety of the complex documents that we have, our enterprise agreements, are in fact geared towards that productivity. That's why the flexibility exists in there. That's why those provisions exist. That flexibility is maximised and utilised to its fullest extent by the employers, which is why they're moving 35 boxes an hour, 24 hours a day, seven days a week. I would say that the entirety of the document, given the restrictive legislative framework that doesn't allow us to just walk off the job—we have to engage in bargaining practices and a bargaining structure that's got a level of mutuality that we support. It delivers a document and working conditions that are conducive to productivity. In fact, the barriers to productivity are all of the things that we've set out around skills and training and underinvestment in the critical infrastructure and technology that we need. You give us a crane. You want us to move forward 40 boxes an hour? Give us a crane that can do it. It's not not being done because of the industrial relations practices or our enterprise agreements; it's not being done because they're asking us to do Ferrari things in a Toyota Corolla, and those two things are incongruent. Senator CASH: Thanks, gents. That's it from me. ACTING CHAIR: Thank you very much to both of you for participating. That concludes our questions. You did both take questions on notice, and they are due by five o'clock on 11 August 2026. Thank you very much..