THERE has been a revolution in Australian economy over the last three decades that has seen millions of people move into insecure jobs without any prospect of permanent employment, the ACTU Congress in Sydney has been told.   :-?

Former deputy prime minister Brian Howe, in his keynote address this morning to around 1000 ACTU delegates gathered at the Sydney Convention Centre, said the internationalisation of the Australian economy had no doubt improved living standards.

"But it has also given rise to unprecedented growth of insecure work," he said, with 40 per cent of workers now not permanently employed -- but instead in some form of casual, temporary or contract employment.


Mr Howe has headed a six-month inquiry, set up by the ACTU, to look at the growth in non-permanent employment in Australia since the 1980s.

The ACTU says that these workers have:

     no regular pay

     no paid holidays

     no paid sick leave

     no job security

The inquiry held hearings across 22 Australian towns and cities, and received more than 500 submissions from affected individuals and groups.

The ACTU's report, released this morning, recommends that casual work be allowed only for ''irregular, intermittent or very short-term work''.

And, under the plan, the creation of jobs deemed temporary would be outlawed "where there are reasonable grounds to expect that the work will be ongoing".

The national workplace umpire, Fair Work Australia, would also be given the power to make "secure employment orders" forcing employers to convert casual workers to permanent.

Employer groups have said this week that most of these ideas were too radical, and would dangerously shift the balance of power from employers to employees.

The Australian Chamber of Commerce and Industry warned earlier this week that, while the report indentified some worthy issues that industry needed to discuss with unions, business would resist most of these proposed "solutions".

But Mr Howe said the problem was bigger than employers were admitting.   :(

"The evidence we heard confirms the view that there are a very large number of people engaged in insecure work who want more stable conditions, but find themselves trapped on the periphery," he told the ACTU Congress.

Mr Howe said that the Labor budget released last week had attacked unemployed people, rather than coming up with a way of tackling the growing problem of insecure work.   :(

"The derisory way this was addressed in the last budget was regrettable," Mr Howe said.

"All this emphasis on punishing the unemployed has really proved counter-productive," he said.   :(

Unions needed to speak out more strongly about the most vulnerable being attacked in this way, he said.

"We are not going to wear this situation where unemployed people are treated as pariahs. That is absurd, and no sophisticated country should do that," he said.   :(

There was a growing crisis nationally that saw too many working people trapped in jobs that left them not knowing "what hours they will work from week to week".

He said this left too many people unable to get home loans or make long-term plans that would lift them up over time.

"This is not a matter of turning the clock back -- the clock has moved on," he said.

He said a new focus on improving skills in the workforce would help many lift themselves out of insecure positions.

"Without very serious investment in marginal workers, nothing much is going to change," Mr Howe said.

Read more: http://www.theage.com.au/opinion/political-news/howe-warns-of-dangers-of-casual-revolution-20120516-1ypwm.html#ixzz1uzdrQsUd

Did they really just find out about this?

Anyone would think it's a new phenomenon.

Ex Dame Pansi wrote on May 16^th, 2012 at 11:58am:

Did they really just find out about this? Anyone would think it's a new phenomenon.

They pay ex-polies and consultants megabucks to do research on the obvious !!

The issue has resurfaced because the unions are losing their subscription base. I mean who is going to join up to a union in a job they only do a few hours a week and don't know whether the job will be there the next day because the company has closed down :(

Anyway what can they do about it when their so called great free trade deals has seen the wholesale de-industrialization of the country only to see valuable jobs shipped over to china and other 3rd world sweatshops :(

For 3 decades.

Oh wow.  I guess they showed up in their T model ford because the horse died last week and the wheel fell off the old cart.