Unfair dismissal is an everyday occurence in Tassie already. 

Watch how employers - who receive a subsidy to take on a jobseeker for 6 months or so - sack the workers as soon as the subsidy runs out.  This is illegal but the Federal and State Governments have never bothered to enforce the laws in this respect.

Now they want to take away ANY power these impoverished and newly jobless might have had to defend themselves in an industrial court.

As Media, Entertainment and Arts Alliance Tasmania Branch president,  I commend Branch secretary Andrew Muthy’s tireless work on behalf of members,  at times putting his safety and well being at risk in his pursuit of justice for them.

Read his article carefully.

We live in volatile times and I urge readers to be wary of those in Canberra who said, hands on hearts, that mothers threw their children overboard and of their new Fair Pay Commissioner, who said that God would guide him in his role.

This posting by the Media, Entertainment and Arts Alliance (that is, the journalist’s union) is full of the scaremongering and misinformation which has been the bread and butter of the union movement for the past several months of the IR debate.

The most important factual omission, which the Alliance failed to point out, is that the State Cinema was going broke under its former ownership, and if Mr Kelly had not purchased it in 2002 all employees there – be they full-time, part-time or casual - would have been unemployed.

The article goes on to detail a number of mostly untested allegations in relation to sick leave, AWAs, awards and wages.

It conveniently overlooks the fact that under Workchoices, a number of new and strengthened safeguards will be introduced.

For example, under Workchoices, 10 days personal/carers leave will be protected by law for the first time. It will not be able to be traded away as is the case today.

Award are not being “stripped”. Conditions such as penalty rates will remain in awards, and people staying on awards will retain these conditions.

The Office of Workplace Services will be strengthened, with considerable extra resourcing, and heavy penalties will be dealt out to employers who make false declarations about AWAs or underpayment of wages.

Finally, the Alliance’s claim that 16 year olds can be forced to sign contracts is just plain wrong.

Under Workchoices, any person under 18 who is employed under an AWA must have it agreed to by a parent or guardian on their behalf – and this will be protected by law.

This scaremongering and blatantly false information by the Alliance highlights the depths they will go to scare Tasmanian workers into somehow thinking a union knows what is best for them.

The facts are, individual workers know what’s best for them, and they should be able to negotiate with their bosses an agreement – underpinned by a legislated safety net – which suits their interests.

It seems the Alliance would rather Mr Kelly hadn’t bought the State Cinema when the Australian Film Institute couldn’t make a go of it, and made some changes to make sure it could continue to operate and keep people in work.

Apparently, they would prefer it if the Cinema had closed, with all employees put out of work.

Well Abetz, as if the majority of workers don’t know where the Howard Government stands on the rights and wellbeing of workers.

As a former member of the public service we heard Howard say to the public that no worker would be worse off as he stripped away a large portion of our award conditions in 1997 and 1998.

This right wing and extremist Government has presided over massive casualisation of the workforce, over mega corporate takeover of land, over a massive increase in unpaid working hours, a giant rise in the cost of housing, record levels of debt for families, alarming rises in the cost of petrol, healthcare and education, widespread deterioration in the quality of drinking water and other environmental indicators, skyrocketing disease rates. The list goes on.

Howard asks the public to trust him and asks them to base that trust on his record.  Well your Government has a long history of lies and deceit and corruption.  We will remember and record everybit of it.

Brad

I have read the article and comments and acknowledge some bewilderment as to where the truth lies - in the trust re babies overboard or in the deception you place that there is some inference as to the Alliance’s preference for the Cinema to close.

Unions are as much politics as parliamentary parties. Don’t set yourself apart.  Obviously here neither understands the other and there is a mix of left/right inflections.

But what is apparent to blind Freddy is that there has been some notable trauma for innocent workaday Tasmanian islanders for whom you show no compassion.

Yours in trust; only kidding

JL

Let’s keep a positive line of thinking on all this.

Personally, a sudden redundancy or unfair dismissal could be a great thing; it might just get me off my arse and out of a confusing work environment and put to the test the fancy that I could do something reasonably productive or useful or rewarding with my egotistical perception that I have some skills that presently fall on pretty barren ground.

And then I would become truly successful and employ some of the new generation of the exploited and abused and discarded beings and mentor them towards realising some of their personal potential too as we travel together to greater success .
 
The Liberals may have a great plan here to finally deconstruct the hopelessness of the narrow-minded commercial globalisation mentality.
But my lifelong friend Pollyanna has, I hate to admit, an even bigger dream:  that the accountants and the shareholders and the bosses have an ability, merely dormant,  to realise that employees are their greatest asset and that instead of abusing the bastards’ skills and potential, that they will (truly, says Pollyanna) turn to exploiting this wonderful resource one day for their own benefit as well as the benefit of such salary-sucking minions.

I love Pollyanna ... but I think we shall just keeping throwing our babies overboard.

G’day Brad,

Welcome to TT.  I hope that what you find here is of use to you in your future in politics.

Say G’day to Eric.

Rosinante

Hello Andrew,

Just wanted you to know that was an outstanding article of yours in the Tasmanian Times; Have you thought about sending it to every major newspaper in Australia? But then I suppose the bigger newspapers would pander towards economic rationalism anyway, so you’d have a slim chance
of publication; Never-the-less it’s worth a try.

Little Johnnie’s IR reforms will be a bonanza for every shonky operator in Australia. Makes you laugh when the Libs talk about productivity gains doesn’t it? The only productivity going on will be the money pocketed by the business owners as they screw their employees labour conditions.

I want to say thankyou for the article, I intend spreading the word amongst my work collegues.

Thanks
Dave