INTRODUCTION The trade union movement is facing the most serious anti-worker, anti-union laws since the introduction, more than 90 years ago, of the Conciliation and Arbitration Court system in which unions were accepted as playing a central role with guaranteed rights. The Howard/Reith Government's "second wave" of industrial legislation seeks to turn the clock back by 150 years to the dark days of the master-servant relationship, by attacking workers' wages and conditions and preventing workers from collectively bargaining in their trade unions. The aim of the Government and employers is to put every worker on an individual work contract, thereby turning the clock back to the time when workers had no rights. In this special four-page lift-out ANNA PHA, editor of "The Guardian", outlines some of the key features of the legislation and what it would mean for workers if Reith's Bill becomes law. Copies are available for distribution. ****************************************************************** STOP REITH'S "SECOND WAVE" The wages, working conditions and right to organise of millions of workers will be savaged if the Federal Government's "second wave" of industrial legislation is passed. The rule of law would be replaced by the diktat of bosses if Workplace Relations Minister Peter Reith gets his way. Reith's "second wave" legislation not only gives employers more powers to stand over workers but attempts to cripple trade unions and prevent workers organising and struggling collectively to defend their wages and conditions. This legislation CAN and MUST be defeated by the united actions of workers organised in their trade unions together with all other progressive and democratic community groups and individuals. Workers worse off When electioneering, Howard declared: "No worker will be worse off". This was a shameful and deliberate lie! Millions of workers and their families have become "worse off" as awards were stripped back to 20 "allowable matters". Gains achieved over decades have been ripped off workers. Instead of a steady job there is casualisation and job insecurity. Rio Tinto, Patrick Stevedores and other big corporations have pushed Peter Reith's laws to their limits in their anti-worker drive. * The sacked Oakdale workers are $6.3 million worse off. Many other workers have lost their entitlements. Š* Rio Tinto callously dumped 115 men and their families on the scrap heap after announcing a $34 million profit at Hunter Valley No 1 mine. * Wharfies were subjected to the trauma of balaclava clad private security thugs with dogs, removing them from their jobs in the middle of the night. * Penalty rates for shift and weekend work have been abolished on many jobs and workers are clocking up long hours of unpaid overtime. * And while some are forced to work longer hours, others who want a full-time job, are forced to take part-time work. There is no work at all for the 700,000 unemployed. All this and more thanks to Reith's "first wave". Bosses gained new powers to intensify the exploitation of workers by imposing secret individual contracts and shutting trade unions out of negotiations. The right to take industrial action without being sued by employers for damages was limited to "protected action" during enterprise bargaining periods. "Protected action" didn't protect workers from dismissal. Now, the Howard Government and its big business patrons want to make workers even worse off. That's the job of the "Workplace Relations Legislation Amendment (More Jobs, Better Pay) Bill 1999''. Reith starts his lies in the name of the Bill! It should have been called the ``No Unions, Lower Pay, Fewer Jobs Bill'', because that's what it is. The Government is out to destroy the centralised Award system which protected workers' rights and conditions for almost 100 years. Reith wants to leave individual workers at the mercy of profit- hungry employers without the support of their fellow workers or trade union. Reith's laws breach international conventions The International Labour Organisation -- a body of trade union, government and employer representatives found Reith's "first wave" laws contravened international conventions (laws) which give workers Freedom of Association and the right to Collective Bargaining. The right to join and form trade unions and to bargain collectively are further cut in Reith's "second wave". ******************************************************************** Š REITH'S AGENDA Reith's aim is a world without unions, a world without regulations or any other obstruction to the profit-making of the big corporations. He wants what he calls "an internationally competitive workplace relations system" -- a deregulated labour market with cheap, compliant labour competing with workers in low wage countries for crumbs. "And never forget which side we're on. We're on the side of making profits. We're on the side of people owning private capital", Reith told a business lunch in Perth. Reith is not on the side of workers. The Federal Government's economic policies are centred around making Australia a place for transnational corporations (TNCs) to freely come and go, do what they like, regardless of what they do to Australian workers. It is pushing the economic rationalist agenda, lifting tariffs and other forms of industry and job protection, deregulating the financial markets of the speculators, removing restrictions on foreign investment, privatising like mad, locking Australia into the World Trade Organisation and implementing the disastrous policies of the World Bank and the International Monetary Fund. Tax changes: bad news for workers Treasurer Peter Costello's so-called tax "reforms" are part of that process -- the GST, the removal of capital gains taxes and the reduction of taxes on company profits. These measures all do one thing -- they rip money out of workers' pockets and line the coffers of the big corporations as workers pay more taxes and the big corporations pay much less. Their objective is to transform Australia into the world's best profit-generating haven for the TNCs. Reith's industrial relations laws are part of this aim. In the eyes of the TNCs and other employers, trade unions, collective bargaining, industrial action, awards and anything else which protects workers' rights and entitlements, are barriers to the maximisation of profits. Every dollar a worker receives is one less dollar in profits. Reith has described his government's "second wave" industrial relations legislation as "the next evolutionary change" an indication that there is more to come if the "second wave" is passed by Parliament. "First Wave Š Reith's Workplace Relations Act, passed in 1996, was based on the replacement of the Conciliation and Arbitration system with its recognition of trade unions in a system in which employers deal with each worker individually, and without trade union representation. "Second wave" The "second wave" consists of four Bills, all currently before Parliament. The first removes superannuation from awards. The second allows employers to sack workers without giving any reason and without any recourse to unfair dismissal appeals in workplaces where there are less than 15 employees. The third Bill makes it legal for employers to slash the already low wages of many young workers by introducing a youth wage where one does not already exist. The fourth, and the major Bill, is the dishonestly named "Workplace Relations Legislation Amendment (More Jobs, Better Pay) Bill 1999". The Bill has many far-reaching and draconian provisions to dismantle what remaining protection and entitlements workers have. If passed by Parliament it would open the way to the next step in Reith's "evolutionary process" -- towards the complete abolition of any legal rights for workers and their trade unions to organise and fight for their rights, conditions and jobs in the conflict between labour and capital. ***************************************************************** REITH'S "SECOND WAVE" AT A GLANCE * Awards, already stripped back to 20 "allowable matters" in the "first wave", to be further stripped. * Individual contracts (AWAs) to come into force "before they are approved" by the Employment Advocate. * Secret individual contracts could be introduced when a collective (union negotiated) Certified Agreement is already in force. The individual Contract would override the Certified Agreement. * Secret, non-union individual employment contracts (AWAs), not required to meet Award standards. * Employers could offer different "agreements" to different groups of workers or individual workers in the same workplace. * Non-union Certified Agreements could override conditions already established in awards. Š* Compulsory secret ballots before "protected" industrial action takes place and the Commission given the power to end "protected action" after 14 days. * Solidarity and political strikes and all other union actions except "protected action" outlawed. * A system of Commission orders and court injunctions to halt industrial action and impose penalties for any "unprotected action" and "allow employers to sue workers and unions for damages". * When business is transferred to a new employer the new employer would not necessarily be bound by the existing Certified Agreement. * Commission obliged to issue orders to stop non-protected action within 48 hours of an employer request. * The Employment Advocate, better known as the Industrial Gestapo, could rubber-stamp individual contracts and send its blood hounds out to workplaces to quiz workers and union delegates to compile "evidence" against unions and individual workers. * Illegal for more than 60 percent of workers or a class of workers in a workplace to belong to the same trade union. * Union officials to obtain a written "invitation" from a member before being allowed to enter a workplace. * Powers of the Industrial Relations Commission to be further curbed in relation to settling disputes but increased when it comes to stopping strikes. END OF PAGE 1 The Guardian 65 Campbell Street, Surry Hills. 2010 Australia. Email: <[EMAIL PROTECTED]> Website: http://www.peg.apc.org/~guardian -- Leftlink - Australia's Broad Left Mailing List mailto:[EMAIL PROTECTED] http://www.alexia.net.au/~www/mhutton/index.html Sponsored by Melbourne's New International Bookshop Subscribe: mailto:[EMAIL PROTECTED]?Body=subscribe%20leftlink Unsubscribe: mailto:[EMAIL PROTECTED]?Body=unsubscribe%20leftlink