Next page . . . . Previous page . . . . Speeches . . . . Contents . . . . Debates(HTML) . . . .

Legislative Assembly for the ACT: 1996 Week 3 Hansard (26 March) . . Page.. 645 ..

MR WHITECROSS (continuing):

As a result, since August last year she has been stuck on this issue and refusing to move, refusing to come off her home base, refusing to find a way through, to find a win-win solution to this. In the last Assembly sittings she was saying, "We are not talking to them because they are not doing it agency by agency". She would not be flexible. The only reason she has anybody signed up to any agreements in this dispute is that some of the unions have shown sufficient flexibility - a flexibility that Mrs Carnell knows nothing about - to see it as being to the benefit of their members to sign an agreement rather than go on forever with no agreement signed.

Mrs Carnell has signed a number of individual agreements, all giving basically the same terms and conditions, union by union. She could have achieved exactly the same thing, Mr Speaker, if she had bothered to talk to the unions and negotiate with them in the way that they wanted. Instead, she has extended this dispute. She has cost her workers money and she has cost the community convenience because of her stubbornness, because of her inability to compromise, because of her attitude of win, win at all costs.

Another characteristic which Mrs Carnell has portrayed in this dispute is vanity and pride. For Mrs Carnell it is more important to win the public relations war than it is to resolve the dispute. At a time when unions and the Industrial Relations Commission complained that Mrs Carnell would not negotiate, what was her response? Instead of spending time sitting down and talking to the unions and finding ways through this dispute, what did she do? She put out a series of so-called revised offers at 7 o'clock, or 8 o'clock or 9 o'clock at night, purely for the benefit of the newspapers and the radio. There was no expectation that the unions were going to accept them, no expectation that they would be acceptable to the members of those unions. She put them out just to get herself a headline in the Canberra Times and publicity on the morning radio. It was a public relations stunt. Her energy went into those public relations stunts, not into resolving the dispute. Meanwhile, the bills clocked up for the community and the inconvenience went on.

At a time when she should have been engaging in meaningful dialogue with the unions about the matters in dispute, Mr Speaker, she was slavishly following the public relations path and doubling the term of the agreement so that she could double her offer. What a brilliant move! Did that advance the cause? Did that get the dispute closer to being resolved? Of course it did not, Mr Speaker. It was a public relations stunt. It was something that was done for one reason and one reason only - so that she could get out another press release, another fake offer, to satisfy her desire to be winning the public relations war. It did not advance the cause one iota over the matters that were in dispute.

In recent weeks Mrs Carnell has claimed victory repeatedly. She has boasted that the back of the dispute has been broken, that the matters in dispute are resolved; but, of course, they are not. The best part of 90 per cent of ACT Government workers do not have an agreement. The best part of 90 per cent of ACT Government workers do not have a pay rise. I do not know about anybody else in the chamber, but I would not call that resolved. There is still no-one collecting the parking fees out the front. There is still no-one handing out the parking tickets out the front. There is still 90 per cent of the workers not collecting a pay rise. That does not sound like it is resolved.

Next page . . . . Previous page . . . . Speeches . . . . Contents . . . . Debates(HTML) . . . .