Reform or risk jobs, warns Joe Hockey

    DAVID CROWE
    The Australian
    February 22, 2014 1


TIGHT workplace laws are being blamed for pushing up unemployment and keeping young people out of work as Joe Hockey signals government plans for drastic reforms that extend from industrial relations to healthcare and the retirement age.      

Warning that Australia would fall behind the world if it did not act, the Treasurer made the case for highly controversial changes just as the federal government prepares to cut into its biggest spending programs in the May budget.

Mr Hockey argued for more flexible workplace rules on the grounds that onerous restrictions would limit job creation and punish the young, escalating political debate ahead of a government inquiry into industrial relations laws to be launched within days.

The Treasurer indicated that the retirement age would have to be raised beyond 67 as Australia’s population aged and the government struggled to pay the bill for the pension, healthcare and the broader welfare system.

The warnings come as Mr Hockey hosts a summit of his counterparts from the world’s 20 biggest economies to agree on ways to restructure economies and lift global growth.

Using the G20 agenda to argue for domestic reform, Mr Hockey drew on reports issued on Thursday and yesterday from the International Monetary Fund and the OECD that urged action to make labour markets more flexible.

Mr Hockey said the previous government had “re-regulated” the labour market but the lesson from around the world was that too many rules cost jobs.

“There’s a very clear message here: the more regulated the labour market, the higher the unemployment ends up being,” he said at the summit in Sydney yesterday.

“And it costs people their jobs and it means young people in particular lose the opportunity for a job.”

The Treasurer stood by a Coalition election pledge to avoid any major industrial relations reform until after the next election, giving voters the right to approve the changes.

However, his comments support the case for reform as the government gets ready to introduce legislation as early as Tuesday to allow workers to trade away penalty rates, while also releasing the terms of reference for a sweeping Productivity Commission inquiry into Labor’s workplace laws.

“There is no finishing line for reform. It is a relay race with an unlimited number of runners and it will continue to go on long after we’ve gone,” Mr Hockey said.

ACTU assistant secretary Tim Lyons said Mr Hockey’s warnings about workplace rules and unemployment were “absurd” given the experience overseas. “You only have to look at the US, where there are almost no workplace protections but stubbornly high unemployment, to disprove this view,” Mr Lyons said.

“Mr Hockey seems to want to get hairy-chested about rights at work with the G20 here. It’s a pity he wasn’t that honest with Australians before the election.”    

Mr Lyons said that Australia’s labour productivity last year was the fastest in a decade and that ways to lift it included education and innovation, as the OECD report suggests.

Opposition employment spokesman Brendan O’Connor said Mr Hockey was in a “race to the bottom” on working conditions. “When the Treasurer says he wants deregulation and flexibility, he means one thing, ripping away workplace entitlements,” a spokesman for Mr O’Connor said.      

The IMF is shaping the agenda for this weekend’s summit by telling G20 members they could add $2.5 trillion to global economic output if they get their budgets into balance, free up labour markets, encourage infrastructure investment and “rebalance” their economies to encourage domestic demand.

OECD Secretary-General Angel Gurria added to that push yesterday by also urging labour market reform.

“What we know is that if you have excessive employment protection legislation, what you are going to do is conspire against creating new jobs,” he said at a news conference with Mr Hockey.

“If you have excessive protection of the incumbents - the ones who are already in the market - who are going to be ones who stay out, knocking at the door? The youth.”

Liberal Government back to old habits with the return of Individual Contracts
20 February, 2014 | Media Release Unions demand the Abbott Government drop any attempt to introduce Individual Contracts that will cut take-home pay.

ACTU President Ged Kearney said the Abbott Government has given employers the green light to cut people’s pay under the guise of greater ‘flexibility’.

“This is a blatant attempt to cut pay and conditions through Individual Contracts and shows the Abbott Government doesn’t understand the concerns of Australian workers,” she said.

“We know that the Liberal Party definition of flexibility has always been flexibility by workers not for workers and that’s exactly what we have seen again today.”

“Don’t be mistaken, this is an attempt to slash take home pays and working conditions and despite all the pre-election promises, this is undoubtedly what is happening here,” she said.

“Workers and employers need flexibility but this is an extreme and hard-line stance by the Abbott Government to say that a parent of a sick child should take a pay cut in order to look after their family.

“This is an unacceptable choice between workers earning enough to meet their living costs and their ability to look after their family.”

“Minister Abetz talks about imaginary workers that want to give up penalty rates for nothing. We’re yet to find a worker that thinks this is a good deal.”

Only yesterday new figures showed that Australia is experiencing the slowest wages growth on record while the cost of living is rising quickly, faster than wages.

“Australia is in the midst of a job security crisis with thousands of workers losing their jobs and many others pushed into casual insecure work. That’s what the Abbott Government should be focused on, not on making life tougher for people.”

But day after day we keep seeing the Abbott Government trying to drive down wages at a time when families can least afford it.

News reports today show that the Abbott government pressed SPC to slash worker’s wages by up to 40%. The Abbott Government was twice found misleading the public after private companies SPC and Toyota were forced to publicly clarify misleading statements made the government about worker’s wages and conditions.

“Now that the so called ‘wages blowout’ has been proven to be a lie, the Abbott Government has fallen back on Individual Contracts - which were a hallmark of WorkChoices - cutting wages and diminishing conditions that Australian workers rely on in order to balance life and work.”

Under WorkChoices most individual contracts removed basic award conditions:
-    65% of individual agreements removed penalty rates
-    70% of individual agreements removed shift loading
-    68% of individual agreements removed annual leave loading
-    50% of individual agreements removed public holiday pay

Quote:


How'd that go again??

"The term 'Workchoices' is dead and buried."....T.A.

miketrees wrote on Feb 23^rd, 2014 at 7:15pm:


Can't blame you for that as it probably is illegal.

Dnarever wrote on Feb 23^rd, 2014 at 7:00pm:


Other mean, malicious idiots.

Lobo wrote on Feb 23^rd, 2014 at 7:04pm:

Workchoices is dead and buried ... Now meet his twin brother! Muhahaha!

Trust the Lieberals on Industrial relations - bet your bottom that you can't.

6 years of trust us we wouldn't do that was all BS.

Pantheon wrote on Feb 23^rd, 2014 at 9:43pm:


And the CEO walks away with over 1,000 an hour.