PRIME MINISTER
STATEMENT BY THE PRIME MINISTER, THE HON P. J. KEATING, MP
JOBSBACK 11-ATHING OF THE PAST ~ L Jr
The statement yesterday by the Shadow Minister for Industrial Relations
effectively re-launched the failed Coalition industrial relations policy,
Jobsback. The new " evolutionary" policy has ostensibly lost the more nasty elements
which made Jobsback so unpopular in 1993. On the face of it, one could
interpret this as flattery: Mr Howard and Mr Reith appear to be admitting that
Labor's policy of measured change in the labour market is right. But in truth
the " admission" comes as a disguise for their traditional nasties.
We are told that the three dollar per hour youth wage has been dropped, and
current employees will only be on individual contracts if they choose. In other
respects Jobsback is essentially intact.
The only difference is the camouflage. The old wolves in wolves' clothing
have reverted to being wolves in sheep's clothing.
It is, of course, another step in the re-packaging of John Howard as an
ideological cuddly, another ingredient in the making of a Coalition policy
blancmange. Mr Reith appears to be selling the new policy on the basis that Australian
workers who do not choose individual contracts will be protected in the future
under current awards. Awards which under the Howard/ Reith system will
apparently be frozen in time.
Mr Reith either fails to understand or deliberately fails to address two
fundamental problems with his policy.
First, contrary to Mr Reith's apparent assumption, the labour market is not a
pool it is a river. There is a constant turnover of jobs. Each month 130,000
new positions are filled. The people chosen to fill them new entrants and
re-entrants to the labour market, those changing jobs will be fair game
under the Howard/ Reith system.
Employers will naturally take on those new workers under the cheapest
individual contract.
Presumably Mr Howard and Mr Reith are not oblivious to these facts.
Presumably they know that in the last year over 1 1/ 2 million new job
openings were filled. And because they also know that those wanting the
award will not be preferred, they must know that under their system in time all
employees will be subtly coerced into individual contracts.
That means not a free labour market, but one based essentially on the Master
and Servant provisions of the English Common Law. It does not mean a level
playing field in the labour market: rather, it means a return to the inequality
and authoritarianism of the past.
Under the Howard/ Reith policy the safety net of minimum conditions will be
much reduced. Among the conditions up for grabs will be overtime rates,
shift allowances and holiday loadings.
The essential difference between the new Jobsback and the old can be
illustrated by the case of Mr Howard's driver. Under the old Jobsback his
driver stood to lose the extra $ 100 a week he earns in overtime. Under the
new Jobsback he can keep it he can stay on the award. It is the driver who
replaces the present one who stands to lose; because he will be employed on
an individual contract a contract he will have to negotiate from a position of
profound weakness. In short, he can take it or leave it.
Under the Howard/ Reith plan, the paid overtime and penalty rates on which
so many Australians rely to make ends meet will increasingly become a thing
of the past.
Which is precisely how the new Jobsback might be described. It is a thing of
the past. It is the old Jobsback in a cheap disguise.
And what is the justification for these draconian plans? Low profits? No.
Low employment growth? No. Low productivity growth? No. Industrial
discord? Hardly. Mr Howard and Mr Reith have no case. What they have
instead is the same ideological obsession they have always had.
CANBERRA 22 FEBRUARY 1995