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Issue No. 275 | 05 August 2005 |
Iemma�s Dilemmas
Interview: On Holiday Unions: One Day Longer Industrial: Never Mind the Bollocks Politics: Spun Out Economics: If the Grog Don't Get You .... History: Taking a Stand International: The Split Legal: Pushing the Friendship Poetry: Simple Subtractions Review: Sydney Trashed
Discriminating Centrelink on Charges Taxpayers to Fund Advertising Orgy Constituents Don�t Trust Andrews Howard Steamroller Hits Building Sites
Parliament The Soapbox The Locker Room International Postcard
AFL-CIO Not The Only War Be Afraid Frame Up We Love Morris ANew Development A Readers Suggestion
Labor Council of NSW |
Work/Time/Life Uproar Over Holiday Plans
Tourism and Transport Forum chief, Christopher Brown, said Kevin Andrews' threat to halve guaranteed annual leave entitlements could decimate domestic tourism. Industry leaders expressed their concerns to federal Tourism Minister, Fran Bailey, last week. Brown said Andrews' plan to allow two weeks of annual leave to be cashed out would see workers taking fewer holidays. He said it would take Australia one undesirable step closer to the US situation. "We don't want to end up like the Yanks, with only two weeks holiday," Brown said. At the same time, Sydney University history teacher, Richard White, argued it could split Australian society between the haves and the have-nots. Near-universal access to paid family holidays, he said, had been a defining characteristic of Australianness, different from the experiences of other Anglo-Celtic societies. "One scenario, if we keep on going down this line, is that we'd get to a situation which is a bit like it was back in the 18th Century," White told Workers Online. "(Where) you had a sort of class that could afford leisure and sufficient income - unearned income from investment and inheritance - that that class didn't need to work and they could enjoy quite a lot of leisure. "On the other hand, the majority of people had less and less leisure available to them." The Australian reported, last week, that there was widespread tourism industry support for Brown's warning about economic damage. It quoted voyages Hotels and Resorts boss, Grant Hunt, warning staff would 'burn out' because economics would dictate they should take the money. Queensland Tourism Industry Council head Daniel Gschwind called the proposal a "bad move".
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