July 1 - Zero Hour for Julia's Countdown to Chaos
Wednesday, 30 June 2010 14:44
Just like she did with the BER building rorts scandal Julia Gillard has simply walked away from the mess she’s created for employers, paymasters and workers, flick passing the chaos to Simon Crean.
“July the 1st is the day when the rubber hits the road for the mess that is the Rudd/Gillard Government’s modern awards” said Senator Abetz.
“With a myriad of confusing transitional provisions, classification rationalisation and the impact of the recent increase in minimum wages, this is the day when workplaces really discover the disaster that is Labor’s so called ‘simpler, easier, less complex’ system.
1 July 2010 marks the date when the new rates in modern awards become operative. Labor’s complicated transitional pay provisions have baffled even Government experts.
“I am concerned about this day for a number of reasons” said Senator Abetz.
“Firstly, officials from the Fair Work Ombudsman have been unable to answer questions about how the transitional pay provisions work – if they can’t understand it, what hope does a worker or small business person have?”
“Secondly, despite the fact that departmental officials are unable to interpret Labor’s new laws, the Fair Work Ombudsman is under instruction from Julia Gillard to prosecute businesses who breach the laws.”
“There is a real problem when the educator is also the enforcer and workplaces won’t know if they are being helped or prosecuted when Labor’s industrial police come bursting through their doors.”
“Thirdly, today represents another broken promise from Julia Gillard, who expressly promised that costs to business would not increase as a result of modern awards. This promise was never going to be met and today many businesses will see an increase in operating costs of over 25% which is on top of the minimum wage increase.”
“Fourthly, and most crucially, July the 1st will be the day when many workers discover they face the very real prospect of losing their jobs or having their hours cut back as a result of Labor’s new laws.”
“Feedback from workplaces all over Australia, particularly small workplaces, is that most will need to cut back on staff and hours just to accommodate the massive increase in operating costs as a direct result of the Rudd/Gillard laws,” Senator Abetz said.
“I have always maintained that the Fair Work laws would be a ‘slow burn’ problem for workplaces. Today that burn just got a lot hotter as employers and workers are left to ponder what ever happened to the rhetoric, platitudes and promises from Julia Gillard that “no worker would be worse off” under her new system.”
