By Zari Duniam and Dave Wright
HOBART — Some 100 people attended a very lively, and sometimes heated, debate called "Trade Unions, Jobs, and Industrial Relations in the '90's", at Politics in the Pub here on December 4. The forum, sponsored by Green Left Weekly, came one day after a state-wide day of protest against the Groom government's industrial reform legislation.
Speakers were Jim Bacon from the Tasmanian Trades and Labor Council, Eric Abetz, president of the Tasmanian Liberal Party, and Ian Jamieson, former president of the Tasmanian Mining Industry Union Council and a National Committee member of the Democratic Socialist Party.
Eric Abetz, an architect of the industrial legislation, criticised the industrial action taken against the reforms. "The strikes and rallies, quite frankly, were a dismal failure," he claimed. "Your best expectations weren't realised. Not even a quarter of the public service were at these rallies.
"As time goes on, Jim Bacon and his trade union colleagues will suffer a similar fate as that evangelist did in Korea recently. He made a prediction of what was going to happen in the future, but time ticked by and of course it didn't happen."
He went on to sound an ominous warning for workers in the state. "So in the '90s there will be more and more reform to industrial relations. Individuals will be given greater freedom."
Jim Bacon responded by attacking the industrial legislation and the underhand way in which it had been introduce. He pointed out that Ray Groom had said before the election earlier this year that there would be no significant changes to industrial legislation.
He added, "They looked at Great Britain and said, 'Yes, yes; it's all worked, everyone is in work in Great Britain, they're all negotiating happily with their employer.' But really, Great Britain would have to be at least as badly off as Australia is currently, many people would in fact say worse off.
"The very same ideology, the very same policies, the very same sort of legislation that has been introduced now in Tasmania, in Victoria by Jeff Kennett, is proposed by Dr Hewson and John Howard, is exactly the same as what has been introduced in Great Britain, and which has absolutely proved to be a dismal failure."
He went on to say that working people were tired of being punished for things that weren't their fault.
Ian Jamieson spoke about the inhuman nature of the "economic rationalism" which both Labor and the Liberals were putting forward. He said that the Liberals were doing exactly what Labor wanted to do, the difference was that they were doing it at a faster
He commented that the federal Labor government was now responsible for an unemployment rate of over 11% nationally and over 12% in Tasmania. "They offer no real solutions to the current crisis, just more hardship", Jamieson said.
He criticised Abetz and the Liberals for their callous disregard for working people at a time of deep recession.
"Tasmania should become a real social laboratory", Jamieson argued. "All union members should be trying to protect all gains made, whether they be economic, social, environmental or democratic gains. There must be real job creation schemes that benefit the whole of the community.
"We should prevent the government from pursuing its current course of privatisation. We should be shortening the working week with no loss of earnings, and above all, we should scrap all penal clauses which reduce our right to organise. And that includes sections 45Dd and E of the Trade Practices Act which is still in force under this federal Labor government."