The official IR reform thread! (1 Viewer)

[MoonlightSonata]

This is an important extract from the above program dealing with what the legislation does.

John Buchanan (industrial relations expert at the University of Sydney economics and business faculty) has this to say, after looking closely at the 700-page legislation:

What are the biggest changes that are facing Australian workers?

JOHN BUCHANAN: There are four things going on here.

The first is shrinking the reach of labour law. Currently workers have awards that cover 20 allowable matters there will be only be five issues that are protected in the legislation covered and if you're a casual there will only be three. So the five is not for all it is only for permanent employees.

The second is there’s a move to unify the system through a hostile federal takeover. This will still leave around 2 million workers beyond the reach of the federal system, so it is not going to be totally successful.

Thirdly, there is a big shift in bargaining power so that employers will have far more bargaining power. Unions are going to have significant barriers put in place to taking strikes. It will take at least four to six weeks to get an effective strike up. Under individual lockouts for people in dispute over their AWAs, employers can stand workers down or lock them out on three days notice, no questions asked. Some AWA lockouts have lasted as long as three months.

And the final and the most ironic one is there's a huge centralisation of power in the Minister for Industrial Relations. When you read the bill in all its 700 pages of glory, a lot of issues ultimately turn on what the minister wants to do by direct legislative power or through delegated legislation.

 

[MoonlightSonata]

Love Hawke's responses. Nice find Generator

 

[erawamai]

Insight - Protected by Law

An interesting programme (or so I thought). If you have the time, I suggest that you read through the transcript (or watch one of the repeats).

I saw it last night. The silver lizard is still quite sharp...and funny.

 

[Generator]

If you're interested, use your remote to head over to the ABC to catch the 7.30 Report (on now) for a report regarding the sick leave provisions of the IR reforms.

Edit 2: Or read through the transcript - http://www.abc.net.au/7.30/content/2005/s1501569.htm

Bill Shorten was on ACA earlier today (and someone similar was no doubt on Today Tonight), but I'm not sure as to the specific IR issue that he was discussing (it could have even been about the Boeing workers given that he made note of them last night on Insight, tripping up Hendy in the process).


Edit: ACA dealt with the following -

'Dumped' from workplace hotline job

November 09, 2005


THREE young women employed under contract on the Federal Government's WorkChoice hotline claim they were fired with no notice.

One of the women, who said they were told when they signed a casual contract that the job would last at least three months, said they were sacked after just a month.

The WorkChoice hotline was set up to answer questions about the Government's proposed industrial relations changes.

The women also allege they received insufficient training to complete their job properly.

"I couldn't help people, you know, and I'm not an idiot," one of the women told Channel 9's 'A Current Affair'.

"Had I been trained, I would be able to help people and do the job properly, had I been given that chance.

"It's meant to be this big new change to help Australia and, you know, make our economy better and all that sort of stuff - and I'm unemployed now."

One of the women said she was only told she had lost her job after phoning up to inquire about shifts.

"They just said you've been cut, there's no more shifts, that's the end of your job, basically," another one of the trio said.

Comment is being sought from Workplace Minister Kevin Andrews.

The trio's claims come after a former factory worker who appeared in the government's TV ads promoting industrial reforms says he was misled.

Cameron Meadows, who left the factory soon after the ads were shot, said he was misled into believing the ads were about health and safety.

And Melbourne hairdresser also has alleged she appeared in the ad because she believed she was being filmed for a workplace safety video.


Source: http://www.theaustralian.news.com.au/common/story_page/0,5744,17193633%5E1702,00.html

Haha. If their claims happen to be true, they went to right place to break the story from the perspective of one who is against the reforms, because no matter what many may say about shows like ACA and Today Tonight, nobody can dispute the fact that they are quite popular.

 

[Generator]

IR change 'for our future'

Five-day week extinct: PM

He seems to be ignoring the fact (later raised by the member for Sydney) that for people with kids, or those who work with kids in an educational or caring environment, the working week has not been left behind by the global economy and that we continue to be a five-day-a-week society, no matter the way in which conditions have become more 'flexible' with respect to time.

All of this poses a question regarding Australians and the economy - do we live to work, or do we work to live? I know that it has been asked many times and by many people far more qualified than I, but it's still a question that must forever be raised, it seems.

---

PM dismisses 'absurd hyperbole' of critics

---

Bishop attacks IR laws 'from the 19th century'

 

[transcendent]

i work to live. i have no real interests in a career and only accept work cause it means money and sometimes work is interesting.

 

[Generator]

Govt set to pass IR laws

So much for a proper parliamentary debate.

Edit: Not that anyone was expecting one, of course.

 

[MoonlightSonata]

All of this poses a question regarding Australians and the economy - do we live to work, or do we work to live? I know that it has been asked many times and by many people far more qualified than I, but it's still a question that must forever be raised, it seems.

That's exactly right, what is the point of working if we cannot actually live? I really question this so called demise of the 5-day working week. Sure sometimes work spills over, especially for some professions, but on the whole that is quite an extraordinary claim. It flags a real change that is very disconcerting. Are we to slave away 6 days a week, and spend 1 day "living"? The word "drones" comes to mind.

Again, I cannot but express my deep discontent with the refusal of the government to have proper debate on the issue. As much as I am unsatisfied with both parties at the moment, Beazley has my vote.

I can only hope that that hick Barnaby puts up a fuss.

 

[erawamai]

That's exactly right, what is the point of working if we cannot actually live? I really question this so called demise of the 5-day working week. Sure sometimes work spills over, especially for some professions, but on the whole that is quite an extraordinary claim. It flags a real change that is very disconcerting. Are we to slave away 6 days a week, and spend 1 day "living"? The word "drones" comes to mind.

Again, I cannot but express my deep discontent with the refusal of the government to have proper debate on the issue. As much as I am unsatisfied with both parties at the moment, Beazley has my vote.

I can only hope that that hick Barnaby puts up a fuss.

The IPA (the dryest of dry dry dry thinktanks) guy on the SBS insight said there was nothing wrong with working 7 days. Good for him. I mean isnt that was daylight savings was brought in for? So busy professionals don't die of vitamin D depravation?

 

[loquasagacious]

Neo-liberal economics though; we will only be drones if we want to be. It is our choice to work a 6.5 day week etc etc.

Note: Not necasserily a position i entirely agree with, but food for thought.

 

[erawamai]

Neo-liberal economics though; we will only be drones if we want to be. It is our choice to work a 6.5 day week etc etc.

Note: Not necasserily a position i entirely agree with, but food for thought.

I know...but I really what a BMW 325i in Metallic Gray with 'terra' reddish leather like in this pic

http://www.e90post.com/forums/attachment.php?attachmentid=4908&stc=1

http://www.e90post.com/forums/attachment.php?attachmentid=1843&stc=1,

http://www.e90post.com/forums/attachment.php?attachmentid=2352&stc=1

http://www.e90post.com/forums/attachment.php?attachmentid=2647&stc=1


aluminium trim, code 195 wheels with the comfort access options and xenon headlights...totalling at 80k.

I also really want a plasma TV...and a better computer monitor...a new mobile...perhaps a new watch and some new jeans.

...oh I'd also like an apartment with harbour views

...soo neoliberal economics...if you are up there and listening that's what I want for Christmas.

Thanks in advance

Erawamai

edit: oh and world peace.

 

[erawamai]

THE SMH HECKLER

Introducing SerfChoices

New work laws offer a brave olde worlde, writes Charles Purcell.

The Government is proud to unveil its new industrial relations program - SerfChoices. You may have seen the ads for it already: smiling peasants plough the fields while soothing mandolin music plays. You wouldn't believe how hard it was to find peasants with full sets of teeth for those ads, this being the Middle Ages and all. Or ones that remembered how to smile. But I digress.

SerfChoices features exciting changes to the way your lord handles your employment. In the past, there were many ways you and your lord negotiated. Some lords liked to beat their serfs with maces; some cudgels; some preferred the rack. The Government is pleased to announce there will now be one standard method for beating peasants with large sticks, making it a simpler and fairer system.

SerfChoices also changes the way you, the peasant, negotiate your weekly payment of turnips.

In the past, you negotiated your turnip ration in the presence of your lord and the Government's official torturer, Dagmar the Terrible. The Government is pleased to announce it has eliminated third parties such as Dagmar. Now your lord will beat and torture you directly as you beg for scraps. Once negotiated, your contract will be cast in iron. You can't get much more cast-iron than manacles.
AdvertisementAdvertisement

SerfChoices guarantees that many of your employment conditions remain unchanged. As a peasant, you're not entitled to holidays, so there's no change there. Your medical benefits remain intact - when you pass out in the fields from exhaustion, you will be left until you recover or the wolves take you.

The Government has made it illegal for your lord not to beat you because of race, colour, sex or age. Everyone will be given the same number of beatings, making it a better system for all.

The maximum number of working hours a day will be fixed at 23. One hour is permitted for sleeping, smoking noxious weed from the West Indies, and turnip consumption. Casual peasants will earn a quarter of a turnip and a piece of weevil-infested bread for each hour they work over 23.

Your protection from unfair dismissal will depend on your individual bargaining power - that is, whether or not you can talk your lord out of shooting you with his crossbow. Yet another way the Government is rewarding individual talent.

Thanks to SerfChoices, Sunday will no longer be a day of worship, but of work. Your lord is your living god - you may worship him whenever you please. Collective bargaining - otherwise known as peasant rebellions - will be treated in the usual manner, with the king's horses using the dissenters for speed bumps until they drop their demands.

Over time you may notice that your daily turnip ration goes down. That's because peasants in Upper Saxony and Timbuktu are willing to work for less. SerfChoices will allow us to build foundations for a stronger, more prosperous kingdom. If we don't act now, soon there'll be no turnips for your children and your children's children. And no one wants that.

Readers are invited to apply wit to anything that makes the blood boil.

 

[Generator]

House passes IR bill after debate gagged

 

[Not-That-Bright]

The debate was not gagged, it was not a debate at all.

 

[Sarah]

No surprises there

 

[MoonlightSonata]

hahahha

'SerfChoices'

 

[Generator]

"Work Choices - Well, do you want the funding or not?"

Unis now subject to stricter IR rules

 

[leetom]

The debate was not gagged, it was not a debate at all.

Every Member should be permitted an oppurtunity to voice their rhetoric. The concerns of the electorates whose representatives were denied such an oppurtunity will not be heard, which is non-democratic.

Anybody know if Joyce decides to cross the floor when the Bill is taken to the Senate in a fortnight, will the Government still have the numbers to have it passed? Are there any other Liberals or Nationals wavering?

 

[loquasagacious]

I know...but I really what a BMW 325i in Metallic Gray with 'terra' reddish leather like in this pic

http://www.e90post.com/forums/attachment.php?attachmentid=4908&stc=1

http://www.e90post.com/forums/attachment.php?attachmentid=1843&stc=1,

http://www.e90post.com/forums/attachment.php?attachmentid=2352&stc=1

http://www.e90post.com/forums/attachment.php?attachmentid=2647&stc=1


aluminium trim, code 195 wheels with the comfort access options and xenon headlights...totalling at 80k.

I also really want a plasma TV...and a better computer monitor...a new mobile...perhaps a new watch and some new jeans.

...oh I'd also like an apartment with harbour views

...soo neoliberal economics...if you are up there and listening that's what I want for Christmas.

Thanks in advance

Erawamai

edit: oh and world peace.

Interestingly in a strange way you may have proved my point. That is that for whatever reason you may decide that you value your dream bmw (nice btw) higher than for instance having Saturday off. In other words people are not forced to work a six-day week but choose to do so (or are compelled to do so because on aggregate people choose to). The reason for this choice almost invariably being money.

On a related note: I do not believe this is the best choice to make and that people are making a mistake if they decide to work a six (or seven) day week, but I firmly believe it is largely their choice.

 

[loquasagacious]

Every Member should be permitted an oppurtunity to voice their rhetoric. The concerns of the electorates whose representatives were denied such an oppurtunity will not be heard, which is non-democratic.

Anybody know if Joyce decides to cross the floor when the Bill is taken to the Senate in a fortnight, will the Government still have the numbers to have it passed? Are there any other Liberals or Nationals wavering?

The opposition wasn't trying to debate they were heckling.

That said it must have made pretty interesting viewing for the primary school children and the Chinese Govt delegation seeing democracy in action from the galleries.