Sue Bolton, Melbourne
The federal Coalition government's announcement on May 26 of its new draconian anti-worker legislation has resulted in an avalanche of calls to union offices and ALP offices.
Perhaps Prime Minister John Howard has been emboldened by the ACTU's promise that it would not support industrial action against the government, because the legislation cuts more deeply into workers' rights than had been indicated previously. Among the proposed changes are the following:
- Companies with up to 100 employees will be exempted from unfair dismissal laws. Previously the government claimed it would only exempt companies with fewer than 20 employees.
- Responsibility for setting the minimum wage will be removed from the Australian Industrial Relations Commission (AIRC) and given to a new body called the Australian Fair Pay Commission. It is meant to be "non-adversarial" and to take into account the likely impact of a wage increase on employment levels, particularly in low-paying sectors. It has been reported that the new commission will have treasury and business representatives on it.
- Award conditions will be cut further, from 20 conditions to 16. The provisions to be cut are jury duty, superannuation, long-service leave, and notice of termination, with the government claiming that these conditions are already covered by legislation. However, jury duty under state legislation only provides for payment at a rate well below an employee's normal rate of pay.
- Currently, workers who are switching from awards to individual contracts (AWAs) are meant to suffer no disadvantage (although this "no disadvantage" test isn't always enforced by the Office of the Employment Advocate). This "no disadvantage" test will disappear because the award safety net will be abolished and replaced with just four minimum standards.
Although awards will still exist, AWAs and non-union agreements will only have to comply with the four minimum legislated standards plus minimum wage rates. The four conditions are four weeks annual leave, eight days' personal leave, 52 weeks' unpaid parental leave, and a standard working week of 35-40 hours.
Employers will be able to negotiate away all other conditions — overtime pay rates, times during which ordinary hours can be worked, redundancy pay, higher pay rates for shifts and weekend work, annual leave loading, casual loading, conversion of long-term casuals to permanent, public holidays and pay for work on public holidays, any allowances like being reimbursed for work expenses, long-service leave and superannuation.
- The Office of the Employment Advocate will have the power to approve all wage agreements. The AIRC will only be left with dispute resolution powers.
- All awards are to be reviewed in order to introduce another round of industrial relations changes in about 12 months' time.
- Secret ballots before decisions on strike action are to be compulsory.
- Pattern bargaining will be legislated against.
- Union officials' access to workplaces will be restricted to a time and place determined by employers.
- Workers who are regarded as "independent contractors" such as a delivery driver who owns his/her own van but is employed by a big transport company, will be denied union protection and employee entitlements.
- A single national industrial relations system is to be created. If the states don't agree to hand over their industrial relations powers to the federal government, the corporations power in the constitution will be used to take over the state systems.
These are very far-reaching changes, and yet Business Council of Australia CEO Hugh Morgan and Wesfarmers CEO Michael Chaney say the government hasn't gone far enough and should have cut award conditions to just six.
From Green Left Weekly, June 1, 2005.
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