Patrick Terminals operates at the Port of Melbourne, as well as has sites at Brisbane, Fremantle and Sydney. Photo: Patrick

AUSTRALIAN container stevedoring operator, Patrick Terminals, has locked in a roll-over enterprise agreement with the Maritime Union of Australia (MUA) and its employees.

The deal extends Patrick’s enterprise agreement, originally set to expire at the end of 2025, through to 31 December 2028.

The agreement will provide certainty across all four Patrick container terminals, located at Melbourne, Port Botany, Brisbane and Fremantle.

The announcement follows the recent resolution of an industrial dispute between Qube — which holds a 50 percent stake in Patrick — and the MUA, a standoff that brought significant work stoppages across the country in December and early 2025.

It also comes during a potentially bumper year for enterprise bargaining, with agreements at Victoria International Container Terminal (VICT), Flinders Adelaide Container Terminal, and Hutchison Ports Australia either recently expired or due for expiry in 2025.

Patrick Terminals CEO Michael Jovicic welcomed the agreement commenting that it underscored the company’s ongoing commitment to productive workplace relations.

“This historic agreement roll-over provides a strong foundation for the future, ensuring stability for our employees and certainty for our customers in an increasingly dynamic global environment,” Mr Jovicic said.

“As a trusted Australian container terminal operator, we remain committed to delivering resilient and reliable services to our quayside and landside customers.”

The new agreement delivers a sign-on bonus plus steady pay increases for Patrick’s staff through to 2028, plus guarantees of no forced redundancies and no outsourcing.

Patrick’s management first met with MUA officials and delegates in late 2024, with the company’s leaders indicating an interest in rolling over the current agreement and avoiding negotiations.

MUA assistant national secretary Jamie Newlyn said the roll-over agreement achieved almost unanimous support throughout the membership.

“The process which has unfolded between the MUA and Patrick this year shows what is possible when the company is willing to work in good faith with its workforce on a fair enterprise agreement that both sides are happy with,” Mr Newlyn said.

Freight & Trade Alliance and Australian Peak Shippers Association general manager freight policy and operations Tom Jensen said the agreement represented “a major step toward national stability across Australia’s key container gateways”.

“With so many key agreements in motion across major terminals, this early outcome at Patrick delivers a welcome injection of stability and certainty for shippers, transport operators, and the broader logistics sector,” Mr Jensen said in a statement to members.

The Enterprise Agreement will now be submitted to the Fair Work Commission for approval.

Learnings from Qube-MUA dispute

The announcement has been particularly well received as it comes just months after the Qube-MUA industrial dispute underscored the potential disruption a prolonged standoff between employers and workers can cause.

Qube Ports operates at 18 sites around Australia, offering services including bulk cargo handling and stevedoring across key national ports.

From about April last year, the parties commenced negotiating 19 separate enterprise agreements across various ports around Australia, most of which were due to expire on 30 June 2024.

After negotiations faltered, MUA members voted to commence industrial action at sites including Brisbane, Port Kembla, Melbourne, Adelaide, Darwin and Fremantle.

The stoppages varied in length, ranging from brief one-hour halts to overnight and full 24-hour disruptions.

The parties reached an in-principal agreement in January prompting the end to the industrial action.

The incident spurred industry representative, Shipping Australia, to call for State and Federal Government intervention to prevent this scale of industrial action from occurring again.

Shipping Australia CEO Melwyn Noronha said reform of the industrial relations law was needed to ensure the stability of the shipping and ports sector.

“[T]here are a series of massive dockside enterprise bargaining negotiations that are due to occur this year,” Captain Noronha said.

“Our port sector is subject to a near-continuous campaign of paralysing industrial action.

“Clearly, there needs to be a fundamental root-and-branch reform of industrial relations law and policy if Australia is to remain competitive on the world stage.”