Essential Energy decided to slash jobs in rural New South Wales and our mayor, and many of our readers wondered how they could justify the job cuts.

Three jobs were set to be cut from Dubbo and more than 180 statewide until the Electrical Trades Union (ETU) stepped in and reached an in-principle agreement with Essential Energy in the Fair Work Commission that pauses planned job cuts until workers are provided with further information and additional consultation takes place.

That gives workers until August, with unions given an opportunity to propose alternative cost-saving measures and initiatives that could avert the need for redundancies.

The unions cop a bit of a bashing, especially in rusted on conservative seats like Dubbo, but in this case, if it were not for the union, at least three Dubbo workers would be looking for a job right now.

Cr Shields didn't mince words when he talked to the Daily Liberal about the cuts.

"I find it disgraceful Essential Energy could consider cutting jobs when you only have to drive around the Dubbo region to see multiple street lights out," he said.

"Even the council is struggling to be able to get Essential Energy to do basic things, how would a householder be able to get any service from them?

"They provide an essential service which Essential Energy essentially doesn't give a damn about.

"The level of customer service coming out of Essential Energy is appalling, and the idea that further cutting jobs will improve that customer service is absurd if anything they need to be ramping up customer service and field service teams rather than cutting them."

Daily Liberal reader Simon Wiliams questioned the common sense of Essential Energy big wigs who decided to cut jobs, and his comments were in-line with many of our readers.

"So the electrical network still needs a lot of maintenance done to it, and they need numerous employees to fix the power when there is a blackout, but yet they keep on making forced redundancies!" he said.

Maintain the rage people, because whilst The ETU has done an excellent job in temporarily keeping the job cuts at bay, they won't be permanently successful if public sentiment, which is a valuable negotiating tool, isn't with them.