ASU: Abbott's War on Workers

From ASU Secretary Sally McManus

Tony Abbott has just released the policy he will implement if he wins the 14 September election and gets control of the Senate as John Howard did when he introduced WorkChoices. I have represented ASU members under many laws over the years, including under WorkChoices and know very well the effect of his proposed changes on your rights at work and the ability of your union to defend members and negotiate agreements.

Here is my quick summary of his policy and how it will affect you:

1. Mandate individual contracts in all collective agreements. Workers cannot bargain to restrict the employer from undermining collective agreements. These individual contracts are another form of AWAs.
2. Take away a proportion of annual leave loading from your leave entitlements when your employment ends.
3. Consider taking away the excellent long service leave provisions that all NSW workers have - reducing them to the lower provisions that exist in other states (eg. Long service leave is after 15 years in Victoria).  
4. Weaken the Award safety-net (loosen then "better off overall test" so agreements can go below even the Award minimum).
5. Make it easier for employers to introduce individual contracts outside of the Award or EBA.
6. Make it harder for workers to cancel or get out of individual agreements.
7. If your employer transfers their business to another employer, your existing rights at work will only be protected if you transfer voluntarily.
8. Massively weaken protections for workers and delegates who are discriminated against for trying to enforcing a right they have under law (eg. this is a law Labor introduced to stop employers from discriminating or acting against delegates for standing up for others (or individuals standing up for themselves) when their employer does the wrong thing).
9. Establish an appeal mechanism for the Fair Work Commission. This could allow decisions like the Equal Pay decision for ASU SACS members to be overturned.
10. Conduct a review of the whole Fair Work Act by the Productivity Commission, which views everything from the perspective of what is good for the economy first and foremost, not from the perspective of the rights for workers. We do not know what they would recommend, but can imagine what big business will ask for. This gives Abbott lots of room to make lots of changes after the election.
11. Return right of entry provisions to the WorkChoices laws making it much harder for your Union Organiser to visit you in your workplace.
12. Make taking legal strike action even harder. There are already so many hoops to jump through. The Fair Work Commission will be given the power to prevent action if they determine workers claims are not "reasonable" (we have made – and won - many claims that maybe seen as “unreasonable” such as “no forced redundancies” at Railcorp and a 40% pay increase for SACS workers) AND if workers are not seriously considering the employers claims for productivity improvements (in my experience, “productivity improvements” are nearly always about reducing rights of workers).
13. Restrict your Union officials in the operation of their job by introducing laws regarding union officials "bullying" employers!
14. A paid parental scheme for, in Tony Abbott’s words, "women of calibre" (ie earning $150K) paid for by a tax on large companies. Companies such as Qantas are already raising in EBA negotiations that they will have to cut back on our claims because of this.
15. Bring back a special police force (ABCC) for building workers which give them less democratic rights than any class of people in Australia, including the right to silence. Set up a special anti-union code for building projects and refuse to fund any projects that do not comply.
16. Set up a special "Commission" that oversees the internal operations of all unions and tie members’ resources up in red tape. Apply huge fines and jail terms for breaches of the new law.
17. Allow employers to force through "greenfield agreements" (this is an agreement where the employer sets up a new company with no workers) by giving Unions 3 months to agree to the terms of an Agreement and if they don’t have the court decide.
18. If you are underpaid, Abbott will generously allow you to keep any interest on money taken from you (but it will be harder to make a successful underpayment case - see above re: right of entry for union officials)
19. Abolish minimum hourly rates for truck drivers to stop them being pushed to drive dangerously and take drugs to meet the deadlines imposed on them.