Opening address by ACTU President R J Hawke to the 47th Federal Conference Amalgamated Postal Workers Union
November 8, 1971
Attempts are being made to force the industrial movement into a situation in which the government would see itself creating an election issue.
For several months now we have been engaged in what must be regarded now as a quite futile exercise - a series of negotiations between the ACTU, ACSPA and CCPSO on the one hand and the employers on the other under the chairmanship of Mr. Phillip Lynch, the Minister for Labour and National Service.
The alleged purpose of those negotiations has been to discuss on a tri-partite basis the operation of the Conciliation and Arbitration Act, with a view to trying to see how that legislation could be made more effective and achieve a more harmonious industrial relations situation. We went into these talks in good faith and on the basis that there were many things that could be done which would be in our own interests and the interests of all parties in achieving a better industrial relations situation.
Not the least of these was the question of sanctions in industrial awards and agreements.
The ACTU took the position which we regard as absolutely correct that in this sort of society, where there are no restrictions on any other segment of the community, it is absolutely immoral to say you should impose sanctions only on the labour movement.
In a context in which employers are free to fix the prices of what they have to sell there cannot be any sanction at all in the legislation which applies only to the trade union movement.
But we did not want to be entirely negative. We said that we were prepared to sit down unreservedly in conference, with the employers, and with the government if they wanted to attend, and try to work out a system between us wherein agreements arrived at between parties would be effective and would be adhered to.
In such a system it would be the trade union movement itself which would make agreements work, and, of course, day after day this sort of thing is happening.
The classic illustration of how the trade union movement can make agreements work occurred in the airlines dispute last week.
This was a situation where a group of employees were working under an agreement with the oil companies.
When that agreement was negotiated the employees were working, not at Tullamarine where the dispute originated, but at Essendon.
There was an agreement, but the employees felt they had a legitimate grievance and were entitled to something more in travelling allowances. They felt that while an agreement had been negotiated, here was something new. You had a position from the oil companies' point of view where they said that there was something in what the men were putting forward, but they did not want to just give in because they had to think in terms of precedents which could be created throughout Australia.
We took the attitude that there was an agreement and it should be adhered to, but we said to the oil companies that, if there is something new, you did not sit back and say that: “there is an agreement”.
The employers, and the third parties who were suffering from the dispute - the airlines - realised that the use of penal sanctions would have only exacerbated the situation.
In the event we are able to intervene, get the parties together and resolve the situation quite quickly.
This was a classic example, and a timely one in relation to the position we had adopted in Canberra.
In the tri-partite talks, we were able to show, from experience in New Zealand where they have had an arbitration system for as long as Australia, that in the last 19 to 20 years they have had sanctions in the legislation but those sanctions have not been applied.
The parties in New Zealand generally agreed that blanket sanctions were not necessary for the successful operation of the Act.
Although our position is manifestly correct, it is becoming clearer that the Federal Government wants to manipulate the situation so that it can paint the trade unions as the villians of the piece, and hold them responsible for rising prices, even for unemployment, and a generally slow rate of economic growth.
They see some virtue in making the trade unions an issue in an early election.
It seems that the same sort of situation is developing in New Zealand where the Seamens' Union has been deregistered and an attempt is being made to use troops or sailors from the Navy to do the job of seamen there.
It is an attempt by a conservative government to create a confrontation with the trade union movement.
We in Australia reject the approach adopted by our government and the provocative confrontation action being taken by the New Zealand government. I have sent a cable this morning to the New Zealand Federation of Labor, in which I have said: "ACTU Executive meeting next week, starting November 15. Prepared consider then any request for assistance your executive may forward in relation to the current New Zealand position."
In other words, if they make a decision that we can be of assistance and they forward that request, then the ACTU Executive would consider that request and be in a position to recommend to affiliated unions that they provide any assistance they can to help to smash this attempt to bring in troops and penalise the New Zealand unions in any way.
But I believe the Australian government is making a mistake if it believes that the Australian people are so stupid and capable of being misled and misguided by the government's attempts to create an artificial election issue like this.
The Australian people must be going to consider that we have an education system which, given the level of our economic resources, must be one of the worst in the world, and one containing gross inequalities of opportunity. We have a Social Services system which was once the envy of the world and which is now one of the worst.
We have a foreign policy which makes us the laughing stock of every intelligent and objective observer, and which clearly makes us the lackeys of the United States.
We have the odious situation in which the Prime Minister, Mr. McMahon is toadying to Nixon and grovelling to him to try to create an election issue in this country on the basis of the ANZUS treaty.
The government thinks that people are going to allow all these things to be swept aside so that it can create an election issue out of industrial relations.
All trade unions have a responsibility in these circumstances, not only of educating their own membership, but of getting the story out to the people at large.
It must be made known that we are not asking for any special rights for the trade union movement. We are simply asking for the same rights as employers who have an uninhibited right to go out and get the best price they can for what they have to sell.
The difference between us and the employers is that, in making their decisions, employers do not even have the limitation of going before any independent tribunal to justify their actions.
If we understand that we have a good case and go out and tell our story then we have nothing to fear from the political tactic being followed by the Federal Government.
I would like to deal briefly with the question of international relations. We have continued a very close relationship with our friends from New Zealand. When I was recently in New Zealand I met with the executive of the N.Z. Federation of Labor, and they took up a decision of the last ACTU Congress which was to examine ways of establishing closer co-operation between our two trade union movements.
That decision was that we should establish a body - the Australia and New Zealand Trade Union Consultative Committee - which should meet a couple of times a year to discuss matters of mutual interest.
So we have close and increasingly cordial relations with our neighbours across the Tasman. But it is important that we should play an active part in international relations in a broader sense.
If you do not have international peace and goodwill, then all you do internally will not add up to very much. The trade union movement cannot of itself alter the progress of international relations, but it does have an important role to play in that process.
It is good that the Amalgamated Postal Workers' Union is in the forefront of our affiliated unions in the way in which you approach international relations.
But I believe we are too circumspect in confining our international relations effort to those countries which have political organisations and practices akin to our own.
We must also be talking to those with a wide dispersion of ideas, because it is with these people that there is the greatest potential for areas of conflict to open up.
I hope that we will be able to broaden our contacts in the future, and I am glad that you as a union have an interest in international affairs. I am pleased to have had this opportunity to open your conference and I am confident that you will make decisions which will be of benefit, not only to your own membership but which will play a part in the development of the whole trade union movement.