
Issue No 16		04 June 1999

News

State Wage Highlights Case for User-Pays

The Labor Council says this week's State Wage Case increase adds weight to its push to be allowed to charge non-members service fees for securing them pay rises.

The NSW Industrial Relations Commission this week awarded safety pay rises of between $10 and $12 per week for workers who haven't received a pay rise through enterprise bargaining in the past 12 years.

The increase, awarded after the Labor Council mounted the case, applies to workers whether they are union members are not

NSW Labor Council secretary Michael Costa says the ruling is evidence of the unheralded role trade unions play in improving the living standards of workers, whether or not they are members of a trade union.

Labor Council has asked the Carr Government to introduce free-rider legislation to provide for non-union members to pay trade unions a service fee when they negotiate a pay rise on their behalf.

"This decision has not come automatically; it involved the input of several union officials working for weeks to prepare submission and then travelling to Newcastle to appear before the Commission," Costa says.

"All union members should be looking at their colleagues who are not union members and ask themselves why their fees are subsidising the pay rises of the free-riders.

"The principle of user pays dictates that a service fee should be paid to the union for negotiating these sort of pay rises for non-members".

GST Will Spice up Next Wage Case

Meanwhile, the Labor Council has signalled that next year's State Wage Case will be a more contentious affair, with workers preparing to claim pay rises to match the impact of the GST on work allowances.

Costa says allowances for tools, uniforms and transport will need to be revisited if the costs are to increase by 10 per cent.

"It is an underlying principle that the award system provide allowances to offset the costs as associated with carrying out a job," he says.

"By purporting to absorb these costs into the broader tax system, the government would be undermining this important plank of the award system.

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Issue 16 contents

Interview: Opening Australia
Lindsay Tanner talks about new ideas, new policy and new politics in the Information Age.

Unions: An Educated Fightback
A visiting US trade unionist reveals how training better union delegates is the key to reversing the membership slide.

Legal: A Fair Case for Free-Rider Laws
The proposal to enable unions to charge non-members a service fee for negotiating enterprise agreements is consistent with the principle of freedom of association.

History: New Ideas in Labour History
See the latest from the May issue of Labour History, A Journal of Labour and Social History.

International: Tiananmen Square Ten Years On
We remember the massacre and the role that working people continue to play in fighting injustice.

Review: Organising Our Future - What Use the US??
A new paper looks at what Australian unions can learn from the experiences of their American colleagues.

» State Wage Highlights Case for User-Pays

» Labor Hire Cowboys - the NFF Link

» Murder Call: Charge Bosses Who Kill

» Braddy Bunch to Lift Contractor Veil

» Rural Redundacies - Redeployment Confusion Reigns

» Woolies Shopfitters Win Back Jobs From Body Hire

» Political Payback: NSW Targetted in Costello Cuts

» Rio Tinto Buries the Truth

» Child Care Campaign out of the Blocks

» East Timor Mercy Ship heads for Dili

» Fabian Society Reforms

» Industrial Whoďż˝s Who Head for Geneva