Will Zisis has been a seafarer for seven years.
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The 29-year-old from Wollongong loves the job, the lifestyle it brings, and he wants to keep doing it for at least another seven years.
But, like his shipmates currently aboard the MV Mariloula off Hong Kong, Mr Zisis faces an uncertain future – after BHP chose to terminate the contracts of the last two Australian-crewed ships carrying iron ore from Western Australia to BlueScope’s Port Kembla steelworks.
Maritime unions say at least 70 seafarers – on the Mariloula and MV Lowlands Brilliance – will lose their jobs; replaced by overseas crews on foreign ships.
Mr Zisis has just spent 14 weeks on a ship and was at home watching TV when he received an email saying he might no longer have a job.
“I’m upset about it. It was my future, I’ve done it for seven years [and] I thought I was going to do it for another seven or longer,” he said.
“It’s a lifestyle as well, it’s a good job … but now it’s not a job, it’s not a lifestyle, it’s nothing. It looks like I’m just going to get made redundant.”
Mr Zisis said his crewmates still on the Mariloula “don’t know what’s going on”.
“They’re stuck up there, they don’t know when they’re coming home,” he said.
The workers’ employer, Teekay Shipping Australia, intends to fly the crews back to Australia and said a decision had not yet been made regarding their continued employment.
The Maritime Union of Australia (MUA) has hit out at BHP for for sacking the seafarers while on the job in international waters.
MUA southern NSW branch acting secretary Mick Cross, who has just returned from visiting affected workers off Hong Kong, said the timing was “nothing short of shameful”.
“Sacked sitting at anchor, not knowing when you’re coming home and having no idea of future job prospects, or whether you’re going to be able to provide for your family,” he said.
“That is absolutely not on. It is industrial bastardry of the highest order.”
BHP said it was no longer in the business of vessel management or operation.
The company has not answered a Mercury question about why workers were told of its “phase out of shipping arrangements with BlueScope” while overseas, saying only that “Teekay Shipping is supporting them through this change.”
The MUA wants a change in legislation to protect Aussie seafarers’ jobs; a call echoed by Labor Member for Cunningham Sharon Bird.
“We’ve made it clear we think those [transitional general] licences should be issued requiring use of Australian seafarers,” she said.
The federal government said it was “committed to ensuring the right regulatory settings exist in order for shipping to takes its rightful place as part of the national transport system”.
Andrew Pearson
Andrew grew up in the western Riverina town of Hay and has strong ties to the region. He is a former DA journo who has a passion for breaking news and has covered everything from council and politics to crime and court.
Andrew grew up in the western Riverina town of Hay and has strong ties to the region. He is a former DA journo who has a passion for breaking news and has covered everything from council and politics to crime and court.
