Justice Kirby attacks Industrial Relations Commission critics
PM - Friday, 22 October , 2004 18:24:24
Reporter: Kate Arnott
MARK COLVIN: High Court Justice Michael Kirby has launched an extraordinary attack on critics of the Australian Industrial Relations Commission, calling them "industrial ayatollahs".
Justice Kirby also said those who wanted to abolish the IRC were living in a fantasy world.
Today in Melbourne, he shared the stage with the Workplace Relations Minister, Kevin Andrews, who seemed even more determined to push ahead with widespread reforms of the industrial relations system.
Kate Arnott reports.
KATE ARNOTT: They may have gathered to celebrate the centenary of conciliation and arbitration in Australia, but it was a deeply divided audience in Melbourne today.
As a former deputy president of the Australian Conciliation and Arbitration Commission, Justice Kirby hit out at opponents of the system.
MICHAEL KIRBY: Those in the bully pulpit who attack conciliation arbitration, who think they have the whole truth for all ages, need to be put in their place. There is no room in this nation for industrial ayatollahs. Ours is a more temperate and open-minded society.
KATE ARNOTT: And Justice Kirby didn't stop there. Some, he said, wished to see the Industrial Relations Commission "closed down lock, stock, and barrel" or "converted into a mediatory body with no legal powers of arbitration or intervention".
MICHAEL KIRBY: Persons of such views tend to live in a remote world of fantasy, inflaming themselves into their rhetoric into more and more unreal passions, usually engaging in serious dialogue only with comfortable persons of the same persuasion.
For the rest of us, who live in the real world and know our country and its institutions better, time will not be wasted over such fairy tales.
KATE ARNOTT: The Workplace Relations Minister Kevin Andrews then took to the stage and detailed the Howard Government's plans for sweeping reforms to the industrial relations system, including a changing role for the Industrial Relations Commission.
KEVIN ANDREWS: Change is constant. Australia's future is inextricably linked to economic change. All institutions will have to continue to adapt to a changing economic environment. I am confident that the commission will meet this new challenge in our national journey.
KATE ARNOTT: When it was time for questions from the floor, not surprisingly it was Mr Andrews who was in the union firing line.
SHARAN BURROW: Sharan Burrow ACTU President, I couldn't resist.
(laughs)
Why would we seek to disable or reduce the powers of the commission when 65 per cent of Australians earn under $600 a week? What's the vision that you have minister for a decent working Australia?
(clapping)
KEVIN ANDREWS: Sharan, can I just remind you a couple of facts, not rhetoric. There's 1.3 million extra jobs created under this government, real wages have gone up by at least 13 per cent, industrial disputation is low, interest rates are low, inflation is low, that's not a bad result for ordinary Australians.
KATE ARNOTT: Mr Andrews did not directly address Justice Kirby's comments, and this was the only response from the Prime Minister.
JOHN HOWARD: I haven't seen the text of the comments, but I note that …was that delivered as a part of a judgment?
REPORTER: No, that was speech today he gave in Melbourne.
JOHN HOWARD: Hmm, well I note that, hmm.
MARK COLVIN: The Prime Minister John Howard, ending that report from Kate Arnott.
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