Julia Gillard has said labor will keep AWA's

well the unions and labor did well with icreased membership by lying to the workers, yet again saying we will tear up AWA's

AWA's are not a problem, it is the minimum conditions and wage setting systems that they are bound to that is a problem. AWA's have really been around since early Howard days and were previously bound to what was the minimum standard. I think Labor's angle is to lift the minimum standard, and restore the rights of workers to form democratic organisations if they wish to assist their bargaining power.

Now I am personally not opposed to individual contracts, but can anybody tell me they didn't know any contractors before work choices came around? The thing I have never understood about these new laws is that the AWAs and conditions that go with them (really, BETTER than a common private contract demands) are meaningless, utterly pointless as the option was always there anyway. Now I do also agree that being forced into a majority bargained average wage when you have better skills to bargain with is wrong. But how many people knew private contractors (before work choices) who were ever forced into this position? What I think is that while individual contracts should be promoted more, there needs to also be flexible majority bargained conditions for anyone who isn't interested in a private contract, of which there are many. Why is it not possible to harmonise the two?

Apparently the Workplace Authority has checked only one in ten Australian Workplace Agreements since the introduction of the ‘Fairness Test’, leaving 110,000 AWA’s yet to be vetted.  Of those checked, one in seven have failed, with employers found to have denied workers penalty rates without compensating them adequately with higher pay rates.

http://www.smh.com.au/news/National/AWAs-are-dead-says-leading-economist/2007/11/12/1194766538075.html

A leading conservative economist and labour market reformer has described the federal government's AWAs as "dead".

News Limited newspapers report Mark Wooden, from the Melbourne Institute, said the government's fairness test on AWAs has prevented employers cutting labour costs.

Mr Wooden is one of a number of prominent economists who have challenged Prime Minister John Howard's claim that Labor wants to return the workforce to a centralised system.

"The advantage of AWAs evaporated with the fairness test," Mr Wooden told the newspaper.

"AWAs are dead - he (the PM) can say what he likes. You'll still get companies like Rio Tinto going for AWAs, but that will be for reasons other than cutting labour costs. They're using them to get rid of unions."

Mr Howard introduced AWAs in his first group of workplace laws in 1997 with a "no disadvantage test" that claimed workers could not be worse off than under minimum awards.

freediver wrote on Nov 28^th, 2007 at 1:22pm:


I don't mean to threadjack, but this clear mandate stuff speaks volumes about serfchoices being blamed for the loss and the pro-Nuclear position coming back for another go.

 

In a two horse race where only a small swing is needed: IT'S SCARY.

So, was serchoices a trojan horse for Nuclear Power where the Libs didn't mind losing an election to get it in(the waste dump that is).

Although I agree with workchoices, seems most of aussie did not.

Right idea of Joe Hockeys, should not block what it seems most of Aussie voted for.

deepthought wrote on Nov 28^th, 2007 at 6:13pm:



....and therefore.....?????

Joe Hockey is a Liberal party member. What he did was very uncharacteristic of a politician.

freediver wrote on Nov 28^th, 2007 at 9:29pm:


No, they always want to be in power, no matter the colour.