PREMIER Coal has started shedding staff positions at its Collie mine.
Company general manager Colin Moffatt would not confirm numbers yesterday afternoon, but said the number of redundancies would be "less than Griffin", a reference to the 17 redundancies announced by Collie's other coal mining company in February.
Mr Moffatt said there was one senior position, believed to be a mine manager, among the redundancies. The redundancies are part of an organisational restructure at the company, with the first redundancy believed to have taken place yesterday.
A Premier Coal employee told the Collie Mail that staff were advised at a meeting yesterday morning that over the next three weeks some staff will have jobs that have changed, while others will be made redundant.
Mr Moffatt said the changes were being made to ensure Premier can meet challenges it is facing.
He said the company had for many years been a low cost coal supplier.
"Premier must continue to adapt to the variable nature of the geology of the Collie coal basin as well as meet changing cost structures brought about by the increasing cost of most inputs."
Mr Moffatt said the changes were not about making more profit. "Everyone likes to make money, but it is not about that," he added.
Miners' Union secretary Gary Wood said that although maintenance and construction workers were not affected, any redundancy was cause for concern.
Collie MLA Mick Murray said it was disappointing to see jobs go. "Every job impacts on Collie and if the mining companies do not become efficient it will be cause for concern."