Business baulks at push to lock in casuals

By Ewin Hannan    

Business groups have vowed to oppose a push by ACTU president Ged Kearney to transfer casual workers to permanent employment, claiming the union strategy would send companies “to the wall” and was out of step with the wishes of employees.

As part of the union movement’s attempt to tackle “precarious employment”, Ms Kearney said yesterday that unions wanted to open a dialogue with the Gillard government, the states and employers about how to reduce the level of casual employment.

Mr Kearney said the tripartite talks should consider a union proposal that would require employers to make casual workers permanent after 12 months.

She also lent support to a plan under which governments would favour companies with mainly permanent workforces when awarding contracts.

“I am not saying we are going to demand these tomorrow, but they should be part of the solution,” she told The Australian.

“And we are also happy to listen to industry solutions as well.”

But employers yesterday savaged the proposals, claiming they would significantly reduce workplace flexibility and disadvantage industries highly-reliant on casual employment.

John Hart, chief executive of Restaurant & Catering Australia, said the plan would have a negative impact on the services sector, where most people working less than full-time hours did so voluntarily. “It would be just driving that sector to the wall,” he said. “It’s ridiculous”.

Peter Anderson, chief executive of the Australian Chamber of Commerce and Industry, said the ACTU position represented a “misguided view of the jobs sector. The major problem is it carries some inference that we can control our labour market with some set of command and control rules,” he said. “We don’t have a command and control economy.”

He said the unions were out of step with the attitudes of most casuals, who received loadings of 20 per cent and wanted to maximise their income by working as casuals for a certain period.

Gary Black, executive director of the National Retail Association, said the ACTU push was “pretty typical of an organisation whose constituency doesn’t relate to the modern-day Australian economy, which is dominated by the services sector”.

Employers said the take-up rate of employees who had the opportunity to convert from casual employment was negligible.

Ms Kearney said the business criticism was typical of the “race to the bottom” attitude adopted by many employers and unions would not be deterred.

The ACTU president said she regularly spoke to parents whose children were stranded on casual employment despite being aged in their 20s and wanting permanent employment.

Article from The Australian, November 1, 2010.