Howard's agenda behind the agendas?

Three areas in current federal government moves - industrial relations, welfare and terrorism (read also law and order) - suggest a neat fit in a national jigsaw which, when the pieces fall together, could bring unnerving change to the reach, strength and nature of federal government.

The new national IR legislation, in effect, will extend centralist government, and together with recent government decisions about education funding and the apparent ongoing lust to minimise, if not demolish, Medicare, does not promise at all well for the average family.

In addition, a forthcoming revision of media laws is likely to lead to a further whittling of media diversity, never a good thing for society, and proposed changes to sedition laws, as part of the terrorism proposals, are causing considerable alarm. Does this all have a pattern to it? It all seems to be happening at once, so what is the big hurry? Could it all be to deliberately confuse by setting several hares running at the same time? So what is the agenda behind the agendas?

While some politicians, lawyers, churchmen and journalists have protested loudly, they have naturally focused on a particular aspect or set of proposed legislation. A focus on the particular can obscure the whole. When all the pieces are brought together, along what path are we treading? And why is there an overpowering sense that people as individuals are being screwed down? A look at a variety of comment suggests that the feeling is well founded.

When introducing WorkChoices, Prime Minister John Howard said it had three major elements: the introduction of a national workplace relations system for the first time; the simplification of the agreement making process and a better balancing of the unfair dismissal laws; and that, “A new and totally independent Australian Fair Pay Commission will be established to deal in a less legalistic and adversarial fashion with such matters as minimum award wages”.

But Economics Editor Ross Gittins (Sydney Morning Herald, November 21, 2005), among others, has condemned WorkChoices proposals in terms of class, and as an undisguised assault on unions, unionised workers and workers generally. The aim? To inflict a blow on the Labor Party. He says that with WorkChoices, “There’s no overall gain to the economy, just a transfer of income from one part of the economy (workers) to another part (employers)”.

“It’s not at all clear this single-minded attempt to discourage collective bargaining (and hamstrung unions in the process) will lead to increased employment, increased productivity or higher wages,” he wrote. Under WorkChoices, “employers may have been deregulated but unions have been subjected to more, highly prescriptive regulation”.

It is not possible to have true bargaining where parties are thoroughly unequal in terms of power.

Gittins’ sentiments echoed James C. Cobb, writing about the effects of Hurricane Katrina (New York Times, November 19, 2005), and low wages and non-union labour which had kept thousands in poverty:

At the very least, Hurricane Katrina put the lie to a generation's worth of ballyhoo about the newfound prosperity of the Sunbelt South. It showed us not only the impoverished and immobile masses of New Orleans, but the shack-dwelling, hand-to-mouth lives of thousands of others within the three-state swath of its hellish destruction. Here the disaster laid bare the shackling legacy of generations of pursuing industry through promises of low-wage, non-union labour and minimal taxation ... where folks have been laid low by wholesale outsourcing of jobs and economic policies that have left real wages stagnant and a social safety net in ever greater disrepair.

Could this happen in Australia?

It is highly remarkable and indicative that Queensland’s National MPs voted (The Courier-Mail November 25, 2005) with their sworn enemy, Labor, to condemn the proposed industrial relations changes.

Michael Raper, President of the National Welfare Rights Network has warned the Senate Community Affairs Committee inquiry that changes to government welfare represented the most significant downgrading of income support provisions in the social security system since the Social Security Act was introduced in 1947.

He said, “Too little of the detail of how the new system will work is contained in the proposed legislation. This represents a fundamental shift in that many rights, entitlements, obligations and responsibilities, previously spelled out in legislation, will now be based on policy guidelines developed by bureaucrats. Such policy is developed without the scrutiny of parliament and may be changed at any time.”

Universities and research bodies have already felt stung by government funding dictates and strictures. They find themselves out in the market having to sell themselves on similar terms to business. The traditional idea of universities being places of fundamental research and reflection - so established thinking on anything and everything could be questioned - has been tossed out in favour of the gods of the market.

One impact, highlighted by Stuart Macintyre, Professor of History and Dean of the Arts at Melbourne University (The Age, November 16, 2005), suggests some researchers have become “victims of a form of political interference in the system of national competitive grants that is unique to this country”.

As a former chairman of an Australian Research Council’s panel - humanities - he claimed Federal Education Minister Brendan Nelson had “vetoed some grants in the humanities that had been approved by the ARC”.

Now the board has been made non-existent, “A committee appointed by the minister, meeting in secret and applying mysterious criteria, is vetting academic applications. Those with applications rejected by the committee never find out what was wrong with their application or have an opportunity to argue their case,” he wrote.

Ironically, the proposed counter-terrorism legislation has struck more terror in people’s hearts than the likelihood of being hurt by an actual act of terrorism. Law and order proposals invariably put journalists on guard, no matter the colour of the political party pushing that barrow. Although the threat of terrorism has a dangerous and international face, both media and lawyers are widely appalled at the attempt to strengthen sedition laws which would endanger freedom of speech.

A number of Coalition backbenchers (Australian Broadcasting Commission, November 10, 2005), have also expressed reservation on the counter-terrorism legislation. The government has agreed to review the sedition provisions, but this needs to happen before legislation is passed. The counter-terrorism Bill seeks to upgrade penalties for sedition to include seven-year jail terms for promoting the use of force to overthrow the federal government.

Liberal backbencher Petro Georgiou believes such laws would threaten free speech. He is also concerned about proposed search and seize powers and a provision prohibiting those detained from contacting family members. Older migrants with personal experience of police states well understand his concerns.

Barrister Ian Barker (Sydney Morning Herald 14/11/05) has pointed out the significant difference between existing and proposed sedition laws. He wrote that previously a person had to commit a proscribed offence, and, at the same time, have a seditious intent. That would no longer be the case:

The definition of seditious intent is now limited to the seditious intent which may be a mark of an unlawful association. The new offences of sedition do not require proof of a seditious intention. They can be committed by mere recklessness, and they carry a penalty of seven years' imprisonment. There is a good faith exception which seems to me to be a reversal of proof. In other words, the practical effect of the new legislation is that a person accused of doing any of the things in the new criminal code bears the onus of showing he or she did not act with a seditious intent. This is repugnant to the notions of fair process.

For example, urging disaffection against the government seems to be what many ordinary people often do, born of sheer frustration … The problem is, the crime is all about words and the construction of words. It is becoming increasingly dangerous to be honest and direct in the use of words.

This is 2005, not 1605 when words could see you executed. A cool, clinical look at what is being proposed overall has to ask: are these pieces being put in place in the national jigsaw to benefit the nation, or to control the nation? What is the real agenda? Unsavoury measures allowed to slip through in phoney haste will set an uphill task for others to redeem.

By the way, there is no sin in watching carefully and trying to assess what is really happening - and then commenting publicly on it. Well, at least, not for the moment. But it is reasonable to wonder whether this article would be regarded as “seditious” next year? And if so, would it get published?