John Tattersall
What tipped me into standing for Socialist Alliance in the Victoria Park by-election on March 11 was having worked through a number of labour hire/recruitment agencies and seeing how badly these young, unskilled and semi-skilled workers, and even tradespeople, were treated.
They talked about feeling invisible — no-one cared or bothered about them — and they feared losing their jobs. Because they lacked skills and confidence, they never spoke up. They were employed as casuals, but in many cases they had worked for two, sometimes three years, before they got a full-time position with the host company. Usually they just got fed up and left.
I worked on a site with one bloke who'd been employed as a casual for five years and still hadn't been made permanent. He had a family and mortgage; he summed it up well when he told me, "You have to save up for Christmas, not for presents, but just to survive the two weeks with no income when the factory closes over the break. It's like being on a treadmill, you've just got to keep going because you can't afford to stop."
Most people think that casuals get a loading to cover their annual leave, public holiday and sick leave (seven weeks in all). But the recruitment agencies set their wage rates against the so-called competition of other recruitment agencies, and then skim workers' entitlements to pay their own wages and running costs. It's a big scam!
The agencies are little different to pimps who use and exploit vulnerable women — the dynamic is the same. Ironically, these agencies believe they are part of the service sector. But what sticks in my throat is that they actually believe they are doing you a favour by placing you in a job. Throughout your employment they continue to rip financial strips off your back, and then fly off to Fiji or some other exotic place for their four weeks' annual leave and fail to see their own hypocrisy. In reality, they are glorified pay clerks for a host company that wants to avoid responsibility for its employees.
The other thing I find hard to swallow is watching state and federal Labor Party candidates walking through the factories at election time, cap in hand, asking for votes as they promise a fair go for workers if elected.
They seemed oblivious to the plight of these young recruitment agency workers and are actually surprised when the issue is raised! My understanding is that a third of the Australian work force is casual, the highest in the OECD countries with the exception of Spain.
Yet, after almost two terms in office, WA Labor has not introduced legislation to protect workers' rights. We now have John Howard trying to turn the remaining two thirds of the workforce into casuals by getting rid of unfair dismissal laws with his draconian Work Choices package — which is basically a tweaked version of the WA Liberals' "third wave" IR attacks.
Both sides of politics are married to big business. Workers need to realise that between Labor's apathy and the Liberal Party's attack-dog approach to workers' rights, we need to speak out and fight back as a class. That's basically why I'm a member of Socialist Alliance.
[John Tattersall is the Socialist Alliance candidate for the Victoria Park by-election.]
From Green Left Weekly, February 22, 2006.
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