23 March, 2009
Fair Work now will replace former Prime Minister John Howard’s draconian WorkChoices as the industrial relations law of the land in Australia. That was assured this past Friday, 20 March, when Parliament’s Senate passed the Labour Government initiative.
But it didn’t come without a political struggle. A compromise was struck between Labour and its allies and the Liberal Party, most notably over the definition of a small business and the inter-connected protection against unfair dismissals.
The compromise sets the small business definition at 15 full-time workers, part-time workers not included for the first 18 months, or until 1 January 2011. But thereafter, workers with one year of service – no matter; full-time, part-time, or casual – will have protection. Under Howard’s WorkChoices, businesses with fewer than 100 workers were exempt from the unfair labour dismissal statute.
The Labour Party also compromised on some restrictions to union access to worksites and union access to certain types of information. In all, 231 Senate amendments were submitted to a Fair Work House version, which passed in December 2008. But the new law is fairer and gives workers far better protections in an economic downturn than what was on the books under Howard.
It creates ten national job standards, charters collective bargaining as the main tenet in labour-management relations, and creates a national industrial umpire with enforcement powers, the Fair Work Commission, thus replacing six Howard-era agencies that essentially were charged with removing workplace regulations.
It also spells out workers’ rights to representation; access to arbitration; establishes a 38-hour workweek; grants four weeks annual leave; and allows the practice of flexible work schedules and conditions to take hold. Additionally, it sets out a standard process for regularly raising the minimum wage.
The unfair dismissal statute, plus implementation of good-faith enterprise bargaining takes effect 1 July 2009, while the remainder of the provisions take effect 1 January 2010.
Sharon Burrow
Sharon Burrow, President of the Australian Council of Trades Unions (ACTU), called the Senate passage a “major step forward for working Australians,” marking “a historic moment in restoring workers’ rights. After a decade of attacks on working people by the Liberal and National Parties the tide has turned,” she said. “We can take pride in what we have achieved.”