Australia

ALP back-pedals on workers' rights

Since Kevin Rudd and Julia Gillard took the leadership of the Australian Labor Party on 4 December 2006, the ALP's website has been changed to remove any upfront commitment to repeal John Howard's anti-worker laws. Under Labor's previous leader, Kim Beazley, the ALP's commitments were vague, but at least the ALP website featured, on its front page, a picture of Beazley tearing up the Howard legislation, and it was easy to find on it speeches by ALP leaders promising the repeal the legislation, even if they were evasive about the ALP's alternatives. All that has gone. There is no link from the...

OK to sack you, as long as it's "operational"

Under John Howard's industrial relations legislation, businesses with under 100 employees are exempt from unfair dismissal regulations, and larger businesses are exempt too, if they fire an employee for "genuine operational reasons". The full bench of the Australian Industrial Relations Commission ruled on 15 January that "operational reasons" means pretty much anything short of the employer coming up to you and saying in everyone's hearing: "I'm sacking you for no other reason than that I am unfair, vindictive, racist, and sexist". The commission found it was legal for cinema giant Village...

Gallop on Rudd

The first comment from a prominent Labor figure on new ALP leader Kevin Rudd's sweeping disavowal of socialism has come from former WA premier Geoff Gallop. Gallop was a friend of Tony Blair at university, and is reckoned close to Blair today. So the comment is not incisive. In fact, although Gallop has mysteriously got himself into a university teaching job since quitting as premier, the piece reads like what a defiantly uninterested high school SOSE student might produce on a bad day. You have to suppose that Gallop endorses Rudd - he says that "market capitalism came to be viewed [by whom...

Rudd and Gillard dump "independent contractors'" rights

The new Australian Labor Party leadership of Kevin Rudd and Julia Gillard has announced another shift towards accommodating John Howard's slaughter of workers' rights. The Australian of 10 January reported that the ALP leadership has abandoned its opposition to the Independent Contractors Act, passed through Parliament in December against ALP opposition. The Act strips "independent contractors" - who may number up to 1.9 million - of any protection from state industrial laws. ALP spokesperson Craig Emerson promised some measures to protect "sham" independent contractors - workers who are...

No fees! No levies! No private schools! Free schooling for all!

Free state education? When my two daughters started year 11 and year 8, respectively, at a state high school this week, it cost me $700; and there'll be another $200 bill coming soon, for year 8 camp. $50 of the costs was an extra, for one of the girls doing instrumental music. The rest were basics: $195 each textbook levy, $160 for a graphics calculator for year 11 maths, $20 for a scientific calculator, $90 for stationery. Probably I got off more lightly than the average parent, since the girls attend the only state high school in Queensland where there is no uniform to buy. I saw the P&C...

Rudd and Gillard signal shift on AWAs

The new ALP leadership has signalled a softening of Labor's commitment to scrap AWAs (Australian Workplace Agreements, individual contracts under which workers can be pressed into "trading" basic conditions for pay rises, sometimes very small pay rises). The Australian Financial Review of 5 January reported: "Julia Gillard told the Australian Financial Review that under Labor's plans, a collective agreement would not preclude employees from negotiating individual common law employment contracts... these individual agreements would have to comply with a list of minimum conditions that would go...

Kevin Rudd and the ALP

Kim Beazley's parliamentary colleagues have dumped John Howard's political twin as the leader of the opposition Australian Labor Party (ALP). Beazley's abysmal election record, to say nothing of his content free policies, appear to have cost him the job 12 months out from an election. It appears that the thinking in the ALP is that, despite positive polls, Beazley was not popular in the electorate. His `risk averse' policy approach may have impacted on such a perception. Beazley's "small target" approach, where he refused to take a stand on Howard's divisive attacks on asylum seekers but tried...

More action needed to beat anti-union laws

The Australian labour movement mobilised nearly 300,000 people on 30 November for more than 300 rallies and protests, across the continent, against John Howard's anti-union laws. There was strong pressure from employers not to turn out for the protest, during work time. As the ACTU points out: "Under the new IR laws workers can be docked four hours pay for any unauthorised work stoppage... In businesses with less than 100 employees, workers have no protection from being sacked unfairly and can be sacked without warning". Federal government employee "Greg McCarron was forced to appeal to a Full...

Call centres - the new sweatshops?

It's the lower end of the call-centre industry I'm working in, here in Brisbane. It's in the lower half of the industry – outbound, rather than the comparatively aristocratic inbound call-centres – and it's a small, low-tech operation within that lower half. We don't have headsets and we don't have automatic dialling (systems which dial the next number on your list as soon as you end the previous call). It's just a room with benches, seats, and 22 phones. There are some skimpy bench-top screens, but it's pretty noisy. Some of the workers prefer it to other call-centres they've worked in...

UK trade unionists rally to support Australian workers

From Amicus: Hundreds of UK trade unionists are to protest outside the Australian Embassy this week (Thursday 30th November) at anti-worker and anti-trade union labour laws introduced by the Australian government. Nearly a year after the introduction of some of the most draconian employment legislation ever seen in the industrialised world, UK trade union members are to protest outside the Australian Embassy on the Aldwych. Amicus’ General Secretary is also writing to Australian Prime Minister, John Howard and Amicus’ activists will write to their Australian counterparts to pledge their...

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