Byrnecut Pay Rates 2026: FIFO, Site & Award Floor Pay
What Byrnecut workers should be paid in 2026 — the Mining Industry Award floor by classification, casual loading, penalties, and where the Byrnecut enterprise agreements sit.
Senior Workplace Relations Writer · GradDip Employment Relations, Griffith University
Who covers Byrnecut workers — award or agreement?
Byrnecut is a specialist underground mining contractor, providing development and production mining services to gold and other underground mine sites, along with shotcreting through Jetcrete and engineering services through Murray Engineering. Nearly all of its workforce is on permanent employment terms, working FIFO or residential rosters.
The Mining Industry Award 2020 is the underlying floor for underground mining work. Byrnecut has a registered enterprise agreement in our corpus (listed below); it has to leave staff better off overall than the award tables that follow.
The federal awards relevant to Byrnecut roles:
- Mining Industry Award 2020 (MA000011)
Workforce snapshot. In its 2024-25 report to the Workplace Gender Equality Agency, Byrnecut Australia Pty Ltd declared 6,558 employees across 6 reporting entities — 1.6% casual and 12.3% women. Source: WGEA 2025 Public Data File, data.gov.au (CC-BY 3.0 AU).
Mining award floor (1 July 2026)
The Mining Industry Award 2020 (MA000011) publishes each grade two ways: the base weekly rate (÷38 = hourly) and an 'ordinary hourly' rate that folds in the award's all-purpose industry allowance. Both are shown:
| Classification | Base hourly | Ordinary hourly (incl. industry allowance) | Casual (base + 25%) |
|---|---|---|---|
| Entry level (first 3 months) | $26.44/hr | $27.53/hr | $33.05/hr |
| Level 1 (basic — labourer, trainee operator) | $27.56/hr | $28.65/hr | $34.45/hr |
| Level 2 (intermediate — plant operator) | $28.58/hr | $29.67/hr | $35.72/hr |
| Level 3 (competent — experienced operator, trades assistant) | $29.45/hr | $30.54/hr | $36.81/hr |
| Level 4 (advanced — tradesperson) | $31.42/hr | $32.51/hr | $39.28/hr |
| Level 5 (advanced specialist) | $33.47/hr | $34.56/hr | $41.84/hr |
| Level 6 (dual trade) | $35.11/hr | $36.20/hr | $43.89/hr |
| Level 7 (dual trade instrumentation) | $36.53/hr | $37.62/hr | $45.66/hr |
Coal mines sit on the Black Coal Mining Industry Award instead, which uses a 35-hour week — our BHP pay rates page explains the difference. FIFO rosters add the award's overtime, shift and weekend loadings on top of these figures.
Source: Fair Work Commission modern awards pay database, current-operative rates (1 July 2026 annual wage review). Casual figures add the 25% casual loading.
The Byrnecut enterprise agreements
Enterprise agreements set rates above the award, with their own classification structures and allowances. Current Byrnecut agreements in our corpus (2 in total):
- Byrnecut Australia Enterprise Agreement 2025 — approved October 2025, nominal expiry 14 October 2029.
- Jetcrete Oz Enterprise Agreement 2024 — approved July 2024, nominal expiry 9 July 2028.
We don't reproduce agreement dollar figures here — the agreement covering your site, state and stream is the document to read. Find your agreement, then your classification, then your pay point, and compare it with your payslip. The award tables on this page are the floor every one of these agreements must beat.
Common mining pay issues at Byrnecut
The patterns worth checking on a Byrnecut payslip:
- FIFO roster averaging that quietly loses overtime or public holiday loadings.
- Wrong level for the competency actually held.
- Labour-hire workers paid below the site's directly employed crew for the same work — the same-job-same-pay rules now apply.
- Travel and standby time unpaid.
What to do if your pay looks wrong
Match your payslip to your classification in the agreement (or the award tables above), and price any gap with our back-pay calculator. Raise it in writing with payroll or your manager first — most underpayments are fixed at that step. Unresolved, the Fair Work Ombudsman (13 13 94) recovers underpayments at no cost, up to six years back, and your union can run the claim for you. Not sure which instrument covers you? Ask our AI advisor with your role and location.
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Official resources
General information and estimates only — not legal, financial or tax advice. Always check your specific award, agreement or contract, or a qualified professional, before you rely on the result.
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Nine years in Australian workplace relations — Queensland hospitality HR, then retail ER in Brisbane and Northern NSW. Graduate Diploma in Employment Relations (Griffith University, 2018). Writes about award interpretation, underpayment recovery, and casual conversion. Member of the AHRI since 2019. Based in Paddington, Brisbane.