Shine, sun, for May DAY!
We are not yet so strong
That we can give you orders, but we must
Have your co-operation in our festival.
Let not a cloud obscure your radiance,
But shine on high as we do here below.

Shine, sun for May Day!
You are a worker too,
Getting up early, producing light and life;
You should be glad to shine on the workers’ festival.
You bring the flowers out; we today are preparing
Enormous flowerbeds of human blossoms.

Shine, comrade sun, for May Day!
Let some distant
Astronomer beyond our space-ships’ range
Marvel, rubbing his eyes beside his telescope,
“The planet earth glows doubly bright this morning,
Not with the sun’s light only, but with its own!”

source john manifold U.Q.P. collected verse 1978

from poet Jim Sharp

http://www.commondreams.org/

View other photos

http://www.labourstart.org/lpoty/

Marx on profit

Rights to information and consultation about work and employer decision-making is a key industrial relations issue. The ACTU found in a survey of 8,000 workers 70% were ‘very concerned or concerned’ about the lack of information and consultation in their workplace.

So what is the DPM’s response in the Fair Work bill? In the NES legally employees can recieve The Fair Work Information Statement. This is only a right to receive a description of the government’s industrial relations legislation in the government Gazette! That is all! This is simply pathetic and into 1984 double-speak to be described as an advance for workers’ rights. Get onto your Senator. Your Rights at Work deserve better.

The Howard Government abolished award rights for consultation. Except where organised by unions with forms of joint consultative committees and with State based Occupational Health and Safety rights, workers do not have legal workplace democracy rights.

Australian citizens can vote democratically, but not at work for their representatives (except where orgaised and agreed to by a good employer). Inequalities in the workplace cannot be addressed unless have some rights. Where employers do not agree, workers deserve a minimum entitlement to have a say over their employment status, their unreasonable hours and working conditions and over unreasonable management prerogative and a voice.

But employees have no legal rights to information or consultation or to elect a workplace representative structure.

What is missing in the FWB is any attempt at minimum workers democracy rights that are legislated for elsewhere, e.g. the European Works Council Directives where the giant corporations are able to exist and prosper with such worker entitlements. You can examine in Europe information and consultative obligations covering small and medium businesses. Such legislative minima provide an process to assist redressing power inequalities.

There is much literature on industrial democracy and in some countries Works’ Councils. One reference reviewed on this blog is ‘Works Councils in Australia Future Prospects and Possibilities’, edited by Paul Gollan, Ray Markey and Iain Ross, Federation Press, 2002.

The Senate ought to insist on minimum rights for employees to information about the business, enterprise and industry they are working in. There ought to be on request legal rights for employees to have information and be consulted about and participate in management decision-making and the ability for union and employee representatives to have some democratic structure and voice as a National Employment Standard.

Fair Work Bill

The DPM’s response to the work/family collision is a NES ‘entitlement’. Employees with at least twelve months’ service can request ‘a change in working arrangements’ to assist them in caring for pre-school age children. This gives employees no more than a right to request the leave! (which can happen now) The law says so long as an employer actually provides a written response to an employee’s request, there is to be no challenge to any refusal. No court order can be made against the employer for an alleged failure to specify reasonable grounds nor can any dispute resolution process in an award, enterprise agreement or contract authorise the Fair Work authority to arbitrate.

An employee can ask for employment arrangements to suit the family, but that the employer can refuse on ‘reasonable business grounds’, a provision very wide, such as costs to the employer, the employer’s ability to reorganise and indeed anything that a corporate lawyer could design for avoidance etc. This is an employer right to refuse a request.

Even the DPM had difficulty rationalising this saying she wants the employee to be able to have a conversation about family issues! The issue of work/life collision has been one of the key agendas from working families, from unions, in academic research and books, in ALP policy,,,but we get this deliberate ‘family friendly 1984 spin. This is not a minimalist reform but a fraud. The SMH front page Mark Davis correctly says: ‘New law fails families’ 27/12/2008.

Contact your Senators about this. Even if the Senate corrects this loophole, the drafting has to be clear for enforcement with orders to be made and penalties.

The NES Discussion Paper claimed it ‘has demonstrated that simply encouraging employers and employees to discuss options for flexible working arrangements has been very successful in promoting arrangements that work for both employers and employees’. But this is not really the UK union experience except minimally and with good employers. The UK does provide for aggrieved employees to be able to lodge a complaint challenging an employer’s response. And at least FWA should be able to review an employer’s decision, such as on no adequate response, or it was based on incorrect facts. There could be conciliation conferences. If the employee grievance was valid, then FWA could order the employer to reconsider the decision, and/or compensate the employee.

Even with this minimalist change, I fear in practice in a recession and this global financial crisis there may not be significant widespread family friendly reforms.

Fair Work Bill

Without question the trade union rights situation in Colombia remains the most serious in the world. Miguel Puerto, a Colombian human rights lawyer and now a member of our staff in London, runs a project aimed at raising awareness through publications and conferences, responding to violations by drafting protest letters, and lodging formal legal complaints through a legal centre that we support in Bogotá and that Miguel himself has taken to the UN human rights Working Groups in Geneva.(see next post).

More generally we try to maintain a dialogue between unions, lawyers, academics and human rights groups from around the world, and to respond to situations where trade union rights are under threat.

I’m afraid to say also that, like many organisations in these times, at the moment we’re also very much focussed on generating income to keep the organisation alive. We remain largely dependent upon small contributions given to us by a large number of subscribers and supporters. Anyone who has a subscription to our journal See our magazine International union rights for regular reports. is playing an important part in helping to keep ICTUR up and running. www.ictur.org

What are the challenges for unions in 2009?
In terms of labour rights there are a few key issues that spring to my mind: obviously frontline work to protect jobs or at least to secure decent severance deals looks likely to be quite important in the current economic climate. More optimistically, the US unions are running an important campaign for a new union recognition law the Free Choice Bill supported by President Obama (but under attack by US corporates…see the AFL-CIO blog on this site and my 2006 paper) that could have implications for union strength and for organising models in the wider world.

Engagement with the Chinese unions remains vital, as does doing more to revitalise and modernise unions generally (see stories on this blog).

Bringing about some sort of sustainable resolution to the recent problematic cases from the European Court of Justice is also a big challenge for us here in Europe. My view is that this latter point will require a political solution through the European Parliament, but one that I think should be grounded clearly in the human rights standards of the Council of Europe.

Is it worse for workers’ rights in recent years or some successes?

Some things get better, others don’t, and new problems keep appearing! But I don’t want that to sound pessimistic: if there is one thing that inspires me here in the office it is looking back over our country case files and seeing those countries where the situation has clearly and tangibly improved, and there are obvious examples.

I think there are always going to be anti-union pressures, so we just have to make sure we keep up the pressure to promote union rights as some sort of balance.

On a long term view I think we’ve done a pretty remarkable job in rallying the international community around a view that at least the core labour standards are fundamental human rights that ought to be respected.

For example, on your Noel Washington CFMEU prosecution we wrote to Minister Gillard and received the reply showing me the letter saying the prosecution has been dropped. We support the repeal immediately of the Building and Construction Act, one of the worst I have seen in the world.

There are serious and large exceptions but overall I think the human rights agenda, and with it the ILO framework of labour standards, is making progress.

How do you see unions responding to the global financial crisis?

In recent years the international trade union movement has consistently sounded alarm bells of disquiet with what appeared to be a growing disconnection between the international financial system and the real world economy. ‘Financialisation’ was picked up by a number of trade union reports, and in particular unions expressed concern around the explosion of new forms of investment based on private equity and the activities of hedgefunds. Major reports examining these issues were produced by the ITUC and IUF in 2007.

Unions are going to be under considerable pressure defending their members at the level of pay, jobs, benefits and redundancies. They are also going to have to make their voices heard in the key debates at national levels, and I think they should probably really go for it: unions can clearly demonstrate their important role, both to workers who may be feeling insecure, and to governments who are going to find it helpful to have buy-in from the unions if they are to implement major policy initiatives.

In volume 16 issue 1 2009 of our journal we have a paper, I cite now, of a common position, this time from the US, (and Obama politics) by Christian Weller and Amanda Logan from the Centre for American Progress ‘A Strained Relationship: Worker Rights and Financial Crises’

‘Many countries have seen rising income inequality amid slow income growth for low-income and moderate-income workers for several decades. Strengthening workers’ income growth through better worker rights is an important ingredient to create strong and stable growth in the long-term. Policy makers also need to pay attention to worker rights during a time of crisis, when profits are under pressure, which can translate into pressure to reduce worker rights. Weaker worker rights however, would make it harder for income, demand and economic growth to resume. A resolution to a major economic crisis requires a sensible policy approach to strengthening worker rights, even though private sector pressures will emerge to weaken such rights.

…good worker protections limit the impact of an economic and financial crisis on people’s incomes and thus on consumption and growth. …South Korea is cited….they refer to the US crisis and cite economic research. Academic research is cited showing stronger worker rights link to increased productivity. As productivity increases, so do profits and, if worker rights are strong, so does wage growth. With stronger domestic demand, incentives for speculative investing are reduced. This results in more stable income growth over the long-run and ultimately more stable and stronger economic growth – just what the financial doctor ordered for the troubled world economy.’

‘Labour rights have a long-term stabilising effect. They tend to reduce one of the inherent long-term economic imbalances – more people having to borrow ever larger amounts.’

There is also an argument from Canadian Professor Eric Tucker drawing inevitable comparisons with the Great depression of the 1930s and the neal Deal policies and the push by unions from below. Peter Bavkis of the ITUC argues that the failure of the right wing economists to predict the massive crisis is damming and calls for a review of the whole financial system.

What is happening with the Indonesian legal centre, TURC?

As far as I am aware the Trade Union Rights Centre in Jakarta is going pretty well. Our formal involvement with them was really just around the initial stage of development, and we helped with some funding issues in their first months of operation. But for the past few years they have been operating without any input from us, although we maintain good contacts and there are good relationships there as friends and colleagues. With help, advice and training from TURC Indonesia’s staff, especially their Director Surya Tjandra and Deputy Director Rita Olivia, we have taken their experience and used this to develop the same kind of model in other countries facing serious trade union rights crises.

The centre we opened in Iraq has closed, in part due to funding issues, but there were also real barriers to carrying out any effective work in the country.

The TURC we opened in Colombia, however, is working extremely well, and I hope Surya and his colleagues are proud to see their model making a difference in Latin America. I’m trying to organise some sort of discussion and development session between the two centres, but don’t hold your breath: the distance and language barriers present significant problems!

What can unions do for you in Australia?

Affiliate to the Australian Committee of ICTUR. We’re lucky enough to have a strong team of committed supports in Australia who run an independent ICTUR Committee which carries out a lot of our work and which for the past few years has supplied our wonderful President Sharan Burrow and a very active Vice President Mordy Bromberg SC. If Australian unions and lawyers can maintain their current level of involvement I’ll be very happy indeed.

I suppose the other thing to mention is that we offer various research and consultancy services. Anyone involved in research on legal, educational or organisational questions that have an international dimension can get in touch with us to talk about how we might be able to help.

Labour rights and the global crisis

• Leighton: Gillard’s honourable men
  Posted on Tuesday, December 16th, 2008 in ABCC Australian Building and Construction Commission – Comments: (0)
  On Monday, 27 October, a floor collapsed during construction of an office block in Canberra’s CBD. Such assaults were nothing new for the lead contractor, Leighton.
• Market meltdown
  Posted on Saturday, December 6th, 2008 in Capitalist Financial Crisis – Comments: (0)
  Canadians debate capitalist crisis See video.The current credit crisis rocking Wall Street may well be the largest market failure within the history of capitalism. The crisis is destabilizing the American economy, and also causing financial crises across the capitalist world.
• McQueen: the very right-wing Rev. Rudd
  Posted on Sunday, December 7th, 2008 in ABCC Australian Building and Construction Commission – Comments: (0)
  As part of his PR campaign, K. Rudd proclaimed that he had never been any kind of socialist. Instead, while playing Judas to his leader, he paraded his species of Christianity in an article for The Monthly.
• MPs pattern bargain but not workers
  Posted on Thursday, December 4th, 2008 in ABCC Australian Building and Construction Commission – Comments: (0)
  In the Financial Review yesterday, DPM Gillard remains tough in Labor’s crack-down on pattern bargaining. Pattern bargaining – industry-wide industrial action in pursuit of an industry agreement or identical enterprise agreements – is like workChoices specifically prohibited by her Bill (sections 412 and 422).
• Not New York education
  Posted on Monday, December 1st, 2008 in Social justice – Comments: (0)
  No, Julia! New York is Not WorkingNew York City Schools Chancellor and prospective US Secretary of Education, Joel Klein, is in Australia next week to spruik his school reforms.
• Nuclear disarmament?
  Posted on Saturday, December 6th, 2008 in Environmental crisis – Comments: (0)
  Nuclear Disarmament and Uranium Exports Inquiry. PM Rudd has a Federal Parliamentary Inquiry into Nuclear Non-proliferation and Disarmament, to examine the set of international nuclear treaties involving Australia – including Australia’s uranium exports bilateral agreements, and to report on how they may be made more comprehensive or effective and how they may advance Australia’s objectives in this field.
• Poor reduction target
  Posted on Wednesday, December 10th, 2008 in Environmental crisis – Comments: (0)
  Geoff Lazarus points out that the essence of the GLOBAL WARMING problem is that current world Co2 levels are at 360 parts per million. This has already taken us through some of the tipping points that could lead us to an eventual catastrophic and irreversable climate change later this century.
• Rudderless in a Sea of Choices: The Defeat of Your Rights At Work
  Posted on Monday, December 1st, 2008 in Featured – Comments: (0)
  Rudderless in a Sea of Choices The Defeat of Your Rights At Work—Analysis and a Possible Response by Harry Glasbeek The Federal government has laid out its proposals to revamp the federal industrial relations regime.
• Search on capitalist crisis
  Posted on Friday, December 12th, 2008 in Capitalist Financial Crisis – Comments: (0)
  The global financial crisis has dominated the headlines for months and has affected countries all around the world. Although, national governments have stepped in to prevent the collapse of the financial system, the world is heading for a major recession.
• How bad can get it?
  Posted on Thursday, December 18th, 2008 in Capitalist Financial Crisis – Comments: (1)
  The Portuguese Communist and Nobel Prize-winning author, Jose Saramago published Blindness (1995) a novel in which an entire society loses the ability to see. Everything goes white.