Back to work

The last 12 months has been really exciting and challenging.

Going back to school, changing career path and living on my own have been great. But one thing about all of this has really blown – no money. With champagne tastes, this beer bottle pocket boy has been a little sad.

Not to complain too much, the truth is I have actually not felt like I missed anything. That came as a little bit of a surprise, but I guess you need less when you are doing things you love.

Thanks to the governments kind support, in the form of Centrelink “AusStudy” payments, and the occasional bit of work here and there I have managed to get by. But now that school is about done, that’s all going to change.

I have been job hunting for the last couple of months and while I have seen a lot of recruitment agents, I haven’t had a face to face with an actual employer. Today changed that and after a year of comfy shoes I had to get back into the suit and tie. Of course this was the day that ANOTHER recruiter called with another interview with another employer – at the same time. Heaven forbid this be easy.

All of this though of returning to the workforce has really caused me to pay more attention to the Australian Federal governments new industrial relations reform than perhaps I would have otherwise. Work Choices, as they like to call it, seems to be more about giving employERS choices rather than workers.

The gist of the changes seems to be a streamlining of the current Industrial Relations law which is (apparently) unwieldy and complex with both state and federal governments having a range overlapping legislation that confuses workplace relations, puts too much power into the hands of the unions, stifles the economy and generally gets the Treasurer, Peter Costello’s panties in a bunch.

I am not a lawyer and I certainly haven’t read all of the existing industrial relations legislation. I have however read the Media Arts and Entertainment Alliance award and its complicated enough to require a couple of reading session, a gin and tonic and a nice cold towel on the forehead. If they are going to streamline things, I guess I am all for that – right? But with the new legislation running to over 700 pages, I am a little hard pressed to see that this reform is going to simpler.

On top of the concern such a weighty tome gives me, there are a few issues in the behavior of the government that’s been giving me some pause. Now remember at this time, the Liberal Party holds a majority of both upper and lower houses. For those people unaware of Australia’s political climate the short it is that the Liberal Party is about as liberal as the Catholic Church is catholic. So with control of the government, you would the Prime Minister could afford a little grace, to implement this reform in something resembling a collaborative fashion.

Apparently not.

The sorts of things that have disturbed me about the governments approach without even looking at the legislation include:

• The government originally planned to release the legislation on Melbourne Cup day -the day all of Australia stops for a horse race. And they planned to give only one day of review time to the House of Representatives.
• Over AU$50M has been spent on advertising this reform. That’s over $2.50 for each Australian
• Of that budget, AU$152,000 was spent RE-printing a government booklet to insert a single word on the cover page – Fairer. This was done before the legislation was released to the public. The government was in overdrive promoting the legislation well before it was made public

All of this seems to say that the Government either is too arrogant to care what people think, or they are afraid of the reaction if there is time for some serious debate on the issue of industrial reform. Or a bit of both.

I don’t deny that given the pressures of a global economy mean that Australia needs to find new ways to be competitive, but I am worried what this is going to mean to the people in Australian society who are only just living on the money they earn now. Do we really need to create jobs at any cost? Even if the cost is widening the rift between haves and have nots?

Having lived in the US, I have seen how the worlds richest country treats its poor, and its not pretty. The aftermath of Katrina showed the world how vast the division really is. Is that sort of division really necessary for continued prosperity?

And is Australia heading in the same direction?