John Lewer

Shifting frontiers of control during closedown processes

Purpose: This paper aims to explore and analyse how shifting frontiers of control emerge and change the labour process so that restrictions to output become diminished, subsequently affecting organ ...

Collective Bargaining Rights under the Workplace Relations Act: The Boeing Dispute

ABSTRACT Boeings maintenance workers at the Williamtoum RAAF base in New South Wales went on strike during 1905–1906 in a campaign to achieve a collective agreement in the face of Boeings determination to rely on individual based industrial instruments. The dispute was one of the longest in Australias recent history and ended with the defeat of the strike. Although Australia has ratified International Labour Organization Conventions on the right to bargain collectively, the dispute demonstrates the absence under the Workplace Relations Act 1996 (Cth) of any legal mechanism to resolve disputes over union recognition and, more broadly, the lack of genuine choice available to workers who seek to bargain collectively with an employer.

The global financial crisis, employment relations and the labour market in Singapore and Australia

This article examines the impact of the global financial crisis (GFC) on two Asia-Pacific countries – Singapore and Australia. After briefly outlining the origins and effect of the GFC in each country, it explores the responses to the crisis from government and policy-makers. The article uses a case study methodology, drawing on key macroeconomic and labour market statistics, statements by trade unions, employer associations and governments and related agencies as well as published expert commentary and analysis. The article argues that, along with extensive stimulus measures, tripartite efforts and labour market interventions contributed to the resilience observed in both cases.

Employee involvement and participation under extreme conditions: The Newcastle steelworks case

Australia’s steel industry underwent a transformation starting in the 1980s in response to an international collapse in demand and steeply heightened competition; such a crisis that it threatened the closure of the Broken Hill Proprietary Company’s iconic steelworks located at Newcastle on Australia’s eastern seaboard. Central to this transformation was the shift by the Broken Hill Proprietary Company from the firm’s highly confrontational approach to industrial relations to one that was far more collaborative. Gradual at first, the shift in participation with the steel unions accelerated so that by 1996 a joint management–union consultative committee – the Transition Steering Team – had been established at the Newcastle steelworks to facilitate a shift to electric arc furnace steelmaking. When the Broken Hill Proprietary Company announced in 1997 that it would exit all steelmaking at Newcastle and not proceed with the new furnace, the Transition Steering Team proved to be the key agency in the management of the steelworks’ closure. Instead of a calamitous fall in performance, under the aegis of the Transition Steering Team the plant set all-time productivity, safety, absenteeism, quality and other records.

Contemporary developments in Australian trade practices and their implications for industrial relations

Originally designed as a legal framework intended to govern the nature of business-to-business and business-to-consumer dealings, Australia’s principal competition and consumer law, the Trade Practices Act 1974 (Cth), has evolved over the last 30 years to the point where it also has a significant impact on a number of industrial relations issues. As competition law continues to evolve, it creates flow-on effects that are also felt within the workplace. This article provides an overview of some key recent developments in competition regulation that have had an impact on industrial relations practices. These include the increased use of the Trade Practices Act as a tool in employment contract disputes; the role competition policy is having on redefining the nature of work in the professions; the impact of secondary boycotts and collective bargaining on the work of trade unions; and the treatment of the self-employed individual.

The Third Way, Employment and the Workplace in Australia

The Third Way program for work, industrial relations and employment is examined. The discussion considers the publications of major third way proponents in the UK and Australia. It then considers what policies have been instituted under New Labour in the UK. The discussion then moves to the possibilities for Australia. Overall the Third Way program is either underdeveloped in some areas (eg the workplace) or largely following orthodox supply side policies in other areas (eg unemployment). The article concludes with a list of some of the important work and workplace issues that could be addressed by a new policy program.

Catherine Casey, Economy, Work, and Education: Critical Connections

advice, labour-law education, advocacy and publicity for those ignored by formal organisations. The authors clearly disapprove of some of these NGOs’ objectives and programmes, including tendencies that foster anti-solidaristic influences or that reinforce the legitimacy of the party-state. The editors’ Conclusion evokes their Introduction’s pessimism, claiming support from the other chapters. My reading suggests the opposite. None of the other chapters are as pessimistic. Whether explicit in their discussions or implicit in their evidence, the other chapters provide ample signs for optimism. Indeed, as the editors end their conclusion, they too appear to see such signs. A few weaknesses undermine this book’s important contribution and high standards. For a 2011 publication, much of the primary data used is quite old, mostly earlier than 2005. Discussion in the present tense is often referenced to the late 1990s or early 2000s. Much of the long-run financial data is not indexed for inflation, making meaningful comparisons difficult. Some chapters needed closer editing: Chapter 5’s concluding pages seem hurriedly cut and pasted from elsewhere; some tables in Chapters 4 and 5 are assembled incorrectly. Nevertheless, this volume will be of great interest to scholars and students of contemporary China, employment relations and state–market relations.

Symposium Introduction Labour, Capital and Change: Selected Papers from AIRAANZ 2009:

The 23rd AIRAANZ conference, which was held in Newcastle, Australia in February 2009 had, as its theme, ‘Labour, Capital and Change’. The theme drew on the contention that, under pressures such as neo-liberalism, globalization, the reassertion of managerial power and the rise of individualism, the traditional vital signs of industrial relations, particularly as measured by the levels of union density and collective bargaining, have declined in most Organisation for Economic Co-operation and Development (OECD) countries. Nevertheless, despite these views and forces, how the rules over work are made, interpreted and enforced still sit at the kernel of most peoples’ lives. A number of tracks were incorporated in the call for papers. These included:

Book Review: Downsizing: Isit Working for Australia?

interpreted by different members and different branches that provide insight into how democratic processes operate within unions in general and UNISON in particular. What is of significance to the representation debate is that once women are elected to decision-making bodies within UNISON, they do not necessarily take part in the decision-making process; this is clearly hindering the promotion of any gender debate. Due to the particular process by which they were elected, they may not be required to speak or vote specifically for women, or it might be because they lack the experience and expertise required to do so. In line with other research findings in this area, the book identifies how newly elected women representatives were marginalised at meetings where they were either fearful of speaking up, or where their workplace issues of concern were seen to be inappropriate to the wider agenda of the meeting. This is an interesting insight into the democratic process of the union as such marginalisation of the less experienced women members may well result in the experienced members shaping the future agenda of the union. As the author reminds us ‘the skills of a representative need to be learned’. The book provides a valuable and absorbing insight into the search for gender democracy in UNISON, a union that, from this evidence, has gone some way to changing the traditional model of male dominated trade union democracy. It does, however, raise concern over how ‘true’ gender democracy can be achieved within unions. The quality of the data and the rigour of the analysis provide invaluable resources and lessons from which other unions embarking on this road should certainly draw. For me, there were two minor omissions from the book. Firstly, I would like to have learned more about the researcher’s role in the data gathering process, how she was perceived by those she was researching and what problems, if any, she encountered in gaining access to her ‘subjects’ and the settings in which she observed them. Secondly, an index would be a valuable addition to the finished work. These issues do not detract from an otherwise stimulating book.