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Legislative Assembly for the ACT: 1995 Week 11 Hansard (12 December) . . Page.. 2918 ..

MR CONNOLLY (continuing):

and democratic rights; that is, to attend industrial meetings, to attend stop-work meetings? The course of industrial relations never runs smoothly. There are always difficulties for any government, Labor or Liberal. The trade union movement, quite properly, very jealously guards rights and privileges of workers and will be reluctant to give anything up unless it gets something in return. That is the proper role. As a result, you will have stop-work meetings and tensions from time to time.

This is the first time in Australia that a government has been threatening a lockout of its own workers. How that must have sent some shivers around at Robert Menzies House on Saturday morning. As Mr Berry pointed out, industrial relations is the big issue that the Liberals want to be very quiet on going into a Federal election campaign. Nobody can tell us the Liberals' industrial relations policy. Mr Kaine interjected earlier today that he had read the Liberals' policy and that there was nothing in it about something. He has not read their Federal industrial relations policy, because it does not exist. I had hoped that he would tell us what it was, because nobody knows. We have on the front page of the Canberra Times not just the headline "Showdown: Govt lockout looms" but the commentary:

Just when logic should have dictated that one side or the other should have proffered an olive branch, the Government has issued notices which virtually commit it to lock-outs in the event of industrial action ...

The ACT unions are fully entitled to take "protected" industrial action ...

Then it says:

However, if the Government does impose a lock-out it will set a precedent. No other employer has used the controversial lock-out provisions of the Industrial Relations Act ...

When we examine the attitude of the ACT Government in this dispute it is hard not to be reminded of the industrial-relations policies of the Kennett Government in Victoria. It seems the Government is determined to be macho rather than conciliatory.

It goes on:

The ACT TLC -

in the view of Mike Taylor -

is also being stubborn.

This Government, driven by these crazy macho policies, has brought the ACT to the verge of a situation where, for the first time, a government is locking out its work force. Fortunately, we have seen a bit of commonsense, and the Government has withdrawn from the absurd macho posturing that we saw on Friday. There is no doubt in our minds

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