It's a proposal to increase fines. It must have taken all of 5 minutes to get that policy together. REAL POLICIES are what prevent the injustice occurring in the first place and fines wont do it. They are already steep.

John Smith wrote on Feb 1^st, 2016 at 4:11pm:


True.  Not a thing.

Although cods says that they are protecting workers by stopping the boats.

I kid you not.

It's a start, but doesn't really sort out the full issues which go much deeper.
For example, a lot of young people are exploited because they don't have a choice and don't want to create a negative relationship with their boss, they see their boss as a "friend" and thus accept the exploitation, when I was young, this was how I was exploited as well, they would put on a smile, say they care about you and whatever, then one day you try to take your entitlements and the foot comes down on your neck.

What has happened is a rapid collapse in class consciousness among workers, this is both the fault of Neo-Liberalism, dividing and conquering workers and making them compete against each other, the other is how sychophantic Unions have become to capital and their very public giving up the fight in the 1980s. Workers don't see themselves as a class, they don't understand their own class interest, they can't fight back because they are worried other workers will backstab them and nobody will stand in solidarity.

Power naturally is in the hands of the boss, but these days the workers themselves basically have nothing and most workers will rather let themselves be exploited, rather than go through an expensive legal process that they could easily lose since the boss can get better lawyers.

Also on the Japanese. What in **** are you talking about? Japan is known to have the most toxic work culture in the world, that is a country where you are expected to KILL YOURSELF if you are unemployed longer than a few months, where you are expected to take abuse from the boss without question, where your expected to work 70-80 hour weeks of unpaid overtime. Where you see workers literally passed out from exhaustion on the train. The highest stress rates in the world, the highest suicide rates in the world. "karoshi" is a common cause of death in Japan, what does it mean? It's from being so overworked your organs fail from stress and lack of sleep and you drop dead on the job.

Why in hell would you want Japanese "Work ethic" here unless you simply hate your workers?

Andrei.Hicks wrote on Feb 1^st, 2016 at 1:15pm:



that explains why the Japanese economy has been going gangbusters for so long ... 

Bill needs to understand a very basic fact.

here on planet earth, which i call "reality",

if you dont have much value as a worker,

You dont get very much MONEY

Kiron22 wrote on Feb 1^st, 2016 at 4:21pm:


No one is asking for that, you out-of-touch dope.

ACTU welcomes Labor's plan to crack down on worker exploitation
1 February 2016
ACTU



The Australian Council of Trade Unions today welcomed Federal Labor's plan to tackle worker exploitation. 

ACTU Secretary Dave Oliver said the examples of 7-Eleven, Myer and Pizza Hut were symptomatic of a wider problem of systemic underpayment of staff and exploitation of workers.

“The high profile cases we have seen in recent months are only the tip of the iceberg. At any point in time, unions are engaged in dozens of legal fights with unscrupulous employers who have underpaid staff or tried to avoid honouring workers’ entitlements.

“We welcome the alternative Government’s plan to increase penalties for employers, ramp up worker protections from sham contracting, increasing the powers the of the Fair Work Ombudsman and better protect vulnerable overseas workers," Mr Oliver said.

“We strongly support lifting the corporate veil and making company directors personally liable for ensuring workers’ pay in cases where companies are Phoenixed, in the same way they already are for unpaid Superannuation. This is a significant and long-called for policy that will protect workers form this unscrupulous, but increasingly common practice.

“We also note substantial cases of employers engaged in sham contracting, shifting permanent staff into contract based roles in order to avoid paying appropriate entitlements. We hope a Labor Government would pay particular attention to these practices.

“Bill Shorten has committed to further consulting on increased penalties and the ACTU stands ready to engage with Labor on that discussion.”

Mr Oliver said Federal Labor’s announcement filled the vacuum created by the Turnbull Government’s silence on these issues.

"The response of the Turnbull Government to these issues has been slow and insufficient, in stark contrast to the way they have continued attacks on labour organisations.

“Where is the Royal Commission into Corporate Corruption and Underpayment of Staff which is far more prevalent than anything Dyson Heydon dug up in more than a year of investigations?”

He said instead of looking to rip money out of Australian workers’ pay packets through cuts to penalty rates proposed by employer groups through the Productivity Commission, the Turnbull Government should adopt the policy released today by Bill Shorten.

“It is high time that the Turnbull Government divorced itself from the Productivity Commission’s recommendations to cut penalty rates.

“If they are as genuinely concerned for ‘fighting for a better deal for workers’ as Minister Cash herself has stated, then they should resist any moves to cut pay through changes to penalty rates.

“These recommendations are out of step with Australian values, out of touch with the modern lives of working people, and would compromise future economic and productivity growth.”

mariacostel wrote on Feb 1^st, 2016 at 5:57pm:


I have worked with any number of high paid people who are absolutely useless and very frequently some of the Lower paid employees are a huge value to the company.

In fact in general the majority of useless people in many companies are very well paid, real workers do not get away with being useless.