Ausgrid workers are threatening to take industrial action after the company announced plans to impose a 12 month wage freeze.
The Electrical Trades Union said an overwhelming majority of members were prepared to take action in response to the wage freeze, with legally protected work stoppages and bans able to occur from early next year.
Ausgrid said the wage freeze was a "necessary response to the financial challenges the company is facing resulting from the impacts of COVID-19".
"These restraints have meant we are in the process of restructuring our business, cutting back-office positions (announced in October), and reducing our executive leadership team by more than 20 percent, in order to become a more sustainable business," Ausgrid CEO Richard Gross said.
"Our executive team and senior managers have been on a wage freeze since mid-2019 and I have personally taken a 10 per cent wage cut this financial year.
"We know this is a tough time for everyone and this is not a position anyone would hope for but given the circumstances this is a fair and balanced offer."
ETU secretary Justin Page said the decision was a kick in the guts at a time when essential workers should be rewarded for their efforts, and the union would be fighting hard to overturn it.
"While millions of Australians stayed home during the height of the COVID crisis, our members continued to put their health on the line to maintain reliable electricity supplies; responding to outages, undertaking essential maintenance, and carrying out much-needed upgrade works," Mr Page said.
"This proposal would result in workers suffering a cut in their real wages for at least the next three years, imposing unnecessary hardship on them and their families.
"The wage freeze comes on top of Ausgrid's plans to slash 500 jobs, with the first 200 workers due to lose their jobs in January."
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