Page 4497 - Week 14 - Thursday, 9 December 1993
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The Chief Minister's central coordinating group is an important plank in the first stage of separating the ACT public service by establishing enterprise bargaining. The Government has insisted that this process be governed by a centralised group and, to that end, the whole process seems to be slowly disintegrating. The list of dissatisfied customers grows by the day, and includes the Transport Workers Union, the AEU, the EPUE, the UFU and the ANF, as well as the AMEU. The CCG does not offer choice, freedom and flexibility - the key parameters for successful enterprise bargaining. It is interesting to note some of the words used by the Transport Workers Union especially to describe the central coordinating group: "Bureaucratic", "cumbersome", "time consuming", "frustrating", and "regulating the pace of reform to the slowest participant".
Mr Kaine: What about "incompetence"?
MR DE DOMENICO: Today, the AMEU said that the Treasury officials in the CCG were not even aware of the conditions agreed with the unions prior to the negotiations. The AMEU said:
your office ... displays a degree of incompetence rarely seen in any other area AMEU operates in.
So Mr Kaine was right; the word "incompetence" was used.
Mr Kaine: Did it say that the Chief Minister was recalcitrant?
MR DE DOMENICO: No, "incompetence" was the word used. The Treasury was unaware that a 4 per cent wage rise over two years had been negotiated to substantiate the Government's commitment to enterprise bargaining negotiations. "How can this be?", one needs to ask. Both unions are dismayed to find their offers of cooperation, their commitment to reform, stymied by centralistic, bureaucratic and rigid application of the Government's policy regarding industrial relations. Just like ACTEW workers, who offered considerable savings last year, ACTION bus drivers now find their proposal to save some millions of dollars once again stymied by the Government's overriding concentration on getting a single agreement in place.
We have a Minister giving broad support to the Federal Labor Government's Industrial Relations Reform Bill, introduced into Federal Parliament last month. That was the basis of Mr Berry's report to this Assembly. In this forum Mr Berry agreed with the promotion of a more decentralised bargaining process. What a hypocritical statement to make! That is what he is resisting in this Territory right now. The Prime Minister, just after the election, said that this reform Bill was meant to "trail blaze deregulation of the labour market and to open genuine workplace bargaining to the non-union sector".
Speaking on this proposed Federal legislation, the ACT Minister, Mr Berry, said:
In the interest of fairness and equity it has properly resisted the arguments of those urging total deregulation of the labour market.
It seems that there is a bit of confusion over the direction and aims of this reform Bill. On the point of open, genuine workplace bargaining in the non-union sector, the Minister is completely ignorant. His response is that, if workers are to have confidence in enterprise bargaining, they need to have the continued support of modern and relevant award structures and be able to involve the relevant trade
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