IR laws set up economy for years of boom or bust

Anthony Albanese is right when he says the current decade will be a defining one for the nation, including economically. In an exclusive interview with Simon Benson in Inquirer on Saturday, the Prime Minister cited “getting wages moving” as a positive in helping workers cope with cost-of-living pressures. So it is, provided those wage increases are backed with productivity gains. In coming years, the capacity of businesses, large and small, to hire staff as needed, and to expand and invest, will determine their profitability and that of the economy.

Thirty years ago, the workplace relations reforms of the Hawke-Keating era, which were further developed by the Howard government, set the nation up well for years of prosperity. As Mr Albanese looks to the future, he cannot afford to brush aside the concerns of employers. These are expounded on Monday by the chief executives of the Council of Small Business Organisations Australia, Luke Achterstraat, and the Business Council of Australia, Bran Black.

An economic storm is approaching this year for businesses of all sizes, which will be exacerbated by the hand of government, they argue. The remaining Closing Loopholes legislation, which the government will try to pass next month, would make offering casual jobs far less appealing for employers and finding those kinds of jobs far harder for workers, they argue. The likely damage to Australia’s medical research institutes has already been highlighted. Casual jobs, which make up almost a quarter of all jobs, are essential to the workforce and to maintaining consumer spending. For many staff, including students, carers and parents who enjoy the flexibility of casual work, the ability to take home an additional 25 per cent casual loading is highly valued in the cost-of-living crisis.

The lobbies are also concerned that: anti-productive changes to the trucking industry will push up prices that feed through to firms that receive road-transported goods; radically overhauling the definition of employment – and making it harder to be your own boss – will tie a rope around 1.1 million self-employed tilers, scaffolders, architects and builders on projects both big and small, and; excessive interference in the gig economy risks making successful food delivery models unviable, a service relied on by 97 per cent of small hospitality businesses and larger firms.

At a time of robust employment and wages growth, Industrial Relations Minister Tony Burke would be better engaged sorting out IR problems than imposing more rigid strictures on business. The minister’s refusal to intervene in the dispute between the Maritime Union of Australia and DP World stevedores is unhelpful for the wider economy. Mr Burke needs to get the parties together around the negotiating table as soon as possible to limit crippling damage to the wider economy, including forcing consumers to pay more for goods that will become harder to find.

Labor’s multi-employer bargaining laws, Australian Industry Group chief executive Innes Willox told Joe Kelly in The Weekend Australian, have incentivised the MUA to drag out its dispute with DP World so it can capture the ­nation’s two other key stevedores, Hutchison Ports and Patrick Terminals. Such a course would inflict acute damage on the nation. On Sunday, AMP chief economist Shane Oliver said the DP World dispute may prove more costly to the national economy than blockades in the Red Sea. Both the dispute and the blockades presented supply-side concerns for the retail, building and some industrial sectors. On Monday, DP world executives will appear before the Senate Education and Employment Legislation Committee inquiry into the Closing Loopholes bill.

As Mr Albanese looks to the economy’s long-term interests, he needs to guard against industrial relations becoming the nation’s – and his government’s – Achilles heel.