An agenda for Labor

In the case of aged care, the Howard Government’s commitment of an additional $1.5 billion for the sector, with associated equity measures to lessen the cost burden for those elderly citizens least able to pay, has raised the stakes for Labor. As the party of social democracy, Labor needs to demonstrate its commitment to care for all Australians.

Howard has now set one benchmark which the ALP ought to trump with additional equity measures, easing means tests and fees for those least able to pay, increasing funding and raising standards for the sector with the aim of improving the quality of life of our most vulnerable citizens, and providing a credible long term plan to deal with an ageing population.

In industrial relations Labor needs to be forthright about its values. The government has specifically targeted building industry unions, and has introduced draconian laws which outlaw strike action in the construction industry, threaten jail of six months for those workers who refuse to answer questions under interrogation, and impose barbaric fines amounting to tens of thousands of dollars - not only upon unions, but also upon individual workers.

As Chris White has noted (PDF 76KB) in the Journal of Australian Political Economy, government legislation includes measures to outlaw pattern bargaining strikes, limit or withdraw protected industrial action, and ban strike action as a means of political protest outright.

Following the introduction of the WorkChoices legislation the vast majority of Australian Workplace Agreements (AWAs) have seen at least one protected award condition traded away. And according to the latest statistics explored in The Age, one in six AWAs “paid staff only five basic entitlements, depriving them of 11 other award conditions such as overtime, rest breaks, holiday leave loading, and extra pay to work on public holidays”.

Furthermore, “[more] then 60 per cent of contracts scrubbed leave loading, 63 per cent wiped out penalty rates and more than half dumped extra pay for shifts outside of normal business hours”.

Fortunately, Labor has not backed away from its commitment to “tear up” the WorkChoices legislation. What is not at all clear, however, is what will take its place. As of late Julia Gillard has voiced her preference for a simplified award system with “some legislated minimum conditions”.

There are also other factors at work: questions that will not be resolved until the ALP National Conference in April.

Further policy shifts should include the rescission of outrageous laws aimed at curbing building industry unions, ensuring union access to workplaces, abolishing requirements for regular secret ballots in the course of any industrial action, and entrenching the right to strike action as a form of political protest.

The ALP ought to accept all such proposals as put forward by the ACTU and individual unions. Labor cannot accept a scenario where, for the labour movement, even the election of a more sympathetic government amounts to “one step forward, two steps back”.

Although there is much talk of a “simplified” industrial relations system, the removal of protected conditions will hurt those in a weak bargaining position: typically those without a strong union. Labor must be forthright about the role of trade unions in defending workers rights through collective bargaining - including the right to protected industrial action, and should restore a comprehensive award system which protects the entitlements of even the most industrially weak workers.

There are many other issues that will also be critical to Labor in the upcoming Federal election: but we can only touch upon these here. The war in Iraq remains deeply unpopular, and Labor remains on course to withdraw Australian troops from this disastrous quagmire. The inaction of the Howard Government over the detention of David Hicks also severely compromises its credibility in the field of human rights.