It’s official. The Government’s purpose in introducing the WorkChoices IR legislation is to reduce workers’ wages for “the general health of the economy”. That was Howard’s answer again yesterday when asked what he would say to Annette Harris when, in renewing her contract with the retailer Spotlight’s Coff’s Harbour store, she was offered 2 cents per hour extra in return for losing penalty rates which would strip $91.35 out of her weekly pay.
Messrs Fraid and Fried the head honchos of Spotlight, (pdf file) Australia’s largest chain of fabric, craft and home interiors superstores, have decided to ‘empower’ their workers (a reference to their mission statement) by introducing an AWA that strips conditions to the bare minimum required in the Government’s WorkChoices legislation. The AWA removes penalty rates, overtime, paid rest breaks, breaks between shifts, maximum and minimum shift lengths, and a cap on the number of consecutive days worked for an increased hourly rate of just 2 cents. The net effect is a shift from wages to profits of up to $91 per week for each worker.
Howard’s response in parliament was that lower pay for workers was necessary for “the general health of the economy” in order to create more jobs. Minister Kevin Andrews took up this theme strongly in the Matter of Public Interest debates on 24 May (Hansard p55) and 25 May (Hansard p56) claiming that the real comparison was not the $91 reduction of take home pay under the AWA but the difference between the Newstart allowance and the weekly pay offered under the AWA, an improvement he calculates as $338.10.
Andrews suggested that most of the 40 employees hired by Spotlight in the new store opened at Mt Druitt recently were previously on the dole and hence would be very pleased at their new ascendency to the first rung of the ladder of opportunity. It turns out that indeed 38/40 were, but I’d suggest that it is humbug to imply, as Andrews did, that the store was only opened because the visionary WorkChoices legislation made it economic.
Sharon Bird in reply invited Andrews to go into Annette Harris’s lounge room and explain to her what a wonderful deal she is getting. His argument sounded good in parliament, but in the real world it won’t run, she told him.
If you want to go out there and put the argument, I invite you to try.
Bird explained that the Spotlight stores are mostly staffed by women in the 30 to 60 age range. The standard rate is $14.28 an hour (which the firm is rounding up to $14.30) so the women employed are unlikely to have professional qualifications with which they could pull more money. If these women are currently earning about $33,000 pa I’d suggest that losing about $4,500 would be quite noticeable.
Beazley sees this as “a direct threat to the livelihood, to the happiness and to the economic security of ordinary Australian families� in “heartland middle Australia.�
Spotlight backed off in the case of Annette Harris, which she accepted gratefully, but gave her former hero a serve:
“I thought John Howard was just Prince Charming I guess you’d say in a way,” she said.
“But I tell you now after what’s happened and his arrogant attitude in Parliament - it’s just left me cold, I was just dumbfounded.
“I’d like him to come and walk in my shoes for a day and see what I actually do as a mother and as a worker and then coming home every night.
“I don’t have people serving me for $14.28 an hour, I’ve got to do all that myself.”
Spotlight has 88 stores in Australia and employs about 6,000 staff. It seems that their tactic is to move to the new AWA as they hire new staff and renew contracts.
The National Retailers Association thought that the Spotlight scheme was “pretty smart� and they expect a lot of other retailers to follow Spotlight’s lead. According to Stephen Smith the Office of the Employment Advocate has found that 63% of AWAs remove penalty rates and 52% remove shift loading.
Meanwhile Victoria have just appointed a Workplace Rights Advocate who will name and shame employers acting illegally or unfairly, and the Beazer tells us that the Gosford garbos are being done over by Howard’s IR laws.
Also Naracoorte meat workers get the rough end of the pineapple while overseas guest workers are maintained in full employment.
There’s more at surfdom.
Good round-up Brian, and might I add, what a goddamned surprise. It’s all ideological fun and games until someone gets hurt, and in this case, some of the people hurt are going to swing their votes in 2007. Guaranteed.
Interesting to see, since a lot of these pay reductions appear to be taking place in regional areas, how this will play out for the Nats and Libs who hold seats where it’s happening.
This is exactly what happened in New Zealand when we introduced the Employment Contracts Act in the early 90’s - wages and conditions were slashed, and some workers lost up to 40% of their take home pay.
Ironically, New Zealand politicians are wondering aloud how to close the gap in wages between Australia and New Zealand. But it looks like John Howard is doing it for us…
I don’t think this will play out well for them at all.Everytime Workchoices dominates media coverage there is a corresponding drop in opinion polls for the government.The last issue with that much potency was the Tampa.These stories will only increase over time and must represent a huge burden for the government come election time.It is always a risk for a government to present ideaology as good public policy.
In the case of retail stores like Spotlight, I’d like to see the ACTU organise a consumer boycott of them. Though I suspect that the free market’s probably illegal under WorkChoices.
The problem will be whether the ALP can make sufficient capital out of it and not simply leave the running to the ACTU. For mine I don’t think such a bang up job.
On the matter of media coverage, Spotlight was struggling for air last week because of East Timor, Aboriginal issues etc (understandably). It didn’t break through to ABC TV until last night, as far as I’m aware. Then only because Beazely and those in shot view behind him held up very colourful and professionally made placards when Beazley asked his lead question yesterday.
The media releases I linked to were not picked up in the mainsteam press this morning. But I heard a reference to Annette Harris in the Gold Coast Advocate and stories like the Naracoorte meat workers are bound to be news locally.
Christine, they are trying, they are really trying as yesterday’s unparliamentary stunt shows.
“the real comparison was not the $91 reduction of take home pay under the AWA but the difference between the Newstart allowance and the weekly pay offered under the AWA, an improvement he calculates as $338.10.”
Well, now they have stated their true position it loud and clear, haven’t they? As far as the Libs are concerned, we should all just be bloody grateful to have a job at all. Anything beyond that is a privilege for CEOs and politicians.
I think some in the media and government would like it if Workchoices was never mentioned in the media again.At some point though the government are going to have to sell the Workchoices legislation to the public and if they can’t,they will lose the next election and judging by the “success” of their last media campaign it is not going to be easy.The whole issue of working conditions and penalty rates is so potent as an issue that it makes the 2004 interest scare campaign pale in comparison.Labor will insure there will be plenty of media coverage on this issue during the election campaign and in the mean time it will just keep bubbling along in the background.This legislation has been a life long ambition of Howards and would explain why he is prepared to take such a risk on it.I just think the issues around Workchoices are so fundemental to peoples living conditions and well being it is hard to think of an issue that can override it.
I’m confused.
Annette Harris gets a once-off back-down, but the 40 Mt Druitt Spotlight workers (and many others, I assume) just have to wear it?
Well, bully for Annette, but apart from the exquisite irony of her being a (former) Howard-hugger, I don’t understand what the media thinks it is doing when it runs this sort of selective crusade/story (one that ends, more often than not, with a victory for a single, middle-class “battler�-manque, and a good deal of media self-righteousness all round).
Shouldn’t the real story be about the powerless masses?
Yes, much of the meeja seems bored with this already and has moved on.
But this may be one issue where local media and word-of-mouth turns out to be more important than saturation coverage.
Word of mouth is going to be the best bet
I’ve just told a couple of workmates the Spotlight story. They had no idea that the IR laws were already taking effect on people’s lives. Looks like it will take a while for the media to start drumming home the realities of our ‘brave new world’.
Problem out here is ‘The West Australian’ is so blinded by its hatred for the state Labor govt that it is rare for any other news to get any traction.
If these workers don’t resign and get other jobs, or Spotlight can get new workers at the new wage, then obviously Annette and her colleagues were overpaid. By all means, argue for greater equity in incomes and wealth re-distributon. But arguing for it to be done through job-destroying state intervention in the labour market is just plain nutty.
Also, there seems to be some disconnect in the Left re: wage growth and interest rates. When Howard cuts taxes, it is derided as inflationary policy that will put pressure on interest rates. But then higher wages are inflationary too, aren’t they?
Yes Brian, I thought the newspaper stunt in parliament was abrilliant idea. Should be more of it - colour and movement.
A boycott difficulty is that is actually quite hard to buy lots of the things in Spotlight somewhere else, particularly in r&r areas - when’s the last time you walked past a haberdashe?
If a business is trading shop hours, under the typical NSW award, and can get plenty of staff, why is it paying “overtime” and “penalty rates”?
Yo-yo,
What “wage growth” are you talking about? This is about wage CUTS. This woman would have been earning less money than she was before. Maintaining her earnings at the same level is not inflationary.
How is that we are expected to consume goods and services for the sake of the economy, if we can’t afford to pay for them? How does this work? Pay people less, and presumably this means they can afford less? Doesn’t it? This leads to a down turn in consumer spending and as a result the market tightens. Businessess feel less viable, profits are not what they were and cutbacks must be made. (To satsify the demands of share holder of course, of course.)
First to go are the workers, (those pesky upstart insubordinates who imagine they have rights). These people are in turn forced onto the dole, whereupon they are subject to some pretty tricky hoop jumping, an overwhelming degree of opprobrium from everyone else and lest they succeed with their hoop jumping as of July 1st, be simply starved for 8 weeks. Not quite enough time to actually kill them. Or is it? Starve or be forced into theft or fraud–there’s your choice. I suppose they could get a job (I hear you cry) and I suppose they could. But have you tried to get a job without a razoo to rub against another? It is impossibleur. Besides generally speaking society looks down upon the poor, as nasty suspect people, and not the sort we want anything much to do with.
The end result? A term in jail, where finally big business can get the cheap and ‘captive’ labour they’ve been so longing for. Its very neat really. May as well cut to the chase, and go down to the police station and hand yourself in now.
Steve:
“If a business is trading shop hours, under the typical NSW award, and can get plenty of staff, why is it paying “overtimeâ€? and “penalty ratesâ€??”
Well, penalty rates are supposed to offset a casual/contract employee’s lack of super, sick pay and holiday pay. So they can save up for when they get sick/old/in need of a holiday. Overtime, well that’s what you pay someone who works overtime. So, if a store wants to be able to hire and fire at will (sorry, have a ‘flexible workforce’) it has to employ casuals/contractors - but until Workchoices had to pay a price for providing none of the above benefits/job security.
Simple, isn’t it?
This just in from Spotlight’s Customer Service types:
Dear Customer,
Thank you very much for your recent email raising your concerns. We
appreciate your feedback and certainly take your comments on board.
Spotlight is currently working closely with staff to keep them informed
of the facts of the issues raised and would sincerely appreciate your
giving consideration to continuing your support.
I hope the employees aren’t just getting “the facts of the issues raised” from the BRW 500 listed heads of the company. What a fucked world when the costs of job creation are borne by workers with low pay and unstable conditions.
And yes, I have been a customer.
A link to add, perhaps Brian or other editor: the ACTU’s Your Rights At Work Spotlight Campaign.
The reply I got came from an email sent via that campaign - the first occasion that a company has bothered to do so. Might have been the customer part!
Matt D,
Yes, I can see that. I am simply pointing out that when Howard cuts tax, he is criticised (in part) for implementing inflationary tax policy because it puts upward pressure on interest rates. But when he implements policy that depresses wage growth, or causes wage cuts, that is still bad, even though it is probably deflationary and reduces upward pressure on interest rates. I’m just saying that the Left cannot have its cake and eat it too on the interest rate issue.
So it looks like the Lying Rodent has hit the nail on the head: What’s good for Spotlight is good for the country.
It looks like we’re commencing the merry journey down the Walmart road. The horrendously low wages paid by Walmart, one of the largest companies in the US, an average of $8.23 an hour, mean that many of its employees remain below the poverty line and have to draw benefits from the state.
In other words federal state social services are, indirectly, subsidising Walmart’s pay and profits. To quote from Wake-up Walmart website:
“The estimated total amount of federal assistance for which Wal-Mart employees were eligible in 2004 was $2.5 billion. [“Harper’s Index,â€? Harper’s Magazine, Vol. 310, No. 1858, 3/2005]
One 200-employee Wal-Mart store may cost federal taxpayers $420,750 per year. This cost comes from the following, on average:
$36,000 a year for free and reduced lunches for just 50 qualifying Wal-Mart families.
$42,000 a year for low-income housing assistance.
$125,000 a year for federal tax credits and deductions for low-income families.
$100,000 a year for the additional expenses for programs for students.
$108,000 a year for the additional federal health care costs of moving into state children’s health insurance programs (S-CHIP)
$9,750 a year for the additional costs for low income energy assistance.
Hang on, Wal-Mart pay taxes like everyone else. To the extent that they pay low wages and make greater profits, they pay a higher amount of company tax. Same with Spotlight. Maybe I am missing something.
Anyway, Wal-Mart’s model of sucking in goods and services from all of the world and selling them in bulk at razor-thin margins has been an absolutely fantastic thing for poor people in the United States. Without their supply-chain initiatives, the average dollar earned by a poor American would not buy as much as it does now.
What I don’t understand is how management think this can be good for their shareholders. Anybody who’s employed people understands that there is an implicit contract here - “I’ll do my best to generate profits by being nice to customers and stay working even when your back is turned, you’ll pay me more than is strictly necessary to keep me off the dole (it’s called an efficiency wage) and won’t treat me as disposable garbage”. Each party violates this contract at their peril, and being seen to violate it by your other employees carries especially heavy costs.
No doubt Spotlight will now complain that their workers are rude and lazy and won’t stay in the job - and that this is said workers’ fault.
If Wal-mart doubled its wages, what would be the effects on employment for its staff and the cost in welfare payments?
What’s good for Walmart is good for America. That’s just beautiful yo-yo.
Hey Yo-Yo,
Your argument on interest rates makes absolutely no sense at all. Now I’m just talking in theory…but…wouldn’t cutting someone’s pay actaully make it harder for them to pay off a mortgage????
Yo-Yo,
I’m not picking on you…well maybe I am…but your post about Wal-Mart. Does that mean you support the buying of imported goods from countries where people live in poverty because they are paid so little?
See Dube, Arindrajit, and Ken Jacobs (2004-08-02). “Hidden Cost of Wal-Mart Jobs”. UC Berkeley Labor Center (Briefiing Paper Series).
Don’t want to get into extended debate on Walmart, other than to say it’s providing a pretty clear roadmap for Australian retail.
Dishing out a direct pay cut (ie, paying $91 less per week for the same work & conditions) can only lower staff morale, productivity, efficiency, diligence, and lastly retention.
I wonder how much thought Spotlight put into the entire scenario?
Yo-yo is a name disliked by the spam filter, so it has to go.
Anyway, here goes.
Christine,
No, what is good for Wal-Mart is not necessarily good for America. However, cheaper goods/services are good for poor people. Is that controversial?
David,
Re: interest rates: I guess my point is about indirect effects. Just like when someone says: “Well Howard’s tax cuts are inflationary so they will ultimately be offset by higher interest rates”, so it could be said that “Well higher wages are inflationary, so any wage rise will ultimately be offset by higher interest rates.” I don’t know whether these statements are true or not, but it seems to me that the Left (OK, maybe not the ‘Left’, but the ALP at least) has inconsistent positions.
Re: imported goods. I think you’ve got it backwards. If we get poor people in developing countries to make our stuff, they won’t be poor for long. This phase of Americans (and Europeans and Australians) going to Wal-Mart (and elsewhere, of course) and buying Asian-manufactured goods is probably the greatest exercise in poverty alleviation the world has ever seen. Again, is this controversial?
Little crystal-ball gazing here Steve, but I suspect they really don’t give a fuck: ‘You’re lucky to have a job. If you don’t like it you can just piss-off.’
Which I think, in a roundabout way, was the PM’s point.
Steve At The Pub, I think that might be the best and most sensible comment on this whole thread so far. There’s hope for you yet.
The two spotlight stores I’ve been in, Campbelltown and Liverpool, have never seemed to suffer from having plenty of staff. It is not an entirely unskilled job.
unrelated to Steve@thepub:
From my experience - I have been dragged all over Sydney for years while the wife looks at fabric - the only reason Spotlight even exists in the fabric market is because most people are reluctant to go to Cabramatta where the fabric is either cheaper, or marginally more expensive but considerably better quality. The staff at Cabramatta have a knowledge of their stock orders of magnitude greater than the typical Spotlight staff. And a wider range to boot. Spotlight’s differentiation is wider aisles and you don’t have to go to Cabramatta. That differentiation is worth nothing though if it isn’t coupled with a staff with at least some knowledge of the stock and its use.
Spotlight’s staff should be exploiting that. But of course, they can’t; Spotlight can absorb reduced business for a few months while they train up new staff but one of their the staff certainly can’t absorb a few months of greatly reduced income while finding a new job. Funny that. Having said that, couldn’t Spotlight have done this anyway before the latest round of IR regulation?
“No, what is good for Wal-Mart is not necessarily good for America. However, cheaper goods/services are good for poor people. Is that controversial?”
Well I think it is Mr Bango, especially when it means shifting manufacturing offshore and depriving people of yer actual jobs.
Avocadia: Having said that, couldn’t Spotlight have done this anyway before the latest round of IR regulation?
No. For a start, all AWAs were subject to the “no disadvantage” test. If you lost penalty rates, sick leave, etc, it had to be adequately compensated in your base rate of pay. This would be assessed against the award.
Now, all you have to do is meet the legal minima, and you do not need to compensate for removing conditions. That’s how Spotlight can offer 2c (which by the way they didn’t have to offer!) in exchange for a raft of benefits. There is no comparison against the award. It is truly a race to the bottom.
Why we need labour market flexibility here
[link]
Just as workers need to be totally free to sack their boss and go and work for themselves or a firm down the road, so the boss needs exactly the same freedom. The rest is just stultifying nanny statism, that never works in the long run. We don’t need any govt interference whatsoever in the rules of engagement in labour contracting. Imagine the hue and cry if the luvvies here at LP were forced by Big Brother govt to employ my set fee building services on a roster basis, rather than choosing me by competitive tender at present. When you support continual interference in the labour market, you need to be aware of achieving what you wish for. Ein supplier, Ein Employer, Ein Volk!
“It is truly a race to the bottom.”
Oh no, not the old- We’re all gunna be Chinese Coolies!
I guess the only answer is for us all to join one big fat union and give ourselves a $100/week wage rise. Hey, why not $200/week since we’re all good unionists?
Christine,
You’re right, it is slightly controversial. But I never understood the controversy because I never understood the mentality that says a comparatively well-off Australian deserves a manufacturing job, but a poor Asian doesn’t.
Spotlight is doing nothing more than trying to squeeze a supplier into selling at a better rate.
If can get their labour supplied at a better rate, why shouldn’t they take the opportunity?
For the reasons you set out above? And Liam thought you were doing so well!
“We don’t need any govt interference whatsoever in the rules of engagement in labour contracting
Government interference? Wouldn’t know offhand how many pages in the Serfchoices legislation, and which is absolutely designed to regulate relations between employers and employees, would you observa?
“If can get their labour supplied at a better rate, why shouldn’t they take the opportunity?”
And if employees want to join together, organise in the workplace, and take industrial action in support of better pay and conditions, why shouldn’t they? But I forget, Serfchoices wraps the whole process up in so much red-tape that if caught-out individual employees face fines of up to $22,000 for each ‘breach’ of the legislation.
“I never understood the mentality that says a comparatively well-off Australian deserves a manufacturing job, but a poor Asian doesn’t.”
Goodness me, what is this sudden outbreak of altruism? PM calling for workers to accept wage-cuts for the ‘good of the economy’, sudden concern for the employment prospects of poor Asians? If I didn’t know better I’d say somebody’s put something in the senapod tea.
“PM calling for workers to accept wage-cuts for the ‘good of the economy’, sudden concern for the employment prospects of poor Asians? If I didn’t know better I’d say somebody’s put something in the senapod tea.”
That’s right, Christine. Everyone who disagrees with you agress with John Howard. Must be comforting to live in that nice, simple black-and-white world of yours.
“And if employees want to join together, organise in the workplace, and take industrial action in support of better pay and conditions, why shouldn’t they?”
And naturally if companies wish to band together to set the price of goods, ie collude for the purpose of price fixing, why shouldn’t they?
For the same reason as workers ought to be allowed to unionise and collectively bargain - the workers are individuals who have little bargaining power confronted with companies, and so are consumers. Therefore collective bargaining is a right given to the powerless to equalise bargaining power, not to those who already have the power.
And derrida derider is exactly right. Your commitment to your employer is normally related to their commitment to you.
As to Walmart, if companies in the US paid decent wages, there wouldn’t be so many poor people who they’re apparently doing such a favour to by selling cheap goods.
Somewhere in the economics of all this, the advocates of freedom of contract missed the concept of “effective demand”.
And it’s interesting to observe that Howard and his fan club have given up asserting that WorkChoices will raise wages. You’re not going to win too many votes by telling people who’ve just taken a 4 grand pay cut that their sacrifice is “good for the economy as a whole”.
Those who have the power don’t have the right to collective bargain?
That rules out trade unions then!
“And naturally if companies wish to band together to set the price of goods, ie collude for the purpose of price fixing, why shouldn’t they?”
Oh come on Steve, comparing groups of workers to price-fixing by big business? That’s hardly much of a comparison.
In fact while Serfchoices prohibits so-called pattern bargaining by workers, it lets employers off the hook by allowing them to do exactly that by ‘offering’ identical workplace agreements.
You can hardly deny, given the numerous cases that have arisen since the introduction of the legislation (Cowra, Pulp Juice, Telstra), that the laws have been designed to place employees in a position of relative powerlessness while handing all the bargaining chips to the employer.
Steve, try to be less obtuse. The point of trade unions is to empower workers collectively. Just about every obstacle to collective bargaining that can be put in their way has been done so in the new legislation. Hence they can, and they will, cut take home pay.
So anti-competitive practices are being outlawed.
Profiteers who have been selling overpriced goods have had their legislative protection removed, and the price is being driven down by the market.
The problem is?
I’d check that rum bottle, steve.
Mark, would you believe Howard and Andrews were still saying just that in parliament.
Apart from ‘it’s good for the economy’ there defence than ran to ‘the best form of welfare is a job and we have created x million jobs’, then to ‘anyway over the last 10 years real wages have increaded by 16%, whereas under the Accord they hardly increased at all’.
(Hence we are magically supposed to believe that will continue, and you shouldn’t worry if you’re getting less because it is more than compensated by someone else getting more.)
Then they just raved on about Beazley black holes, interest rates and anything else that came to mind.
But you are right, it’s going to be hard to sell to the affected voters.
Another defence used by Howard in response to the OEA survey which found the large-scale removal of penalty rates and shiftwork loadings, is that 80% of the AWAs involve an above-award rate of pay. I think there is scope for some serious analysis of this issue down the track, but I’d assume that the workers are not being fully compensated for the conditions lost. If so the bosses still save money and our PM prevaricates (again).
Labor are going to chip away on this one. Beazley, I understand, left a Melbourne radio station to go and stand outside a Spotlight store and also visited the garbos at Gosford. Come election time they should have an excellent collection of qoutes.
According to Stephen Smith in August last year Howard said to Alan Jones:
Brian, 2c more an hour would be an above award rate of pay.
Yes, Brian. Let’s say your award rate is $15 an hour. If I increase it to $15.50 an hour but do away with penalty rates whereby you were paid $22.50 an hour and get rid of all shift loadings, meal allowances, etc. then you’re being paid “above award” wages but you’re still getting less money because as Robert correctly points out, there is no longer a “no disadvantage” test.
Steve, what the legislation does is to enshrine anti-competitive practices. The government has essentially signed up to the agenda of the Business Council of Australia.
I just wonder, though, whether the new laws are going to have unintended negative consequences for business. If we use Cowra as an example, workers were told ‘lose up to $180 a week or no job’. Now surely this level of reduced spending is going to have a pretty significant impact on regional economies. Not to mention the fact that in these situations people won’t be able to meet things like mortgage and loan repayments, so there’s a knock-on effect to the banks.
Still I wouldn’t hang my hat on the laws, unpopular as they are, being sufficient for people to elect the useless rabble over at Club Labor come next election. I have gazed into the crystal ball and predict the government will hedge its bets by tweaking the legislation sometime before next year purely as a window-dressing exercise.
It was reported on Lateline tonight that the preliminary investigation into the Cowra matter by the Government’s Office of Workplace Services found that the Meatworks was acting within the law when employees were dismissed and were invited to re-apply for jobs paying $180-200 less a week.
They can tweak all they like but the cat is out of the bag.He has let his real intentions be known and there will no be going back from here.Howard as soon as he got a senate majority could not wait to race out and pass his lifelong legislative dream without taking it to the electorate at an election.I personally know of previously keen Howard supporters who did not like the fact that he obtained a senate majority after the last election and were worried.Well he certainly confirmed that worry when he raced the Workchoices legislation through the senate with as little debate as possible.The “useless rabble” line may bring comfort to Coalition supporters but when it comes to throwing out governments the Australian electorate generally aren’t to pertubed about who is leading the opposition as Howards election victory in 1996 demonstrates.The laws are deeply unpopular and if Howard can manage to sell them to the electorate then he really is a political genius.Imho he will leave before christmas and pass the “lemon” onto Costello to sell.
Mark: Rum bottle is checked. If that works for you fine, I prefer tea leaf reading myself.
But still this doesn’t explain the apparent problem with lowering of wages.
Christine: How does the legislation enshrine anti-competitive practices? I have been on the business end of other anti-competitive practices aplenty. It isn’t pleasant, & I don’t expect it to end anytime soon.
What is anti-competitive in allowing people to bargain their own conditions?
Brian: Going to be quite a task to analyise AWA’s. There are now almost 20,000 of them lodged since passing of the new legislation. They apply to approximately 40,000 employees, lodged by some 2,000 employers, most of these employers having less than 100 employees.
Throw in the complexity of analysing all the different award conditions which may have been “agreed out” & all the conditions which may have been “agreed in”.
“What is anti-competitive in allowing people to bargain their own conditions?”
Sorry Steve, my apologies. I didn’t realise the pub was actually on one of the planets orbiting star HD37124.
Perhaps the assembled commenters here can offer suggestions on the relative merits/disadvantages of an AWA being used in my workplace.
Have never given an AWA any thought, until today when I saw that there are 20,000 AWAs lodged, covering 40,000 employees. (1 AWA/2 people) *FLICK*
Here’s more John Howard from the launch of George Megalogenis’ latest book The Longest Decade:
Interesting!
What I find the most sickening about this entire debate is that it is utterly concerned with the economics of the situation.
Ther was once a day when things like Happiness, Honesty, Respect and Fairness were a significant part of what everyone sought in life.
John Howard’s regime certainly did not start the trend toward purely fiscal thinking but they have embraced it and extended it to it’s logical conclusion. I think we’re almost there.
This whole discussion has been framed in the economics of the situation - even for those for whom I think the economics are less relevant. Where is the discussion about an employer’s respect for their employees? Where are the questions about how this assault on people’s livelihood will affect their happiness? How fair is it that we ask every person to negotiate, when everyone knows that most people are not good at it?
Even when such questions are raised, the context is economic and the response is economic. We’re being forced into the mold of money obsessed, amoral automatons that power the economic machine.
So here’s my addition to the discussion. Why are CEO’s and politicians not taking cuts to their massive pay packets to improve profits and boost the economy? Don’t bother trying to convince me that they work hard enough to earn that kind of money. This isn’t an idealogical war to support free markets or capitalist concepts - it’s a simple matter of the rich cloaking thier grab for more in pseudo-religious claptrap.
I predict hard and troubled decades to come. Wages and conditions will deteriorate until average people finally grasp the breadth of Howard’s betrayal. He (or his successor) will go and the replacement will be no better. Then it will turn nasty. The union movement will be resurrected or reinvented and the balance will begin to swing again, towards fairness.
‘Ther was once a day when things like Happiness, Honesty, Respect and Fairness were a significant part of what everyone sought in life.’
Until some unions like the wharfies and builders said stuff all that and we’ll hop in for our chop so we can be happy and you lot can respect us. Ditto for those shonky bastards that drove a bus through unfair, unfair dismissal laws. Yes it was all about big unions, big govt and big business getting into bed together to screw the rest of us. F…. you Jack I’m alright. Now they all have to sing for their supper and naturally some don’t like it.
‘Why are CEO’s and politicians not taking cuts to their massive pay packets to improve profits and boost the economy?’
Because politicians wages are not set by market forces and CEO’s salaries are dummy. Still if you reckon you’re good enough to have a crack at running the country or some international company for those enormous rewards, feel free to get off your arse and achieve at those levels. Me, I value my weekends and evenings a bit more, although not as much as some.
Yes Workchoices is a convoluted bit of gobbledegook, largely designed to get rid of unfair dismissals for the majority of businesses and redress the rights of employers vis a vis employees to arbitrarily sack their boss at any time. It has to be gobbledegook to placate the usual suspects of course, when what’s really needed is for everyone but the employer and employee to get out of their negotiations in an open competitive market-place. The only law we need is contract law and all employment agreements be in writing and begin with ‘We the undersigned hereby agree..’ The only legislative legal requirement I’d have is that the period of notice to rescind the agreement by either party, be the same as mutually agreed and it be binding on both parties. If they both agree to one hours notice or one months notice, it’s binding for both. How can you possibly require certain fixed wages and conditions in a free market economy, where at any time, anyone and everyone can set up in business as a sole trader for whatever rewards and conditions suit them? The answer should be bleeding obvious.
“redress the rights of employers vis a vis employees to arbitrarily sack their boss at any time”
So yes, slavery has it’s good points.
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“what’s really needed is for everyone but the employer and employee to get out of their negotiations in an open competitive market-place”
Are you implying that a prospective employee and an employer are negotiating on equal footing? That seems to be a central pillar of Howards AWA system and I think it’s utter rubbish. Here’s why:
For most of us, we’re just one of a crowd. We’re disadvantaged by the very fact that we, as an individual, need a job (usually quickly) to live. The employer needs an employee to fill a place at the business. It’s rarely a case of financial ruin for the business if they have to churn through a number of applicants to find one just desperate enough to accept less than the others.
So then the other applicants go elsewhere - to employers who will use the AWA of the most desperate person from the previous situation as a basis for their AWA. And of course time has passed so the job seekers are even more desperate.
As previously observed on this forum, it’s a race to the bottom.
That’s aside from the fact that negotiation is a recognised skill and applicants will be negotiating with trained (or at least experienced) negotiators.
Regardless of some of the excesses of the union movement, at it’s core it addresses this imbalance where, by targetting the weakest members of the community, employers can forcibly drive down conditions across the board.
This idea of a self-balancing market-place has been concocted with complete disregard for the fact that a business’ only motivational imperative is to itself, especially in regards to destabilising any kind of level playing field. It’s like expecting a calm surface in a pond full of feeding crocs.
Well said Belegdel.
It’s a pity that observa’s response displays his usual inability to understand the issues involved. You might as well be talking different languages.
As someone who has been job-hunting for four months, I can assure you that the bargaining power of the employee consists of one thing only: the ability to not take a job. That’s it. That’s your power. You have no say about conditions — as an individual — because there are another 10 people standing behind you, looking for a job.
Now, some people are lucky enough to work in fields where this isn’t the case, and more power too ‘em. My partner could leave his job today and walk into another one with much better pay — only he doesn’t, because he likes his job, but he also happens to work in a field with lots of employment at the moment.
Unfortunately, I’ve rather stupidly dedicated the last 9 years of my life to pursuing a certain career path in which jobs seem to be rarer then hen’s teeth. Sadly, I really enjoy the work when I’ve got it, and I am now forced to choose between giving up on this career path for something more lucrative but less enjoyable, and having to retrain… or continuing doggedly to stick this path out and hope for the best.
So I have started working at a cafe to make ends meet while I try to decide what to do or until a better job comes up. I signed an AWA at this cafe — I don’t get sick leave, holiday leave, overtime or anything else. As it happens, my employers are nice people who pay above award wages and genuinely try to make life easier for their staff — but not to the extent of paying overtime, of course.
All this talk about the employer and the employee being on equal footing is ridiculous — if I remove myself from this place of employment, I don’t have money to pay the rent or buy food, and my employer can find another staff member very easily. Might I get another job to cover my arse? Perhaps. Perhaps not. How the hell do I know? I’m not having a great deal of success in this endeavour so far. Yet I am sure my employer knows they can find another staff member to replace me very easily, and they won’t go bust if I quit.
It’s like being a fly trying to get the attention of an elephant.
“Unfortunately, I’ve rather stupidly dedicated the last 9 years of my life to pursuing a certain career path in which jobs seem to be rarer then hen’s teeth. Sadly, I really enjoy the work when I’ve got it, and I am now forced to choose between giving up on this career path for something more lucrative but less enjoyable, and having to retrain… or continuing doggedly to stick this path out and hope for the best.”
Why can’t I have all the interesting work I like at the price I want right now? Try lack of demand for those services and plentiful supply which means our society faces a choice. Ration it out or let the price signals decide. The former is the age old recipe for tyranny, while the latter means freedom to choose and Kate is doing just that right now. I have some rather surprising news for Kate. I wouldn’t have got out of bed and gone to the coalmine every day all these years if I didn’t get paid, selfish mercenary bugger that I am. Yes the O was faced with some unpleasant tradeoffs too, when clearly he was born for much higher things. God why hast thou forsaken me all these years when I was your chosen one?
I read this in sihanokville,cambodia where a mechanic makes $20 week and a factory worker $12.
If australians accept being shafted by howard and andrews we workers will end up like cambodians.
All will depend on how the media play the stories-I am not optimistic.
As foryou yo yo-you are an ignorant, smart arse dickhead with no understanding of battler’s lives.
Dear Santa: Why can’t I have lots of interesting work I love for the prices I like?
Well Virginia, for an economic understanding of the issues try here at
[link]
Read a few of the articles on demand for labour and try to get your head around the notion that essentially the ‘wage’ you can command in a competitive economy is determined by the value of your marginal product (VMP) over the long haul. Essentially what this means is that if an hour of your productive effort(which is reliant upon the physical and human capital you personally have to work with) is worth $x, then that’s what you’ll get in a competitive market. No more and no less. If you demanded more than that, no employer would employ you to lose money on selling the end product of an hour of your labour. OTOH, if there are lots of workers prepared to work for less than that, then employers would have a strong incentive to employ more of their hours, to produce the hours of output that earned them more profits.
There is a snag here for the marshallers and sellers of your labour. Firstly there is not infinite demand for the product of your labour and as the supply increases, the market clearing price begins to fall with diminishing marginal returns to consumers. At some stage of this market maturation process, the demand for the product(ie its clearing price) falls sufficiently to equate the supply and demand for labour at its given price(wage). Some workers are not prepared to sell their services for that price, largely because they can earn better returns elsewhere in the marketplace, or they simply prefer to smoke bongs on Centrelink payments if available. Whatever turns you on. Here you should also note that suppliers of labour may change their preferences for supplying labour. eg they may come to view nursing or plumbing work as yukky and socially demeaning. It may become more socially desirable to aspire to work in basket-weaving enterprises, so off they go to do basket-weaving courses at esteemed tertiary education institutions for that purpose. Unfortunately a glut of basket-weavers produces a relative fall in their wages(or more realistically if wages are fixed by those with comfy bums on seats already in this subsidised industry, then unemployment ensues for the wannabes), while demand for nurses and plumbers to attend to society’s drips continues unabated. With a growing scarcity of plumbers and nurses, consumers bid up the prices of available service suppliers and of course they in turn offer ever increasing wages and conditions to nurses and plumbers to make profits satisfying the demand. Well you can see where this is going can’t you? At some stage, some prospective basket-weavers decide that at those relative prices, suddenly plumbing and nursing doesn’t seem so yukky anymore. Unfortunately with long qualification lead times, this can present some problems in satisfying demand immediately. In the long run some of the demanders may be dead, if the hospital waiting lists get too out of whack here, or we have to rely on more and more Dr Patels to plug the dyke.
Now of course the real world is a tad more muddy than this. For example, society may in its wisdom decide to control the price of a service for the good of all. eg only paying a prescribed Medicare benefit. This may not be enough to attract a willing supply of nurses at that price to satiate all the yukky demand. Enter the nursing agencies as an intermediary for the supply of labour. They can’t offer most nurses ever increasing wages, but what they can do is offer them a non-price solution by offering them convenient shifts at the going wage, rather than less desirable ones. Unfortunately the patients don’t always fit neatly into those desirable hours and so the hospital administrators have to close wards for elective surgery to cope, as well as boot patients out quickly at less than optimal recuperation times. Welcome to non-price rationing, similar to brownie points for one wage fits all, teaching in remote areas and the like, in order to get back to a cushy metropolitan school.
Now Virginia, what you need to appreciate, is that there is a body of people who believe that market determined wage rates treat people like cabbages, rather than higher universal beings and there is a better way. The planned economy. When you leave school, the Phds in basket-weaving from the Dept of Perfect Outcomes, pop round and assess how you will fit in with their grand plan, which of course they are all omniscient about and don’t you worry your little head about how that came to be. They decide you will become a nurse to fit in with the new Five Year Plan. Hang about sez you. I want to be a basket-weaver like you lot and there’s no way I’m gunna be a yukky nurse. Trust us say they, nursing is much more fun than the Gulag or being treated like a market cabbage.
Oh for god’s sake Observa. Get over yourself, or at least try to be a coherent condescending old fart.
I don’t expect a job, but I do want to do something I enjoy at least marginally, and I don’t see why I should apologise for that — what’s the point of working like a slave for forty years in a job you hate so you can make money to buy shit you won’t enjoy because you’re too busy working in a job you hate? And then you die. Sounds fabbo to me, but I’m sure the knowledged that I was a productive part of the economy will warm the cockles of my worn-out-old-heart.
Yes, sacrifices and choices have to be made. I don’t regret my choices or the sacrifices I’ve made, but the fact that I choose different sacrifices — pay for enjoyment, perhaps? — doesn’t make me an idiot.
My point was not to bemoan my employment or lack thereof or to demand that the universe gives me a job.
My point was that some of us have less choices than others, and that suggesting that employers and employees have an equal balance of power is stupid, and that some things SHOULD be protected in law — like sick leave, for instance, irregardless of supply and demand or markets or whatever.
Kate, was there actually any meaningful argument in that comment by observa that you could interpret?
What Zoe said!