Demonising unions is wasting precious Government time
Had the Morrison Government spent as much time doggedly pursuing corporate organisations the way it has unions, Westpac probably wouldn’t be in the mess it is now, writes Michael McGuire.
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The decline of the union movement, in numbers as well as in moral authority, has been bad for workers, bad for the economy and bad for Australia. The persistent attempts by successive Liberal governments to destroy the union movement in Australia is based on ideology and not common sense.
Its latest – so far blocked – attempt through the Orwellian-named Ensuring Integrity Bill is just another whack at controlling unions and hampering the basic right of allowing workers to organise.
Clearly, in many instances unions have not helped themselves. There are too many stories of bullying and violence. Too many dodgy officials who seem more interested in picking fights than looking after workers.
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Then we have stooges such as the CFMMEU Victorian boss John Setka. A bloke who is just a gift to the Liberal Party. A bloke sent from central casting to be the main actor in every “union thug’’ story you will ever need.
People like Setka give unions and unionism a bad name. And there’s no doubt people have been fleeing unions for a long time.
Perhaps some now take for granted the advances unions made for workers going back a century. We’ve forgotten unions fought for annual leave, maternity leave, superannuation, penalty rates, equal pay, worker safety, workers’ compensation and a million other basic rights.
According to a study conducted by the federal parliamentary library, union membership as a percentage of the workforce fell from 51 per cent to 14 per cent between 1976 and 2016. It said the reasons for the fall included the end of compulsory unionism, the decline of Australia’s manufacturing industry and the growth in part-time and casual workers.
A report last week by consulting firm PwC said one of the reasons for the rise in workers not being paid what they were due was the “declining presence of unions as a source of oversight within the workplace’’.
PwC estimated 13 per cent of the workforce didn’t receive full entitlements each year, adding up to about $1.35 billion a year. There’s certainly been a bunch of high-profile wage-theft cases. Woolworths, Bunnings and Qantas have ad-mitted to underpaying staff. As have celebrity cooks George Calombaris and Neil Perry.
The demise of the union movement is also part of the reason why wage growth has been so slow in Australia. The boffins at the federal parliamentary library said in April that real wages growth in the five years to November 2018 was 0.5 per cent, compared to 1.8 per cent in the five years before. Since then wage growth has been similarly flat. And the lack of growth in wages is feeding into the nation’s sluggish economic growth.
Yet, demonising unions is taking up a lot of the Federal Government’s time.
It spends far less time demonising the bad behaviour of large corporate organisations. It may be having a crack at Westpac this week – hard not to really – but Scott Morrison had to be dragged kicking and screaming to the banking royal commission.
The right of unions to take industrial action has been severely curtailed in recent times. The Ensuring Integrity Bill wanted to further strangle the movement. Under some interpretations of the Bill, officials would have been banned and trade unions could be deregistered for minor infractions.
But, nobody is saying Westpac should be disbanded after breaching anti-money-laundering laws 23 million times and giving a helping hand to child pornographers. No one is saying departed chief executive Brian Hartzer should be banned from working.
And you have to laugh at the use of the word “integrity’’ in the Bill at a time when Morrison is refusing to stand down Energy Minister Angus Taylor, a man who is under investigation by NSW Police, looking into the origins of a dodgy document that was used to attack Sydney Lord Mayor Clover Moore.
The Government Bill was defeated last night after One Nation Senator Pauline Hanson took exception to some matters – but it might not end there.
The union movement needs to use this moment to rebuild trust with the nation.
Michael McGuire is a columnist for the Adelaide Advertiser.