06:05 AM EDT, 03/14/2025 (MT Newswires) -- (Updates with Rio Tinto's response in the fourth paragraph.)

Rio Tinto's (RIO) more than 400 workers at its Paraburdoo mine represented by the Western Mine Workers Alliance have signed a petition to support collective bargaining, the Alliance said Thursday in a Facebook post.

The Alliance, collectively formed by the Australian Workers' Union and the Mining and Energy Union, will also make a formal application to Australia's Fair Work Commission to "make an order for Rio Tinto" to collectively negotiate with its workers at Paraburdoo, it added in the post.

"We expect that Rio will do whatever they can to oppose and slow our application," the Alliance said in the post.

"Our experience is that our existing approach helps drive productivity and wages growth," a Rio Tinto spokesperson told MT Newswires in an email late Thursday. "This model has delivered for our people, our business and the Australian economy, through the creation of jobs, strong and sustained wage growth, and the payment of royalties."