Reintroducing industry-wide bargaining – a practice not seen in Australia since the early 1980s – is a far reaching change that would needlessly threaten the mining industry that earns over $423 billion in exports, employs over 277,000 thousand Australians in high paid jobs and contributed $43.2 billion in taxes in 2021-22.
In the last 20 years, employment in mining has tripled and wages doubled benefiting hundreds of thousands of Australians, especially in regional areas. Don’t destroy these gains by unleashing industrial relations chaos through multi-employer bargaining.
The introduction of the Fair Work Legislation Amendment Bill today is a breach of faith with all Australian businesses large and small, who took the Treasurer at his word when he said on Insiders last year that industry-wide bargaining was not Labor’s policy:
JOURNALIST DAVID SPEERS: ‘I understand that, I’m just asking you about industry-wide bargaining. Is it a yes, or a no, or a maybe?’
TREASURER JIM CHALMERS: ‘It’s not part of our policy, David. I’ve just explained to you what our policy is on industrial relations, we’ve already announced that some time ago.’
(Insiders, 21 November 2021)
The introduction of the legislation has occurred with no proper consultation; no proper assessment of the consequences and with no apparent regard to being upfront with the Australian community at the last election:
‘But despite pressure from unions, Labor did not commit before the 2022 election to legislate multi-employer bargaining if elected’
(The Guardian, 25 August 2022).
No wonder it caught attendees at the jobs summit by surprise.
The only rationale for the introduction of this Bill is that it is a reward for the union movement for their silent support over the past three years.
While unions have been pushing for a reintroduction of industry-wide bargaining since 2018, they have not been successful until now. Even the then Shadow Industrial Relations Minister Brendan O’Connor expressed wariness.
Forcing unions back into workplaces is not a solution to increasing wages; improving workplace productivity is.
While this change will increase union power, the case has not been made that industry-wide strikes and one-size-fits-all agreements imposed from above will improve wages.
The Minister for Employment and Workplace Relations Tony Burke has conceded that the bill needs significant amendments and ongoing consultation – yet the government wants to ram through this far-reaching reform with no real opportunity for scrutiny.
Implementing multi-employer bargaining is a radical change to the workplace relations system that could have severe unintended consequences for jobs, livelihoods and wages.
The MCA strongly urges the government to slow down and provide for a proper parliamentary review process.
