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Issue No. 334 | 24 November 2006 |
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It’s Who The Economy Works For, Stupid
Interview: Common Ground Industrial: A Low Act Unions: The Number of the Least Politics: The Smoking Gun Economics: Microcredit, Compulsory Superannuation and Inequality Environment: Low Voltage History: The Art of Social Justice Review: Work’s Unhealthy Appetite Culture: A Forgotten Poet
The Soapbox Parliament
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Editorial It’s Who The Economy Works For, Stupid
From the moment John Howard unveiled his nasty plans, there has always been three stages that needed to be navigated - awareness, impact and solution. Tracy, the mum in the TV ad being dragged into work, bought awareness into the nation's lounge rooms and took ten points off the PM. The government's own ham-fisted $56 million campaign shaved another ten. Awareness of changes went from less than 10 per cent to more than 90 per cent in a matter of months. The real victims of WorkChoices charted the impact across the workforce and, despite some of the conservative boosters saying the issue hasn't really bitten, WorkChoices is being implemented with the spread of AWAs and arbitrary sackings and while few workers will put their heads up, everyone seems to know a victim. Which brings us to November 30 and the launch of the political phase of the campaign; the phase where unions must entrust the industrial movement's political wing on delivering a government that will restore rights at work. The mistake as we enter this phase is thinking of the Rights at Work campaign as being about the 'issue' of industrial relations. To be effective it must be about much more than that. Rights at Work is a frame for the politics of the next 12 months - a frame that aligns the Labor Party with working Australians and their families and the Howard Government with the interests of big business. This is an important distinction - if IR is just another issue, it can be swamped by the nuclear debate, or interest rates or whatever moral panic the Howard Government cares to manufacture. But if it becomes a broader frame, these issues can be absorbed. Take nuclear and climate change - rather than being drawn into the science of fission, the pointed response is the Howard Government is putting the interests of the nuclear industry - that is big business - ahead of the interests of working Australians. There are a whole series of issues that fit this frame - issues that are of broad community concern, but struggle for sustained oxygen. From the skills crisis to off-shoring of local jobs; from section 457 abuses to private equity takeovers of icons like Qantas and Coles Myer scratch the service and in each instance, the government sides with big business against the interests of working Australians. The challenge of the political phase of the campaign is to seize this opportunity and define the choice for the next election along these lines. That means talking about working Australians, not the retro class cringe of 'middle Australia'; it also means discarding the language of 'employees' and bringing contractors and small business people into the family of Australians who get up and go to work each day. Get these concepts straight and it won't really matter who is leading the show, the Labor Party has the opportunity to win back its base and end the Howard Era. It starts on Thursday. Peter Lewis Editor
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