Urgent need for new code, say builders. - EWIN HANNAN and RICK WALLACE, The Australian, 24/3/14. THE nation’s builders have urged the Coalition to fast-track controversial changes to the construction industry code, warning that they need the intervention to withstand union pressure to cave in to new enterprise agreements containing restrictive work practices. But Labor and the Greens signalled yesterday that they would not support the passage of the code through the Senate, prompting employers to accuse the opposition parties of condoning union coercion and intimidation. **(More treasonous actions/threats from the Liebour/Gangreen coalition!). Master Builders Australia yesterday seized on comments by Employment Minister Eric Abetz in The Weekend Australian that he wanted to break the “closed shop” between head contractors and the Construction Forestry Mining and Energy Union by reviving the Work Choices-era building code. Senator Abetz said the code, which he promised to release “relatively shortly”, would seek to prevent employers getting commonwealth work if they struck workplace agreements with “restrictive” work practices. The new code, to be based on the Howard government’s controversial 2006 guidelines, would potentially force the removal of clauses in agreements that relate to outsourcing, contracting, use of labour hire and union rights. **(More like union wrongs). Employers in Victoria said they hoped the code could be used to reduce the 20 rostered days off that apply across the state’s construction sector, claiming that the current 36-hour-week industry calendar left the sector dormant for considerable periods of the year. The Weekend Australian revealed deep concern among contractors that they were being forced to sign up to generous union agreements to secure work in the building industry. Nigel Hadgkiss, the director of the Fair Work Building and Construction national industry watchdog, said it was a “widespread practice” for head contractors to strike agreements with unions and then require smaller contractors and sub-contractors to sign up to the same agreement if they wanted work on a project. Wilhelm Harnisch, the chief executive officer of Master Builders Australia, said the “clear feedback we are getting is that the builders want the code re-introduced as soon as possible. There is a high sense of frustration that it has not happened,” he told The Australian. “The reason for that is that a lot of builders are being pressured to sign new EBAs (enterprise bargaining agreements) ahead of the code. The builders are looking for the code to be able to say to unions they won’t be able to sign (agreements) because they will be ineligible for government work.” Opposition workplace relations spokesman Brendan O’Connor said while the ALP had yet to see the detail of the proposed code, “we would oppose any legislation that seeks to revive core parts of ... Work Choices”. **(OConnor should have added, ....because that will increase productivity AND employment and that is the LAST thing that we want!). “The government wants to use its proposed code to put anti-worker fingerprints all over workplace agreements on building sites,” he said. “The government is inching closer to reviving Work Choices with every new attack on ... conditions.” Greens deputy leader Adam Bandt said yesterday it “seems unlikely we’ll support a return of this intrusive regulation”. “When the free market works in favour of employees and they lawfully negotiate enterprise agreements, Tony Abbott can’t rush to regulate quickly enough,” Mr Bandt said. “This is Tony Abbott striking out lawfully-agreed protections that he doesn’t like, as well as legalising conduct the courts have found to be unlawful. “Before the election, Tony Abbott said Work Choices was dead and buried, but he is now trying to smuggle the corpse in through the back door.” Mr Harnisch, whose organisation has 33,000 members, including head contractors such as Leighton and Lend Lease at a state level, criticised the position of Labor and Greens, saying they were “condoning coercion, stand- over tactics and intimidation”. **(Of course they are. They are continuing on their chosen path of ruining Australia for all of us!). Lawrie Cross, general manager of industrial relations with the Master Builders Association of Victoria, said the government could use the code to influence upcoming bargaining negotiations with the CFMEU. In Victoria, workers operate under a 36-hour week, working a calendar that includes 20 rostered days off and 11 gazetted public holidays. Negotiations are expected later this year ahead of the current agreement’s expiry in March next year. Mr Cross said the current calendar ensured contractors were “not occupying building sites for vast amounts of time during the year. **(31 days off every year, PLUS 4 weeks annual leave! WOW! No wonder these parasites dont want fairness in the workplace!!!). “If the government was to take a stance that they don’t want contractors tendering for work if they are using any restrictive form of a calendar, then I think it’s going to force the industry to re-think completely how it goes forward with the notion that there ought to be large chunks of downtime as presently exists,” Mr Cross said. “It’s their code and I think potentially they could insist that contractors come to them with far more flexible and productive arrangements than they currently do.” Senator Abetz said he empathised with head contractors who believed they were being “blackmailed” by unions as project delays could leave them exposed to penalties. But ACTU secretary Dave Oliver said yesterday the minister’s statements about the code were a “government form of blackmail” against builders. He said it was in the commercial interests of builders that workers on projects were engaged under the same wages and conditions. “This is part of their ideology to take unions on,” he said. “Eric Abetz and the Coalition government don’t like unions and they will do whatever it takes.” **(NO sensible person likes industrial thugs, Mr Oliver. You and your mob are anachronistic dinosaurs who have in all probability cost your members around 500,000 jobs over the last 30-40 years!).
Posted on: Mon, 24 Mar 2014 16:30:50 +0000
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