SimBel wrote:
To be fair to Rudd and Gillard:

The Australian Building and Control Commission was never a Workchoices initiative, it was established following the Cole Royal Commission into what anyone halfway honest will concede can be extraordinarily dodgy practices by the construction unions (and here everyone means the CFMEU regardless of others having members the industry). They made it clear before the election that it would remain until 2010.

They made it clear in their pre-election policies that that they would do away with AWA's and the more pernicious elements of Workchoices and rollout Fairwork Australia in late 2008.

In the wake of workchoices they have to embark on the much (try at least 50 years) overdue standardisation of awards which is unbelievably complex and difficult.

They also have to ensure that they don't stuff the economy. Their parts of this country (WA for instance) where good solid ALP voters are passionate about keeping workplace arrangements in place that allow them to be paid far above award rates.

This is a very complex issue - not really an area for simplistic sloganeering!

Really, this is just simplistic sloganeering. The ABCC, The Independent Contractors Act and Workchoices were three prongs of the same intent. That is to completely control the price of labor; drive it down and exert complete control. The intricacies of the legislation are staggering, its effect profound. Rudd and Gillard are a joke, it will not be too long before the dissent becomes louder and more damaging for the ALP. The only people stuffing the economy is the finance industry, but you won't see any action by ASIC or APRA.

You have no idea wrote:
The only people stuffing the economy is the finance industry, but you won't see any action by ASIC or APRA.

Not until people start putting a candle under Labor's arse.

Dumbarse ALP - abandoning the common working family and chasing DONATIONS (bribes) from business and organised crime.
http://www.theage.com.au/opinion/state-of-the-union-20080919-4k5g.html

State of the union

* Shaun Carney
* September 20, 2008

THROUGHOUT most of the 20th century, Australia's industrial relations system worked along relatively simple lines. There were unions and there were employers and there was a central tribunal with powers to conciliate and arbitrate in the middle. Please note the last two words of the preceding sentence, "the middle". Because more often than not, the tribunal would look at the claims of both sides, find the mid-point between them and that would form the basis of its decisions.

In some superficial respects, the Rudd Government's proposed workplace laws, its much-awaited replacement for John Howard's ill-fated WorkChoices, sit in that old Australian IR tradition. What the Workplace Relations Minister Julia Gillard has done is to look at what the employer organisations wanted, which was to hold on to WorkChoices, and what the ACTU wanted, and given them both a little bit of what they were after — in effect, splitting the difference. On the face of it, this might seem a reasonable enough approach, perhaps even fair.

But the very nature of WorkChoices needs to be borne in mind. It was the most revolutionary set of industrial laws Australia had seen. Labor's substitute for WorkChoices, which it calls Forward With Fairness, is no counter-revolution. In a way, it's more an attempt to make WorkChoices more efficient, the sort of prescription that John Howard might have gone for had he not been overwhelmed by the desire to leave behind a profound ideological mark after he won an increased majority at the 2004 election.

Howard made two massive misjudgements in 2005 that ensured he would leave politics a loser. One was to set the ball rolling on WorkChoices. The other was not to hand over the Liberal leadership to Peter Costello. Combined, those two decisions guaranteed his defeat last year. But on the WorkChoices score, Howard should have some cause to take comfort.

WorkChoices had two goals: an economic objective of giving employers extensive natural bargaining power over hiring, firing and wage-setting; and a political goal of crushing the union movement and, as a consequence, weakening the Labor Party. The political consequences of Forward With Fairness could well turn out to be more profound than the industrial ones. All told, this new IR regime reveals the truth about the contemporary Labor Party: its ties with the unions are technical and historical, not elemental. There is little in this package of measures that suggests it is the product of a Labor government committed to entrenching social democracy

Forward With Fairness does make some fundamental changes to WorkChoices. The application of a sunset clause to Australian Workplace Agreements, which were the bluntest instrument of the old laws, is the most obvious. Some of the restrictions on collective bargaining have been eased, and the new industrial tribunal Labor will set up to supersede the Industrial Relations Commission will have some sort of power to arbitrate intractable disputes, although how much power and in what circumstances is yet to be determined. Importantly, the burden of the law will require employers and employees to negotiate but not to reach an agreement.

Resort to unfair dismissal procedures will be extended to many small businesses, but the threshold for employers to dispose of employees has been lowered significantly. Even the Fair Pay Commission, which sets minimum wages for the lowest-paid workers, will continue to exist, rebadged and with different members. The wage-setting power will continue to be denied to the central tribunal.

Voters who expected to see WorkChoices dismantled probably should have looked beyond the rhetoric and examined the fine print of the policy outlines Gillard delivered last year. The John Bray professor of law at Flinders University, Andrew Stewart, is advising the Department of Workplace Relations on the drafting instructions for the Forward With Fairness legislation.

He said yesterday that the relatively mild nature of the package should come as no surprise. "Early last year when it announced its policy, the Labor Party made a whole series of compromises. It was very concerned that there might be a backlash from employers and as a consequence it wanted to go to the election sending out two messages. One was that it would get rid of WorkChoices and the other was that it would look after business. There is no significant commitment that it made back then, as far as I can see, that it has gone back on," he said.

The changes that Forward With Fairness imposes on the existing WorkChoices model will lead to a fairer and more efficient industrial relations system. In tandem with the new laws, the award modernisation process being undertaken by the Industrial Relations Commission — a massive project — will streamline workplace relations.

But they do little to encourage the growth of unions, and that's where the political significance of Labor's course on IR lies. The Whitlam government cruelled itself by giving too much to the unions. The Hawke government avoided that mistake by tying the ACTU to a joint approach on incomes, the social wage and economic policy generally. The Rudd Government, faced with a union movement that's been weakened by 11 years under Howard, has accepted the diminution of union power as a fait accompli and has fashioned its new IR regime around that fact.

Eventually, Labor will have to reorganise itself internally to reflect this reality; it cannot continue indefinitely to have 50% of its conference constituted by unions — especially if its IR laws regard union representation as an incidental extra. What is guaranteed is that the public campaign by the ACTU in response to WorkChoices and which provided so much help to Labor in its 2007 election effort will not be repeated. That campaign was a reflexive attempt by unions to escape the hangman's noose under Howard. Victory has resulted in unionism being plugged in to what amounts to a rudimentary form of life support under Rudd and Gillard.

The attentions of many union officials will now turn to the Greens, with a view to persuading Bob Brown and his fellow senators to negotiate amendments to "toughen up" Forward With Fairness in the upper house. Thus the minor party that has a good chance of taking a number of formerly safe inner-city ALP seats at the next election could, in the case of this policy, save modern Labor from itself.

Shaun Carney is associate editor.

Alternative Liberal Party ALP wrote:
Dumbarse ALP - abandoning the common working family and chasing DONATIONS (bribes) from business and organised crime.
http://www.theage.com.au/opinion/state-of-the-union-20080919-4k5g.html

State of the union

* Shaun Carney
* September 20, 2008


The attentions of many union officials will now turn to the Greens, with a view to persuading Bob Brown and his fellow senators to negotiate amendments to "toughen up" Forward With Fairness in the upper house. Thus the minor party that has a good chance of taking a number of formerly safe inner-city ALP seats at the next election could, in the case of this policy, save modern Labor from itself.

Shaun Carney is associate editor.

Another great piece by Carney, I hope the unions are listening. They need to dump the millstone around there neck that is the ALP. Labor is so embarassing, the union movement needs to kick them to the kerb and create a new movement.

SimBel wrote:
To be fair to Rudd and Gillard:

The Australian Building and Control Commission was never a Workchoices initiative, it was established following the Cole Royal Commission into what anyone halfway honest will concede can be extraordinarily dodgy practices by the construction unions (and here everyone means the CFMEU regardless of others having members the industry). They made it clear before the election that it would remain until 2010.

They made it clear in their pre-election policies that that they would do away with AWA's and the more pernicious elements of Workchoices and rollout Fairwork Australia in late 2008.

In the wake of workchoices they have to embark on the much (try at least 50 years) overdue standardisation of awards which is unbelievably complex and difficult.

They also have to ensure that they don't stuff the economy. Their parts of this country (WA for instance) where good solid ALP voters are passionate about keeping workplace arrangements in place that allow them to be paid far above award rates.

This is a very complex issue - not really an area for simplistic sloganeering!

"The Australian Building and Control Commission was never a Workchoices initiative."

No it was an initiative to make things nice and smooth for those property developers to make sure those big donations keep rollin' into both Labor and Liberal coffers. Does anyone seriously believe that the ABCC is anything but a political agency designed to make sure that the constuction unions cannot put bans on controversial projects that are unwanted by the community? Does anyone seriously believe the construction/property developers did not buy of governments with massive donations to make sure they have no trouble with planning and control of the labour? Puh.....lease, join the dots here. Developers are the biggest political donors, the size of the payoffs were well worth sacrificing a few unions for.

The construction unions very seldom put bans on projects unwanted by the community, what they do a lot of is run a racket that intimidates members of other unions on building sites, sub-contractors legally performing duties on building sites, rig internal union ballots on things like industrial action. They also do a lot imtimadating of employers in the construction industry - but some people can't seem to care less about that even though they are the ones who provide the jobs.
If you want to talk about the ABCC - read the testimony and findings of the Cole Royal Commission. Senior leaders of mainstream unions concede privately that the CFMEU in particular needs watching. The leadership of that union, particularly in Western Australia, is the rump of what was once the BLF!!!
I personally think some of the ABCC's powers are extreme and should be wound back, but to confuse the ABCC for the rest of Howard's extreme IR laws is just plain wrong and intellectually dishonest.

On WorkChoices - of course it is incredibly complex and it was at its heart an attempt to fatally damage unions. But let's be very honest - a tiny minority of electors who voted for Rudd in response to Workchoices understood the true perniciousness of it. They all thought the worst of Workchoices was their children and grandchildren working casual hours at the local bakery could be treated appallingly (and many were). One of the worst thing about Workchoices was that it actually legislated against awards. Once an employer took you off an award, you could never go back, you could be put back on the same pay rate but not the same conditions!!!

This is why the award standardisation being conducted by the Commission is vital. The pay rate in industrial agreements must be fair to all parties and not rely on 'conditions' to compensate. The issue of these conditions is what the industrial battle ground was really about in Workchoices as well as unions themselves.

If anyone thought Rudd and Gillard were going to to usher in an ACTU dominated industrial environment they were naive in the extreme. Look at the way Brumby threatened the nurses with Workchoices during the election campaign with Gillard's support.

Simbel wrote:
The construction unions very seldom put bans on projects unwanted by the community,

The unions were key in Sunshine's fight for an outdoor pool, and the Building Industry Group instructed its members unions not to cross the picket line.

Trades Hall played a key role in getting the State Government to fund the project and we are grateful for their efforts.

Trades Hall has a great record of supporting community campaigns. Great credit is due to those unions and workers who supported our pool, but their actions don't negate points made about the national workplace relations environment.

SimBel wrote:
their actions don't negate points made about the national workplace relations environment.

my heart bleeds for the poor billionaire developers.

Simbel wrote:
The construction unions very seldom put bans on projects unwanted by the community, what they do a lot of is run a racket that intimidates members of other unions on building sites, sub-contractors legally performing duties on building sites, rig internal union ballots on things like industrial action. They also do a lot imtimadating of employers in the construction industry - but some people can't seem to care less about that even though they are the ones who provide the jobs.
If you want to talk about the ABCC - read the testimony and findings of the Cole Royal Commission. Senior leaders of mainstream unions concede privately that the CFMEU in particular needs watching. The leadership of that union, particularly in Western Australia, is the rump of what was once the BLF!!!
I personally think some of the ABCC's powers are extreme and should be wound back, but to confuse the ABCC for the rest of Howard's extreme IR laws is just plain wrong and intellectually dishonest.

On WorkChoices - of course it is incredibly complex and it was at its heart an attempt to fatally damage unions. But let's be very honest - a tiny minority of electors who voted for Rudd in response to Workchoices understood the true perniciousness of it. They all thought the worst of Workchoices was their children and grandchildren working casual hours at the local bakery could be treated appallingly (and many were). One of the worst thing about Workchoices was that it actually legislated against awards. Once an employer took you off an award, you could never go back, you could be put back on the same pay rate but not the same conditions!!!

This is why the award standardisation being conducted by the Commission is vital. The pay rate in industrial agreements must be fair to all parties and not rely on 'conditions' to compensate. The issue of these conditions is what the industrial battle ground was really about in Workchoices as well as unions themselves.

If anyone thought Rudd and Gillard were going to to usher in an ACTU dominated industrial environment they were naive in the extreme. Look at the way Brumby threatened the nurses with Workchoices during the election campaign with Gillard's support.

I am fully familiar with Cole, and the fact it was a political stunt. You blame the CFMEU as being being responsible for allegations of widespread corruption in the building industry; that is not so. As for some union leaders of 'mainstream' unions privately believing that the CFMEU 'need watching' you need to look at the motives of those unions leaders. You have the right wing unions attacking the left wing unions and vice versa all the serving their own agendas. The ABCC WAS just another deunionisation agenda and an attempt to demonise the CFMEU, and that remains to this day. If any government truly wanted to be an anti-corruption, crusading, fair to all government they would pursue the stalled insider trading cases (over 50 well known high profile individuals)that allegedly have enabled some to enrich themselves by trading shares when they had price sensitive inside knowledge. They would enact legislation to protect consumers, not just enact 'light touch' regulations, it is this hands off regulatory environment that has brought about the meltdown in the worlds financial markets. Some unions might have a few rogues but not as many as the big end of town has, the only difference is the big end where suits and have more expensive lawyers. Wake up SimBel you cannot be serious, it is you engaging in intellectual dishonesty.

21% swing against Labor in NSW.

Minority government in ACT.

With swings like that no branch stacker is safe.

Big swing hey wrote:
21% swing against Labor in NSW.

Minority government in ACT.

With swings like that no branch stacker is safe.



At long last widespread community apathy in politics is being replaced by a very concerned community in the mood for radical reform and a regular turning over of politicians until they find a skilled and caring team with the the right formula for them and their families futures.

Branch stackers beware - your time is up.

Looking forward to seeing the size of the swings against the ALP in the Brimbank Council election after the years of corruption, cronyism, nepotism and neglect.

Council Turnover wrote:
Looking forward to seeing the size of the swings against the ALP in the Brimbank Council election after the years of corruption, cronyism, nepotism and neglect.the labor party has no endorsed candidates in the city of brimbank nore in the past.any labor party member is free to stand and exercise his democratic right as an australian citizen.this means you can vote who you believe is the best to represent you.the present counclors to not represent the labor party but semself.

dont kid yourself wrote:
any labor party member is free to stand and exercise his democratic right as an australian citizen.this means you can vote who you believe is the best to represent you.

That's right you can vote for which Labor party branch stacker can represent you best. Unfortunately none of them can the filthy bastards and there's one behind every labor party candidate in the election.

http://www.theage.com.au/national/labor-thrashed-in-nsw-act-polls-20081019-5400.html

The Rees Government in NSW lost the seat of Ryde on a swing of nearly 23%. It will hold the usually ultra-safe Cabramatta, but suffered a swing also of 23%. Lakemba, seat of former premier Morris Iemma, also stays in Labor hands, but with a swing against it of 13%.

ABC election analyst Antony Green said the swings were the biggest in NSW and federal postwar byelections.

Greens leader Shane Rattenbury said "We have seen the political landscape redefined in the ACT. We have a three-party system in Canberra now," he told the ABC.

The anti-Labor swings continue the pattern set this year in the Northern Territory, where the Labor Government just held on, and in Western Australia where the ALP lost, the first breach in the all-Labor pattern across the nation.

http://www.theage.com.au/

Because many ethnic groups have close social and cultural ties, Labor operatives have found it relatively easy to persuade large numbers to sign up en masse.

"A large percentage of (Turkish and Vietnamese community members) handed over their ballot papers for their escort to fill in," the party member said of the 2003 vote.

In Gorton, 95 per cent of the party's membership claimed to earn less than $32,000 a year, yet the 2001 average household income for the area was $50,000.

The Gorton investigation found evidence of phantom meetings to admit new members, forged signatures on membership forms, bogus records, memberships routinely paid by others and no questions asked when a member's fee was paid twice in the one year.

Having regained control of the state branch, Labor Unity wants up to five sitting federal MPs dumped at the next round of federal preselections.

Theo Theophanous crisis sparks reshuffle speculation

by Nick Higginbottom
http://www.news.com.au/heraldsun/story/0,21985,24521179-2862,00.html

October 20, 2008 12:00am

THE Theo Theophanous crisis has sparked speculation of a Cabinet reshuffle with Planning Minister Justin Madden under threat.

Factional heavyweights have been busy jockeying for position in what many have suggested will be a summer-time move to inject "fresh blood" into the ministry.

Sources said that Mr Madden was a probably victim of a Cabinet shake-up ahead of the 2010 election.

A member of the Planning Minister's own Right faction said Mr Madden had not performed particularly well and only remained as a third-term minister because of his public profile from his AFL success.

Police and Emergency Services Minister Bob Cameron is also under pressure because of his botched handling of the Brookland Greens methane crisis where he stumbled badly trying to sell the government position.

But powerbrokers in the Socialist Left faction, of which Mr Cameron is a member, were yesterday confident the former barrister would retain his Police and Emergency Services ministerial portfolio.

They also said Public Transport Minister Lynne Kosky was also likely to remain in her job despite reports to the contrary.

The back-room manoeuvring came ahead of today's community Cabinet meeting at Horsham in the state's west.

The reshuffle, which would be Premier John Brumby's first, looks set to go ahead regardless of the outcome of a police investigation into allegations Mr Theophanous raped a woman in Parliament House in 1998.

Mr Theophanous is expected to be interviewed by police this week, but since he temporarily stepped aside from Cabinet and Parliament last Monday he has strongly denied any wrongdoing.

He is also under pressure amid concerns in the ALP that the controversy could drag on for months.

Energy Minister Peter Batchelor, despite speculation his political career is drawing to an end, will still contest the next election.

Upper House MP Martin Pakula is favourite to fill the next ministerial vacancy.

madden's career is fly blown.

when you get in bed with low life you become low life

the first thing he has to do is get rid of Hakki

then he might just be able to save his career and his reputation in the community as it has been badly scarred by his factional boss cum ministerial adviser

fly blown wrote:
madden's career is fly blown.

when you get in bed with low life you become low life

the first thing he has to do is get rid of Hakki

then he might just be able to save his career and his reputation in the community as it has been badly scarred by his factional boss cum ministerial advisercant wait to see him gone.has not done anything for our area to have him as our upper house member.hope he knows where the door is for a speedy departure.