Page 180 - Week 01 - Thursday, 9 April 1992
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MR DE DOMENICO: You gave me a copy yesterday. Let me tell you what happens in here.
Mr Lamont: Yes, it was. The Leader of the Opposition knew about it.
MR DE DOMENICO: Here is the logic of the Labor Party, by the way. Last year there were 479 buses on the road and it took 1,016 staff members to administer them. How many buses are on the road this year? There are 463. Do you think that rationalisation has taken control? Of course not. Although we have 16 fewer buses, the number of staff has gone from 1,016 to 1,091. There is rationalisation for you!
Mr Connolly: Yes, under your government.
MR DE DOMENICO: The fewer buses that you put on the road, Mr Connolly, the more people you need to service them. No wonder we agree with you when you said, "Unless the unions agree to this rationalisation we will corporatise ACTION", or, "We are looking at corporatisation".
But we know that you will not do that personally because you are constrained by a political wing of your party that you do not belong to. Last year, after corporatisation of Totalcare Industries, your party said to you, Mr Connolly, "No more corporatisation of anything else". I am going to agree with you; we need corporatisation of ACTION, Mr Connolly, and we look forward to your way of doing that. If you are strong enough to beat your left wing on that, you deserve our commendation. So, we are looking forward to that as well. What about industrial relations, because this is what this is all about?
Mr Wood: We are going to get onto it, are we?
MR DE DOMENICO: Yes, we are. On page 16, in section 2.23, under "Objectives", the ACTION report says:
Establish the costs and benefits of non-award work practices, and implement a program of negotiations on any revisions considered desirable.
The result of this objective was:
This objective was not achieved due to the lack of a proper mechanism to undertake suitable discussions with the unions.
That is what the report says. The union movement, one would think, would find it more comfortable discussing things with members of the Labor Party; but no, the report says that there was "the lack of a proper mechanism to undertake suitable discussions with the unions". Hopefully, Mr Connolly once again is going to now implement these suitable mechanisms. That, folks, is about all there is about industrial relations in the report. There is an utter failure to address any of the real relevant and pressing issues about industrial relations, and ACTION in particular.
It is when you see reports like this and ACTION's complete inability to fight the unions that you realise how entrenched some of these practices are, just like the $10,000 I mentioned before of illegal payments - I am sorry; they are legal now,
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