A PROPOSAL by the Australian Council for Trade Unions (ACTU) to give workers the legal right to collective bargaining has been criticised by industry groups for being flawed.
A PROPOSAL by the Australian Council for Trade Unions (ACTU) to give workers the legal right to collective bargaining has been criticised by industry groups for being flawed.
In a speech to the Australian Industry Group (AIG) in Melbourne, ACTU secretary Greg Combet said the Federal Government should give Australian workers a genuine democratic choice, similar to those in countries like the UK and Canada, to bargain collectively with their employer if they want to.
“The Federal Government talks about choice for workers, but what their proposed workplace laws are really about is giving greater power to employers,” he said.
“Under the Government’s proposed system of AWAs (individual contracts) Australian workers will have no rights at all to bargain collectively with their employer. All the choice will be with the employer.”
However, Heather Ridout, chief executive of the Australian Industry Group claimed the ACTU proposal was flawed on a number a levels.
“The principle behind the compulsory bargaining model proposed by Mr Combet was examined in detail several years ago and rejected by the Australian Industrial Relations Commission (AIRC) … the AIRC concluded that such a system was not appropriate for Australian circumstances,” she said.
This was because when the AIRC considered the word ‘negotiate’, and concluded that an agreement could not be reached with a person who does not want to agree and negotiations for an agreement cannot take place with a person who does not want to negotiate.
Ridout maintained that employers should have the right to pursue collective agreements, individual agreements, agreements with unions or those directly with employees.
She said that although unions had the right to pursue their preferred agreement making strategy and have the right to strike in pursuit of a collective agreement, “neither party should be forced by the law to have a particular form of agreement”.
“The ACTU’s proposal adopts some elements of the bargaining systems in place in the US and UK. However, a further flaw in the proposal is that other important elements of those systems have not been adopted.”
