BY MICK BULL
After two years and more than $60 million of taxpayers' money, the recommendations from the federal government's building industry royal commission have been put into proposed legislation. The draft Building and Construction Industry Improvement Bill (BCII bill), was released by industrial relations minister Tony Abbott for public comment on September 18. If the bill is passed and successfully implemented, it will all but destroy the building unions in this country. It will:
1. Establish an Australian building and construction commissioner (ABCC) and a federal safety commissioner (FSC).
The ABCC is being described as a "watch dog", but is clearly intended to be more like an anti-union attack dog. With a team of building inspectors supported by a team of lawyers, financial advisors, industry experts and support staff, the commissioner will be armed with enormous powers to sue unions and individuals.
The FSC will prohibit the workforce from taking industrial action over occupational health and safety issues.
2. Restrict pattern bargaining.
A government summary of the bill explains that it encourages "genuine bargaining at the enterprise level" and claims that "pattern bargaining is not 'genuine bargaining'". If passed, the bill will give the Australian Industrial Relations Commission (AIRC) the power to suspend or terminate a bargaining period where a party engages in pattern bargaining.
"Pattern bargaining" is a tactic employed by militant unions in order to maximise workers' collective strength. Because industrial agreements are now negotiated at a workplace level, unions co-ordinating pattern bargaining campaigns will get agreements across an industry that have a common finishing date. They will then conduct simultaneous struggles across work sites for agreements with common standards of pay and conditions.
With a common struggle, more strongly unionised work sites are able to set a standard that forces bosses across the industry to give their workers better conditions.
Abolishing pattern bargaining could thus kill off unions' ability to regulate wages and conditions throughout the building industry.
3. Provide mandatory "cooling off" periods during which industrial action is not permitted.
If protected industrial action is granted during a fight for an enterprise bargaining agreement, then the "cooling off" period kicks in after only 14 days, when the dispute would be referred to the industrial relations commission. The commission would then be instructed to hand down a simplified award that will be limited to providing only basic entitlements.
In a nut-shell, if the employer can last through two weeks of industrial action, then the employees will have to accept the simplified award. The simplified award would strip away many current entitlements, such as site allowances — meaning a 50% pay cut. Other award provisions such as site amenities and safety facilities would also be slashed.
The "cooling off" clause would also spring into action over a safety dispute, but in this case it would be implemented before industrial action was taken. If an unsafe situation developed that may cause industrial action, no action could be taken for 14 days and then only by secret ballot. In the meantime, workers could be maimed, or even killed.
4. Allow bosses to "recover any losses they suffer due to unlawful action".
All industrial action other than a two-week period every three years would be deemed illegal under this act. If the workforce was to take any other industrial action, such as over a safety issue, it would expose them and their unions to considerable damages financially.
The ABCC would also have the power to pursue damages on behalf of the employers, even if the company decided not to pursue any court action.
The bill will also empower the Federal Court to "undo transactions" by organisations which move "assets and incomes" in an attempt to avoid paying damages for industrial action.
5. Strengthen so-called freedom of association provisions.
The ABCC could determine that "coercion" had been used against a worker to force him or her to join a union.
6. Enhance the "right of entry system" and limit the scope for state laws to be used to circumvent federal requirements.
For a union organiser to gain entry to a workplace under this bill, he or she would have to give 24 hours' notice to the employer and tell the boss which worker requested the union visit.
If a union organiser's "federal permit is suspended or revoked, entry to a building site [would] not [be] permitted under state law".
7. Ensure that registered organisations are "accountable for the actions of their officials and employees".
According to the government's summary, "The BCII bill will also regulate the deduction of membership fees, expand the grounds for the deregistration of organisations [unions] and allow the Federal Court to disqualify a person from being an officer or exercising specific powers in an organisation, if found to have contravened the BCII bill, [workplace relations] Act or state industrial law".
8. Increase penalties and enhance access to damages for unlawful conduct.
Unlawful industrial action will be penalised by a maximum fine of $110,000 for the union and/or $22,000 for individuals under this bill. "Misdemeanours" would be penalised by a fine of up to $11,000 for the union and $2200 for the individual. A person refusing to answer any question of the ABCC will risk being fined $2200.
Victorian Construction, Forestry, Mining and Energy Union (CFMEU) state secretary Martin Kingham is calling on all unions, workers and community groups to oppose this legislation.
"This legislation will initially be used against building workers, but if successful, it will flow on to all other industries. If we don't stand together now it will be too late tomorrow. We call on the federal senators to block all aspects of this legislation", he said.
Nationally, the CFMEU will have a week of action against the legislation beginning on October 7 and culminating with protests in Adelaide on October 13.
The Victorian building unions will hold a mass meeting and rally on October 8. As details are confirmed, they will be avilable at the Green Left Weekly web site <http://www.greenleft.org.au>.
[Mick Bull is on the Victorian state management committee of the CFMEU's construction division.]
From Green Left Weekly, September 24, 2003.
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