I dreamed I saw Joe McDonald tonight …
Industrial relations - - Posted on March, 12 at 7:49 pm by Ken L
Remember Joe McDonald? He’s the WA CFMEU official who Kevie demanded be drummed out of the Labor Party for swearing on a building site. At a boss, no less 
.
Anyway Joe refused to go, and then he got acquitted by a bunch of magistrates of doing anything wrong, and there was an election and I kind of lost track of what happened about the expulsion thing. However amongst a lot of Labor supporters there was a general feeling that Kevie did the right thing and that the behaviour of union thugs like Joe should not be tolerated in the new bright clean antiseptic ALP.
A court case decided today gives a few clues about why industrial relations on WA building sites are so fraught with conflict and antagonism:
The Commonwealth Workplace Ombudsman has secured its biggest ever penalty in a single case and sent a message to employers not to exploit foreign workers.
The Federal Magistrates’ Court in Perth has fined West Australian construction company Hanssen Pty Ltd $174,000 for 21 breaches of the Workplace Relations Act 1996 in relation to the lodgement requirements of Australian Workplace Agreements.
Commonwealth Workplace Ombudsman Nicholas Wilson said that Gerry Hanssen, the director of the company, exploited fifteen 457 visa holders from the Philippines and Ireland by not providing access to their proposed AWAs and information statements and by demanding that they not date the agreements when they signed them, or they would lose their jobs and be sent back overseas.
“Hanssen professed that the AWAs were signed and dated by the workers lawfully when clearly they were not,’’ Mr Wilson said.
Mr Wilson said the workers were in a vulnerable position because of their status as migrant workers.
“As highlighted in court, Mr Hanssen, the director and secretary of the company, gloated that the employees would sign anything because they were frightened of being sent back overseas,’’ Mr Wilson said.
“This was a deliberate case of exploitation and something that the community, quite rightfully, will not tolerate. The penalty imposed on Hanssen Pty Ltd today reinforces that the Workplace Ombudsman and the Courts won’t tolerate exploitation.’’
Hanssen was on the ABC News tonight saying he didn’t understand what all the fuss was about. After all, none of the workers had made a complaint to him. I can only observe that this is typical of the attitudes I encountered from many WA builders when I had the misfortune to have to deal with them from 1980 to 1994.
Given this long history of bastardry by builders, I think union organisers show commendable restraint if all they do is swear at the pricks.
Posted in Industrial relations |
March 12th, 2008 at 8:42 pm
The workers didn’t complain to him! I love it.
Now, is the title a ref to Ochs, or to something more obscure still?
March 12th, 2008 at 9:06 pm
Did he threaten you with taunts: “I’m coming back!”?
March 12th, 2008 at 10:39 pm
Not quite Damian - it’s to a song about Ochs’ song.
March 13th, 2008 at 12:45 am
Saw a lot of blatant exploitation and thuggery and fraud from both sides when I was in the building industry many many moons ago. Was on the receiving end of a bit too (from bosses).
How nice to see that those quaint old traditions are still with us. Fair warms the cockles of my heart.
March 13th, 2008 at 8:48 am
This is our very own slave labour episode. To exploit people like this was and still is becoming increasingly evident over recent years and was assisted by the great Blight on Australian workers Serfchoices. Thank heavens the Rodent and the enemy of the worker has been thrown out of office. One can only imagine how far serfchoices would have pushed us down this road. The guy should have been jailed bigtime (years) for deprivation of liberty. He’ll pay the fine, get some other poor bastards to work for him, collect his millions and when he gets caught again will gladly cough up the pittance he has been fined for running a slave labour camp.
March 13th, 2008 at 10:11 am
Most people forget that the building unions, along with the wharfies’ unions, are militant for a very good reason. They had to be to get half-decent wages and conditions for men who worked in dangerous and poorly-paid jobs.
March 13th, 2008 at 12:12 pm
I can’t imagine why anyone in their right mind would want to swear at a nice person like that Mr Hanssen.
March 13th, 2008 at 12:27 pm
Of course, 174 grand is chickenfeed for a sizeable business. It’s not going to act as much of a deterrent.
I wonder if it a union had beens a scofflaw to this extent if they would similarly have been given such a small rap over the knuckles.
And yeah, the construction game has always been played for keeps by both sides.
March 13th, 2008 at 1:06 pm
No argument there, I acknowledge the historical importance of unions and support their ongoing role. But some of them have also played unnecessarily dirty sometimes, or, like the wharfies, gone way overboard in their claims.
March 13th, 2008 at 2:23 pm
Unless you are referring to ‘ambit claims’, which are a negotiating tactic in any bargianing situation, from buying a house to divorcing the spouse, then in my view claims which seem OTT now, seem less so as time goes on. For instance the claim in the 1920s for a paid holiday was originally greeted with absolute derision when first advanced, now four weeks leave is regarded as a basic right. Some claims seem outlandish unless sen in context-whatever. The once heavy kevvie Reynolds came out ahead of Mr ‘they just love it where they come from’ Hanssen very well, and in future, kevvie needs to take good advice when it is given on how to deal with lying crawling runts a little better than he did last year. He looks as though he might be learning a thing or two-our not so heavy kevvie. Ha ha ha.
March 13th, 2008 at 3:31 pm
$174,000 is nothing. Hanssen probably spills more than that on the pub floor every Fridy arvo.
Utter, utter bastards builders. They seem to suffer from small ilk syndrome.
March 13th, 2008 at 3:56 pm
Understand what you are saying, AS, but I am talking about conditions the wharfies were actually getting in the early-mid 80s, not ambit claims, or the legit and hard struggle for decent basic conditions back in the 1920s.
Unions have a been a massive net benefit to society. But any suggestion they are squeaky clean is just silly, they have their dark side. I have seen it first hand several times, ranging from just plain ideological bloodymindedness and negotiating incompetence that delivered their members no benefit at all, to straight threats of violence.
Having said that, the vast majority of my experience with trade unions is positive. I ain’t anti-union.
March 13th, 2008 at 3:59 pm
And BTW, I am not a fan of ambit claims, they just corrupt and prolong the whole negotiating process.
March 13th, 2008 at 4:10 pm
Unfortunately Seeker, negotiation research suggests that an extreme opening frequently sets an ‘anchor’ that results in an outcome favouring the party who made it more than a moderate one would have. This might especially be the case in a situation where the parties are very reluctant to walk away without a deal, as in employment.
That often gives unions a natural advantage in negotiations of course. Most of the time the employer’s anchor is already known, viz the status quo. That’s another reason employers liked WorkChoices - they could start negotiations with a brand new package instead of being stuck with an existing award.
March 13th, 2008 at 10:13 pm
This anti building worker stuff goes back further than the subject man here,and it is likely some on the other side would tell a tale that would show there are other reasons for anti opinion,but would be reluctant in a forum like this.Its who is in the game that counts not how it appears to be played regularly,most of the posters here incl.Ken would be welcome as part of management,I would hazard to guess!?When you see the shadecloth hanging over large building sites,it will be traced back to me eventually,as a suggestion,wether it has worked out as that,to improve safety,productivity and improve working conditions.If any one has been exploited since that became common it is yours truly and the petro-chemicals that make shadecloth.I have recommended ya!?
March 14th, 2008 at 1:39 pm
You may well be right, Ken, I am not familiar with the research. I can only go on my personal experience of the few ocassions I have seen both parties make reasonable claims up front, as the negotiations are then quick and amicable, and everybody wins.
March 14th, 2008 at 2:44 pm
Ah well now you’re talking about integrative, collaborative negotiations Seeker where both parties want to preserve a good relationship. I never saw much of that from either side in the commercial building industry. “Anything you win will be at my expense” pretty much summed up negotiating attitudes there.
March 14th, 2008 at 4:58 pm
Yep, that was about 98.4% of it. And both sides lost out because of it. Just one of the reasons I left that industry early on.
Oh well.
March 14th, 2008 at 5:01 pm
Ken: Not quite Damian - it’s to a song about Ochs’ song.
Ah, I see. Well, I was thinking of Braggy’s song about Ochs. You win this time. But I’ll be back, dude.
March 14th, 2008 at 5:07 pm
Re David’s comment, I have to agree. I’ve just started reading Upton Sinclair’s The Jungle and the descriptions of the work and living conditions in the stockyards and meat plants is enough to make me (a bloody vegetarian!) sick to the gut. Not just because of the aesthetics of it all, but, you know, it makes me think, have I ever worked a day in my life that could compare with twelve hours in those conditions? I grumble after an eight or ten hour shift on my feet behind a bar, or about long days at the office when I have a headache and red eyes. Fact is, we have jobs that don’t kill us precisely because someone in the past took a stand.
How this relates to the post I don’t know. Sorry.
March 14th, 2008 at 6:38 pm
Trouble is, it’s all about perception. Experience shows that people will accept union officials in power (think Bob Hawke, Greg Combet, Bill Shorten and Simon Crean to name but a few).
Regardless of any facts of the matter, Kevin Reynolds and Joe MacDonald, however, appear, to the public at large, to have been stamped out of a mould marked “Loud mouthed, unappealing thug with snout firmly in trough”. Such an obvious stereotype plays right into the hands of the BOO–UNIONS crowd, as we saw with the LNPs pre election ad campaign.
Maybe they’re good union leaders, I have no idea. But as far as public perception is concerned, the union movement and the ALP would, I suspect, be better off had they been retired in….Oh, about 1975.