National Jobs Plan: rebuilding manufacturing INSIDE
AUTUMN 2013
A shipbuilding revolution National breakthrough for AMWU women Book giveaway: Greenwash
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EDITORIAL
Australian Manufacturing Jobs – WORTH VOTING FOR
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The Opposition have also said that they will axe the steel industry transformation program, axe the auto-industry coinvestment scheme and axe the clean technology and efficiency grants.
Australian Manufacturing Jobs...
ast month the Federal Government released a $1 billion package aimed at securing jobs and skills in manufacturing and implementing a plan for the future of the industry in this country. Not only does the policy tick a number of the key boxes that the AMWU has been campaigning for, it puts Australia’s manufacturing industry and its million jobs front-and-centre in this year’s election.
they listened and have now acted to tackle some of these problems. I think it also demonstrates an astute political understanding of how much Australian’s value jobs, skills and being a country that makes quality products. Don’t get me wrong – there is no quick fix here and we need to keep arguing and campaigning to defend our jobs, our skills and our industries.
But the policy is a genuine attempt to kick-start a national industry plan and to build a smarter and The policy, ‘A plan for Australian more globally competitive industry Jobs’, demonstrates the Gillard in a high cost country, one that Government’s understanding of the competes on quality, invests in need for Australia to have a diverse skills and innovation and rewards economy, not one solely based on its workers with decent wages. You what we dig up out of the ground. can read more about the details of the policy in the following pages. I sat on the Prime Minister’s Manufacturing Taskforce, along In contrast, the Opposition has with bosses, academics, denounced the government’s Government Ministers and plan claiming that all it does is bureaucrats, as we grappled increase red tape for companies. with the enormous pressures That’s because the policy seeks facing manufacturing businesses to make sure that Australian and workers. manufacturers get a go at supplying projects worth over Above all else, the key issue that I $500 million. Well I reckon that’s a and other union representatives bit of red tape we need in this sought to get through to the government was the importance of country at the moment! manufacturing jobs and skills for our The Opposition have also said that nation’s future. That meant making they will axe the steel industry sure they understood how important transformation program, axe the it is to stop the loss of jobs. auto-industry co-investment I think it’s a credit to the Prime Minister and her government that
AMWUNews AUTUMN 2013 AMWU News is the official publication of the Australian Manufacturing Workers’ Union, (registered AFMEPKIU) National Office, 133 Parramatta Road, Granville, NSW, 2142. Editor: Paul Bastian AMWU Communications Team: Rod Masson, Neil Wilson Design: dcmc Design, Melbourne All information included in this publication was correct at the time of publication, but is subject to change at any time. Please contact your union organiser for updates. © AMWU National Office Made in Australia by AMWU members
scheme and axe the clean technology and efficiency grants.
All of which would result in massive job losses across manufacturing. What we don’t hear from the Opposition is what they will build through their policies. Everybody (employers included) involved in the Prime Minister’s Taskforce agreed on the need for governments to develop policies that, taken together, form an industry plan for manufacturing. The Opposition has offered no thoughtful or detailed policy for manufacturing jobs. We still have a lot more work to do to secure jobs and build a brighter future for our industry, but we have made significant progress in getting this government to make a good start. Over the next six months leading up to the federal election, it is crucial that we do not lose sight of the fact that Australian manufacturing jobs matter and that they are worth voting for. In unity.
Paul Bastian AMWU National Secretary
Paul Bastian’s editorial ........................................................................................ 3 AMWU welcomes jobs strategy........................................................................... 4 Analysis: Planning to stay prosperous................................................................ 5 Mexican diet boosts recruitment ........................................................................ 6 Campaign for shipyard revolution ...................................................................... 7 Cold cash for green Electrolux ............................................................................ 8 The case for helping apprentices ........................................................................ 9 National first for AMWU women.........................................................................10 Book review: Greenwash by Guy Pearse ............................................................11 Delegate profile .................................................................................................12 AMWUNEWS
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AMWU WELCOMES JOBS STRATEGY The basis of the new strategy is: • Companies will be required by law to submit Australian Industry Participation (AIP) Plans for projects worth $500 million or more to give local industry a fair opportunity to win work in the multinational supply chains. A new AIP Authority will help local business identify and win work. • Projects worth over $2 billion must employ an Australian Industry Opportunity Officer in their procurement and global supply centres. • Ten Industry Innovation Precincts with $500 million in government assistance, to integrate firms, university research, technology experts and business providers. The aim is for businesses to lead research to produce innovative products for export. The first precincts will be set up in Adelaide’s maritime defence area and Melbourne’s southeast industrial belt with a separate food innovation precinct to have its headquarters in Melbourne. PM Julia Gillard met AMWU delegate Con Polihronopoulos when she launched the plan at Boeing in Melbourne. With them: the AMWU`s Paul Bastian, Industry Minister Greg Combet and Boeing chief Ian Thomas.
• A $350 million boost to the Innovation Investment Fund to stimulate private investment in start-up companies which apply technology and skills to smart products that consumers demand.
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• Venture capital tax arrangements will be clarified to give certainty to small and medium firms.
he AMWU has been campaigning since the Prime Minister’s Manufacturing Taskforce wound up in August last year for a national plan for manufacturing.
In response to the Taskforce’s work, the Federal Government has announced a $1 billion plan giving manufacturing much-needed certainty to innovate and compete on a fair basis to create employment. If industry grabs the new opportunities to invest in skills, grow exports and take back more work on mining and infrastructure projects, the plan can add $1.6 billion a year to the economy and sustain over 10,000 jobs. National Secretary Paul Bastian said the plan takes on the big challenges arising from the high dollar, lost productivity and the failure of big business and governments to prioritise buying local in some areas. He said the AMWU would look at the draft legislation to ensure that it delivers on local content and jobs and he called on all sides of politics to support the plan. It includes the establishment of 10 innovation precincts to bring research and industry together, tougher rules around industry participation in the big mining projects and funding for growth
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in cutting-edge small and medium businesses. “‘A Plan for Australian Jobs’, will adopt the best practices from around the world, including investing in innovation, skills, science and technology,” Mr Bastian said.
The plan builds on the already announced government appointment of an Automotive Supplier Advocate to help the car components industry and the establishment of an Anti-Dumping Authority.
“It focuses on lifting management’s ability to make informed, strategic decisions and it looks to empower the workforce. It backs our nation’s ability to keep making things well, to be competitive and to get access to work”. Mr Bastian dismissed a complaint from the Minerals Council about having to employ local content officers on large projects as ‘the blindness of greed’. “It’s a bit pathetic when on Western Australia’s biggest mining infrastructure projects, mining companies have sourced less than 10% of their fabricated steel from local companies, while youth unemployment has risen in Perth’s industrial belt,” he said. “They are taking massive profits out of Australia, it’s time they put a fair share back by using local industries right here on their doorstep.”
A Plan for Australian Jobs booklet
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Politicians must give reforms teeth: WA effectively locked out Australian steel fabricators, were broken down into realistic components which local companies could bid for.
and companies could afford to bid. “The policy’s a good step forward, but we will need to keep companies like Chevron honest about breaking contracts into smaller chunks, like they clearly do for steel makers in countries like Vietnam. No Australian company is big enough to bid on single $1 billion or $2 billion contracts,” he said.
“We are definitely now heading in the right direction. If Australian Participation Plans are linked in with Australian standards for manufacturing, it gives a strong incentive for our local factories to be able to compete by doing quality work.”
in place through trade restrictions in offshore markets, predatory trade practices in our home market and large corporations in several sectors utilising supply chain management practices that are as unproductive as they are unfair. The ‘getting access’ agenda is also about precincts and collaboration. It is about better connecting our ideas and inventions with smart firms and growing the next generation of mid-size global businesses ($25-$250 million). These firms anchor value-adding activity in this country because
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Getting competitive and getting access to foreign and domestic markets are two sides of the same coin. There has been a serious erosion in the international competitiveness of the Australian economy. This commenced from just after the Sydney Olympics. Our exchange rate surged and our consumer prices increased more than the average in other advanced economies. The result was the well-known ‘lost productivity decade’. Within manufacturing, these economywide effects were compounded by a wide range of factors identified by the PM’s Taskforce. There is a very large agenda involved in building more productive and profitable manufacturing firms which includes turbo-charging productivity through the right investments in infrastructure, skills and innovation. A little less politics and polemic and a bit more substance on these issues from all quarters wouldn’t go astray. The ‘getting access’ agenda is partly about making sure that firms get a full and fair opportunity to win work at home and abroad. This is about removing the barriers that are put
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Labor’s Jobs Plan is an important part of the Gillard Government’s broader policy agenda. It’s objective is to forge a more productive, innovative economy through Australia becoming more competitive, so we can have a more prosperous, fairer society. The strategy aims to build better manufacturing businesses with the management systems and organisation to succeed in the global economy. The post GFC world has brought on the first wave of a fundamental global restructuring of manufacturing industries. Australia has lost fewer jobs than many comparable countries (see table) partly because of how well government, business and unions worked together during tough times. The challenge that union and business leaders from the PM’s Manufacturing Taskforce have addressed is how to harness that spirit of co-operation and collaboration as this global restructuring of manufacturing plays out.
“The effectiveness of the policy will also come down to the strength of the Federal Minister and the bureaucrats. It’s a lot better than what we have and the government should be congratulated, but we will need to keep the companies honest.”
% Change in Manufacturing Employment: 2007 to 2011
AUSTRALIA
ANALYSIS – By Nixon Apple, AMWU Economist
The AMWU delegate at steel fabricator AGC, Ray Hall, said a test for the policy was whether developers had to break down contracts so local consortiums
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A plan to access prosperity
At the same time, youth unemployment in the industrial zones near Perth sits at around 27%.
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Mr McCartney said there had to be a cost breakdown of tenders so that contracts over $1 billion, which
Under the Barnett Government, virtually no steelwork on the giant Wheatstone project and only 23,000 of 310,000 tonnes on the Gorgon gas project have been done in WA.
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WA State Secretary Steve McCartney
said the Australian Industry Participation Plans for projects over $500 million should make it tougher for developers to use local purchasing policies which lumped in everything from fuel and earthmoving to corporate boxes at the football as ‘local content’.
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AMWU members in resourcesrich WA have welcomed the Gillard jobs plan as a way to expose the purchasing policies of multinational developers who have so far sent about 90% of steel work for major LNG projects offshore.
Mr McCartney praised the plan’s requirement for companies to hire Australian Industry Opportunity Officers to work with them on projects worth more than $2 billion, but its effectiveness depended totally on how much influence they had in company supply offices.
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AMWU National Secretary Paul Bastian leads a union jobs march in Perth.
“That would be a real step forward but we still have to see more of the detail, that’s the test.”
their business cases stand up to scrutiny in boardrooms where decisions are made. After watching these issues play out for 30 years, I believe there is a strong case to support Labor’s Jobs Plan. Importantly, it seeks to formalise a permanent leadership dialogue about smarter firms, smarter workplaces and smarter partnerships. It seeks to work with the market to drive that agenda throughout the economy. And it has no illusions about the painful structural adjustment that lies ahead, seeking to deal with that in a fair, efficient and effective way. AMWUNEWS
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Mexican diet boosts recruitment M
embers at tortilla and taco shell-maker Gruma Oceania are on the path to spice-up their wages and conditions with a fresh EBA filling after discovering that solidarity is a compelling recipe for success.
The determination of a multicultural group of AMWU delegates has grown membership among the diverse workforce from zero to more than 160 in the four years since the Mexican flag of Mission Food’s overseas owners first flew in the Melbourne suburb of Epping. AMWU organiser Jason Hefford said at first nearly everyone at Gruma had difficulty understanding the Australian diet of fair bargaining and safe workplace culture, which management found particularly hard to digest. “It has been hard yakka, originally dealing with the management, then when we were convincing our new members that they have workplace bargaining rights and how they can be used to improve their rights at
manufacturing delegate Dakena Thomas. “We really have to try to emphasise the proven benefits from joining the union, because sometimes people have been made to feel afraid.” The initial agreement in 2009 went through 35 translated versions, relayed back and forth across the Pacific. It took the minimum wage from $14.98 to $18.57.
Good mix: AMWU delegates (L:R) Kashif Kahn, Eryk Herbel and Dakena Thomas.
work,” Mr Hefford said. “You have to try to deal collectively with a key issue like wages to spread trust in the union rather than just relying on some individual issues, people have to see progress shared on a wide basis.”
payment for these higher duties are now on the menu. There have been five human resources managers and four health and safety managers in four years of operations.
Successes included getting tea and coffee supplied on-site, getting sick leave entitlements recorded on pay slips and opportunities to advise workers about accessing their WorkCover rights if injured.
Delegates face both language and cultural obstacles and hardline tactics from supervisors intimidating workers of the same ethnicity. The AMWU has formally complained about one supervisor who stood in the doorway of an authorised workplace meeting to discourage employees from attending.
Fair access to verified training, then
“I couldn’t believe it,” said
The next challenge is to complete bargaining for a new four year agreement, with a wage offer of 15.7% to 2016 which would take the lowest grade well past $20 an hour, a key aim. But workers rejected a management entrée which would see a rise of just one per cent in the first year, so talks are continuing. The company agreed to join a working party on casual employment, yet still prefers to bring in new casuals from a labour hire firm rather than the Agreement which allows for casuals to switch to full time after six months. One worker was kept casual for 13 months straight with just one day off in that period.
AMWU pressures councils and states on local car shame
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he AMWU has cranked up the pressure on all levels of government to buy Australian in their car purchases following a shock revelation that only 30% of local councils’ passenger vehicles are locally made.
Vehicles Division National Secretary Dave Smith wrote to every local government across the nation quizzing them on their car procurement, which could secure thousands of Australian jobs if they prioritised vehicles made in their own country. State and Territory Governments are already under scrutiny over their purchasing policies, with only the vehicle-building states of Victoria and South Australia and the Federal Government having a clear majority of locally-made cars in their fleets. The Gillard Government has appointed a new Automotive 6
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Supplier Advocate, ex-Ford executive Bill Angove, to improve purchases of Australian vehicles across all levels of government, which could boost the industry by $240 million annually. Mr Smith challenged local Mayors to show leadership by putting Australian jobs first and increasing local car purchases from about 16% in 2011 back closer to the 66% level of 2004. “In order to stimulate our industry immediately, all government levels need to take a good, hard look at what they are doing with their car purchasing policies,” Mr Smith said. Victoria, with most vehicle manufacturing, uses locally-made cars for 98% of its core government passenger fleet and about 70% of all agency vehicles, while the figure for the South Australian government is 78%. The Federal Government sits at 71%.
Mr Smith said since government agencies had started offering employees leasing arrangements for vehicles, it had reduced large-scale fleet purchasing of Australian-made cars.
More local orders means more local car jobs.
Figures from industry body FCAI for fleet procurement of cars and SUVs in 2010-11 put NSW at 42%, the ACT at 34%, Queensland and Tasmania at 33%, the Northern Territory at 31% and Western Australia at 26%. “The Federal Government is reasonable, but in NSW and Queensland it’s quite pathetic to be honest, considering the number of cars they need and the amount of extra support they could be giving to fellow Australians and local jobs,” Mr Smith said.
AMWU senior delegate at Ford Broadmeadows Stewart Harris, said the decline had been noticeable and worrying for workers. “This should not have happened. The choice for people provided with a car as part of government employment should be vehicles made in Australia – there should not be an option when taxpayers’ or ratepayers’ money is concerned,” Mr Harris said. The AMWU supports Victoria’s Labor Opposition, which said if elected it would restrict choice with salary sacrifice deals to locally-made cars.
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Once in a lifetime” chance for a shipbuilding revolution
Generating jobs: Maintaining the Collins Class subs is part of $4 billion spending supporting thousands of jobs.
Full ahead: New Minister for Defence Materiel Mike Kelly talks to AMWU shipyard delegates.
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hipyard delegates from across Australia have launched a campaign to secure the nation’s maritime future by pressuring Federal MPs to approve the total design, construction and maintenance of the next generation of submarines and navy ships in Australia.
A special meeting in Sydney of AMWU delegates called for investment of $250 billion over the next 30 years to make the 48 vessels here in Australia as the key to a wider transformation of design services, engineering and manufacturing across the country. AMWU National Secretary Paul Bastian said this was a ‘once in a lifetime opportunity’ for high-end shipbuilding skills to help sustain Australia’s manufacturing base, potentially for 100 years. In contrast to buying an off-the-shelf overseas design, doing all the work here would set up Australian-based defence companies with the knowledge and facilities to build and maintain the 48 navy vessels outlined as required in the 2009 Defence White Paper. That includes 12 submarines, eight frigates, six amphibious landing craft, two combat support ships and 20 offshore combatant vessels – just for starters. New Defence Materiel Minister Mike Kelly told delegates the shipbuilding schedule was ‘our modern day Snowy Mountains Scheme’ with detail expected in a new White Paper to be released soon and followed up by a
Maritime Construction Industry Report. He envisaged building the vessels on a rolling basis to allow for flexibility and improvement as the backbone of a wider defence and commercial industry ‘that rolls on forever’. Dr Kelly held out the possibility of buying the Spanish-designed Navantia SA Cantabria supply ships to avoid the ‘valley of death’ loss of up to 3,000 skilled jobs when the Air Warfare Destroyer program winds down later this decade. He did not commit to a fourth AWD being built.
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It would employ tens of thousands of people and give us a reputation around the world that we can build these things.”
And the minister was unable to give delegates any guarantee of new work at BAE Systems at Williamstown in Victoria, where there is a gap mid-year between completion of the first Landing Helicopter Dock ship and the arrival of the second LHD from Spain, then little work from 2014. Forgacs’ Brisbane ship repair yard is without work at present. A recent defence business analysis found that since 2007, the proportion of defence jobs awarded to local contractors had fallen from
80% to just 53%, at a loss of Australian jobs and $8 billion to the economy. Delegates were sceptical of the value of sourcing work from European designs after problems with the engines of the Collins Class submarines and AWD compartments. “If we win the full contract for the subs at ASC everyone in the shipbuilding industry can share in it, it’s too big for one company,” said ASC delegate James O’Connor. “We have the lads next door on the destroyers, so we need the subs to avoid the ‘valley of death’. “It would employ tens of thousands of people and give us a reputation around the world that we can build these things.” He said the Gillard Government must lock in the submarine and other fleet vessels well before September’s federal election. PM Julia Gillard has made Adelaide’s defence precinct one of 10 manufacturing hubs under the new $1 billion jobs plan. A new report by an expert panel including former defence chiefs Peter Cosgrove, Angus Houston and Russ Crane has found compelling economic and security reasons for both designing and building the submarines here. The Defence South Australia Advisory Board, chaired by General Cosgrove, warns that to outsource the project or select a foreign ‘off-the-shelf’ design would be to ‘surrender our sovereign independence and gift an entire industry to another country’. In conclusions which strengthen the stance of the AMWU, the board’s ‘Guarding Our Edge’ report says the Collins Class project means Australia has the expertise and infrastructure to be a world leader in designing, building and maintaining non-nuclear subs. The report cites the flow-on from the Collins project, where $4 billion in spending saw hundreds of new companies arise, while the earlier Anzac ship project generated 7,500 jobs and a $3 billion boost to GDP. AMWUNEWS
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New asbestos website steps up funding pressure The National Asbestos Strategy goals include: • Prioritising the audit and removal of asbestos from all government and commercial buildings by 2030 • Introducing Asbestos Content Reports on all homes and flats built before 1987, to be administered by councils, to alert all owners and buyers to the dangers • Introduce Asbestos Safety certificates for residential buildings to further alert householders Asbestos campaigners Serafina Salucci and Pat Rogan at the launch of the website: www.asbestosfreefuture.com.au
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he AMWU and community groups are urging members to help pressure the Federal Government to commit Budget funds to the massive task of clearing Australia’s buildings of asbestos.
The union and asbestos diseases groups in every state want guaranteed funding in the 2013-14 Budget so a National Asbestos Authority can be set up, with resources to immediately begin removing asbestos from all government and commercial buildings. National Secretary Paul Bastian said funding is also needed to ensure the new Office of Asbestos Safety can target publicity campaigns warning home renovators of the continuing danger of asbestos sitting in the roofs and walls of up to two thirds of houses built between WWII and 1983. He said that if the urgent recommendations of last year’s Asbestos Management Review Report were to be given meaning in safeguarding Australians, then politicians on both sides of parliament had to make good on statements of support by committing future Budget funding. Mr Bastian was speaking after launching the new ‘Asbestos Free Future’ website with co-sponsor the CFMEU and campaigners, Serafina Salucci and Pat Rogan, who are both battling mesothelioma.
The site www.asbestosfreefuture.com.au tells their stories and makes it easy for AMWU members to sign a letter to the Federal Cabinet’s powerful Expenditure Review Committee and their local Federal MP pressing for funding to implement the National Asbestos Strategy. “We have the highest rate of asbestos-related diseases in the world on a per capital basis and unfortunately the death rate will continue to rise through this decade,” Mr Bastian said. “This is not a problem of the past that ended with James Hardie ceasing production, because this lethal hazard still lies in thousands of older buildings in almost every suburb in Australia.” Ms Salucci said it was deeply disturbing to hear amateur home renovators considering removing old asbestos sheeting, which indicated wide community ignorance of the continuing dangers. The 43-year-old mother of four is among a ‘third wave’ of people suffering from mesothelioma due to domestic use of asbestos products, a legacy of her dad building a garage when she was a child. “While asbestos is still in our older buildings, like houses, hospitals and schools, there’s a risk of exposure if fibres become airborne, so we must work to safely get rid of it,” said Ms Salucci. Former NSW Member of Parliament Pat Rogan said
• Adopting new national standards for licensed operators to handle, remove, transport and dispose of asbestos safely in approved sites • Asbestos education courses for those working with the substance • Enacting a national set of laws on standards for asbestos waste disposal sites and to assist residents with safe disposal • Asbestos awareness campaigns for the public that are targeted and evaluated • Establishing a National Asbestos Authority to oversee the work funds were urgently needed for both prevention and research. He wants a safer environment for his grandchildren. “I’m a Labor man and I think it’s great the Gillard Government are committed in principle to getting rid of asbestos in buildings, but it is a mammoth task with the thousands of homes built with asbestos sheeting and they have to make a start,” he said. “Awareness is terribly important, it has to be a priority because today’s younger people have to know to leave it alone, not to try and renovate or work with it because the danger is still there.” Visit www.asbestosfreefuture.com.au to send a message to your MP.
Cold cash helps green Electrolux jobs as review gets underway
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embers at refrigerator maker Electrolux have welcomed a boost in its clean technology investment as the NSW factory faces an internal review. Electrolux Home Products in Orange is looking to expand clean manufacturing after the Federal Government agreed to a $4.7 million grant as part of its Clean Technology Investment Program, funded by carbon tax revenue from big polluters.
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AMWU official Mick Rattigan (left) with Electrolux workers Ally Shaw and Tony Cardwell.
The company will invest $9.4 million in new plant and equipment as it modifies its production line to increase the
energy efficiency of its refrigerators by at least 11%. But whether Electrolux, which produces 300,000 fridges a year, can remain profitable after 2015 in the eyes of its overseas owners, depends on expanding its small export market, management told the AMWU. AMWU NSW State Secretary Tim Ayres said after meeting delegates and management that he appreciated cost pressures on Electrolux. The union intends to meet the steering committee
Electrolux has formed at Orange as part of its review. Mr Ayres said any extra Federal Government help would be welcome and called on local politicians and the council to give the company support in exploring niche export markets it had identified. He was confident the internal six-month review would end well for its 600 workers if it looked at quality, safety and competitiveness.
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A fair deal for our apprentices T
HE need to guarantee Australia’s future skillbase by paying fair wages to young workers is the driving force behind the AMWU running an historic test case to overhaul pay and conditions for apprentices.
Rebecca Mayer sometimes wonders whether taking on an apprenticeship due to a love affair with cars has unfairly disadvantaged her daughter Stella - and she knows it shouldn’t have to be that way. The mature-age fourth year auto apprentice has willingly made many sacrifices to learn the trade but it hurts when her low wage and training expenses means she can’t afford to give Stella the dancing lessons other six-year-old girls enjoy.
The case aims to stop the disturbing drop out rate of up to 48% of apprentices, mainly in their first and second years, often due to wages which are often less than those paid to workers in fast food outlets and convenience stores.
Ms Mayer, 33, is determined to stick it out on $16.65 an hour and qualify as a motor mechanic.
AMWU National President Andrew Dettmer opened the AMWU case to raise the wages of first year apprentices to at least 50% of the adult trades wage, the first rise in relativities in 33 years.
But with rent alone taking more than two thirds of her wage, she can see why many others quit and how industry and the nation are the losers as a result.
The union is also seeking to drop the adult apprentice starting age from 21 to 20 and to ensure employers pay TAFE training fees and associated travel expenses for apprentices.
“I’d like to see more enticement for future apprentices, including adults, because it’s as though there’s no real incentive with the wages. They’re shocking, even though the trade is essential,” she said.
Mr Dettmer said rates as low as $7.80 an hour for first year apprentices was not a living wage for an independent person, effectively ruling out almost anyone without financial support of their parents.
“It costs me money every week to go to work, I still think of leaving as it’s very hard to stay afloat.” Ms Mayer has always had to pay for her own TAFE tuition, textbooks and transport to college, as well as her tools. These are expenses she hopes the Fair Work Commission inquiry will look at.
People from poorer families or those in conflict with parents who had left home risked being shut out of the apprentice system unless they took on the burden of a second job or had a working partner willing to supplement their apprentice wage. “They risk being deprived of a financially secure future and Australia cannot afford such a tragic loss of potential if we are to keep our manufacturing industry skills ahead of our competitors,” Mr Dettmer told AMWU News. An AMWU survey of 545 apprentices found most considered quitting their apprenticeship, with 35% citing low pay as the reason, 20% a lack of proper mentoring, 19% poor quality training and 14% the burden of travel to work or TAFE. “The demands on apprentices are greater than ever , with 71% of our survey expected to do overtime, including 54% of first year apprentices,” Mr Dettmer said. “This challenges the claim of many
BEC DRIVES HER DOLLAR HARD
Coping together: Apprentice Rebecca Mayer gets some help from daughter Stella.
employers that first and second year apprentices are ‘unproductive’.” First year wages for an apprentice with a Year 10 education can be as low as $7.80 an hour which is 42% of the basic trades rate of $18.58 an hour. The AMWU aims to raise this by 8% to 50% of the trades rate or $9.29 per hour. The AMWU is also seeking that the first-year rate for apprentices who have finished Year 12 be increased from the equivalent of 50.6% to 60% of the trade rate The number of mature age apprentices is also on the rise, with conditions meaning a person who begins an apprenticeship at 20 being stuck on
junior rates until the age of 23 or 24. “If we want to recruit mature, grounded young people into trades, then the age eligibility for adult apprenticeships should be lowered from 21 to 20 to give them extra incentive to get into it.” Mr Dettmer also said it was inconsistent for employers to pay for tuition and travel-accommodation when training adult staff, but not to compensate apprentices. In one South Australian instance, an apprentice travelling long-distance to attend block training sessions paid $12,071 in fares and accommodation, but only recouped $2,782 in government subsidies.
She would also like to see more thorough training processes, with some companies using first year apprentices as cleaners and barely letting them touch a tool. “Apprentices are used by some employers for cost-cutting too,” she said. The single mum from Melbourne’s inner suburbs says that the nest egg she built up from driving trucks in western Queensland mines has taken a hammering, as she has run it down subsidising normal living expenses like rent, school costs and childcare at $150 a week. “I could have never done this otherwise,” she said. “I don’t have the internet at home, I don’t go to lunch with the guys and I’m still drawing on my savings, but you just have to believe that becoming a qualified tradesperson will make it all worthwhile.” AMWUNEWS
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National first for AMWU women G
reater participation and recruitment of women in the AMWU plus improved networking and mentoring were key themes at the inaugural AMWU National Women’s Conference. The milestone meeting at Manly in Sydney also suggested initiatives including a ‘buddy system’ to link new women delegates with experienced delegates, expanding the Anna Stewart union training program for women delegates, improved and targeted communications and an information-contact pack for new women delegates and members. The 36 delegates from across Australia also noted that intimidation, harassment and bullying remained an endemic problem in many workplaces and that delegates and members need more information on their rights if we are to fight it. They proposed that procedures be negotiated in enterprise agreements so that complainants could assert their rights to fair treatment without being victimised.
had to be unlocked, partly through better support for female delegates and AMWU information geared directly to women. Delegates singled out creative marketing, promotion and branding of the AMWU by the Queensland Branch as an example of ways to attract women and younger people.
Inspired: National Women’s Conference delegates by Sydney Harbour with National secretary Paul Bastian (centre).
“Often bullying is dealt with individually and separately to other union issues, but we have to have a process which makes it part of the wider union collective,” said National Women’s Committee Convenor Anne Donnellan. Outcomes from the conference in February were directed towards what delegates said was the fundamental need to recruit more women into the AMWU, vital for its future growth. The proposals were strongly endorsed by National Secretary Paul Bastian, who received reports from delegates on some of the key
recommendations of the two-day conference. Mr Bastian said it was crucial that the AMWU’s membership, values, priorities and image reflected the diversity of our society and our industries. Delegates reported that often women who were in the minority in mixed workplaces did not give opinions at meetings and were identified as passive because their contributions were not valued by male AMWU members. The potential of these women as activists giving their perspective
Noo’s story good news for all Q UEENSLAND delegation member Noo Rodewald’s courage in asserting her workplace rights proved inspirational to women at the conference as she told how she survived then thrived in a male-dominated workplace. Ms Rodewald received the 2012 Emma Miller Award for her contribution to fellow workers as a health and safety representative and advocate for women at News Limited in Brisbane. The mother of three girls, two aged under 15, emigrated from Thailand nine years ago and is now raising them alone. In 2008 she was still struggling to speak fluent English when she went to work as an assistant in the Courier Mail’s press hall - traditionally a hard, masculine environment of skilled tradesmen. When asked by the Emma Miller committee for three words to describe Noo, AMWU officials came up with: intelligent, courageous, tenacious.
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Noo Rodewald tells the conference how she persevered in asserting her rights at Queensland Newspapers.
Delegates listened intently to her sound advice on gaining co-operation and respect in a traditionally maledominated shop, where she was the only woman, a non-skilled worker among more than 30 tradesmen. Other women had tried and left. “They weren’t used to a woman being there,” she said. “I had to show them I liked to learn, I would ask for advice and after a while everyone started speaking to me and they gave me respect.” She said in the early months she would
NSW food delegate Kelly O’Driscoll also said informing the membership of the broad range of products our women members make would help identify their significance and strengthen the union’s campaign for manufacturing jobs. Victorian print delegate Jodie Wilson strongly supported the setting up of a ‘buddy’ or ‘mentor’ system for new women delegates, even if that person was at another workplace, so they had someone to call for advice rather than placing all the load on their organiser. Conference delegates plan to have their proposals debated in state forums in the lead up to the National Conference in July.
sometimes be in tears after work, but persisted in being helpful to printers. She asked if she could ‘join in your party’ – the union.
able to use those rights too – I learned if you speak out you will get support from your union and your colleagues too,” she said.
Her varied tasks included changing ink tanks, helping with winch and chain to change parts and cleaning machinery parts in the presses.
Ms Rosewald has grown in confidence as a workers’ advocate and has also broken down barriers in causing some tradesmen to re-think the barriers between skilled and ‘non-skilled’ workers when they work as a team.
That involves the heavy use of chemicals in a noisy press hall, so becoming pregnant with her third child was a turning point. She realised it was dangerous for her and not content with management assurances it wasn’t a problem, she gathered information from her doctor, and from international studies to back up her arguments for a transfer to another area. Ms Rodewald gained union backing in persistently pressing management, which ended with her doing general duties around the building. Male printers supported her and she also gained flexibility in her maternity leave after her daughter was born two years ago. “I convinced my boss to allow me to move, so then other women should be
Ms Rodewald is now the breadwinner for her daughters and attending the Sydney conference was the first time she had been separated from her two-year-old. Her advice to other women in male dominated workplaces is to persist in making friendships and ask the men questions about workplace issues of concern so they understand you care as much as they do. “I’ve learned so much, my English, many life skills for Australia, all through my job,” she said. “Without the union I wouldn’t have known the kindness people can offer, they have inspired me to speak up and be a giver, not a receiver.”
NEWS
GREENWASH The AMWU has long argued that industry needs to clean up its act and reduce the damage it does to the environment and the risk it creates for workers and nearby residents as much as possible. In recent years, we have championed the Clean Technology Investment Fund and other initiatives that will genuinely help drive innovation and jobs in our industries and help us get a slice of the $6 trillion clean technology sector. While the serious work of energy efficiency and clean technology is being done in smart workplaces across Australia, the advertising industry and the big end of town are tripping over themselves to cash in on the genuine and justified concerns of people on the environment. Guy Pearse, the Queensland environmental analyst, outlines the facts around the advertisingPR spin machine and holds them up to the sunlight of scrutiny in his book Greenwash. He finds that many of the major brands and corporations are either exaggerating the impact of their carbon saving measures or conning us on green credentials when in fact they are among major accelerators of global warming –
signs in New York, is symptomatic of the fundamental problem western companies face.
with no sign of stopping. Pearse looks at everything from coffee, cars, fashion, beer, travel and petrol to the dubious green sponsorship of sports, the carbon pawprint of our pets and the true green credentials of Oprah Winfrey and Leonardo Di Caprio.
Coke’s intensivelyadvertised and wellresourced efforts to reduce emissions in western home markets pales compared to its emissions growth by massively expanding into Asia and India, where environmental standards are of less priority than rapid development.
His criticism of Earth Hour, the switch-off-the-lights feel-good worldwide phenomena created by Sydney ad agency Leo Burnett, is scathing. Pearse gives us a guide to the rote routine by which many companies promote their green intent – the clichéd slogan, the new logo, the ads with flowers, hills, forests and animals, the new green livery, a green website and sponsorship of token green initiatives.
The impact of greenwashing consumers is to limit public pressure on governments to take real action.
Greenwash argues powerfully it’s often a better day for the advertising industry than the planet when the chief executive decides its time He sets the bar high, so those companies boasting to go green. of cutting their own manufacturing emissions The AMWU has 50 copies of Greenwash to give often fail to take into account the performance of away. Please email news@amwu.asn.au with the companies in their supply chains. your membership number or mail entry to AMWU News, 2nd Floor, 251 Queensberry Street Carlton The ultimate global brand Coca Cola, known for South Victoria 3053. innovative imagery such as carbon-absorbing
S W E N rief in b
LOOKING OUT FOR NEIGHBOURS Four union activists from Papua New Guinea wanting a much fairer deal for local workers on resources and transport flew to Brisbane recently for training courtesy of a network including the AMWU.
Australian), a twentieth of what expat workers get. Refinery workers average 120 hours a fortnight, but are paid for 80. On the $15 billion PNG Liquified Natural Gas pipeline and processing plant run by Esso Highlands, about 3,000 PNG locals also have inferior conditions to 10,000 expats. Daniel Mathew, of the 7,000-strong maritimetransport union, Belinda Lowan and Penias Puka were the other PNG unionists on courses to help them teach other officials to be trainers.
They became the first PNG unionists in decades to access union training in Australia, made available to the PNG Energy Workers Association and the Maritime and Transport Union of PNG. AMWU President Andrew Dettmer and Queensland Secretary Rohan Webb, along with the ACTU, TWU, CFMEU and MUA, supported the courses through the International Transport Workers Federation. Despite liquified natural gas projects and a thriving oil exploration industry worth more than $20 billlion, local workers are paid a pittance compared to thousands of expatriate workers. Energy union delegate Patrick Pahina said InterOil Corporation refinery and LNG workers near Port Moresby are paid about 2.50 kina per hour ($1.15
SUPER SPRINGBOARD FOR AMWU LEADER The AMWU’s Anne Donnellan is among 10 women across Australia to receive Super Springboard scholarships, designed to increase the number of potential female directors of superannuation funds. Ms Donnellan, National Assistant Secretary of the union’s TSA Division, will undertake comprehensive training to prepare her to represent the interests of AMWU members and defend and build their superannuation savings. The scholarships, funded by the Federal
Government, are a project of the Australian Institute of Superannuation Trustees and Women in Super. Ms Donnellan, also the convenor of the AMWU National Women’s Committee, will do specialist study including the AIST’s Trustee Director Course, under guidance of a mentor.
HELP IN FLOODS AND FIRE AMWU members and officials pitched in to help Australian communities ravaged by floodwaters in the north and bushfires in the south over summer. In Queensland, seven AMWU officials journeyed to Laidley in the Lockyer Valley in late January to help the clean-up of homes. Queensland Printing Division Secretary Danny Dougherty said they helped one union supporter whose home was ruined but had not been able to afford a $12,000 insurance premium. In Tasmania, the AMWU has been part of a union effort which has raised $65,000 for victims of the January fires on the Tasman and Forestier Peninsulars. The union had made its barbecue trailer and generator available to help residents including retired member Bob Brakey, whose house was lost at Dunalley. Cadbury delegate Mark Mann helped organise fund raising at the company after also using his boat to assist the flotilla transferring evacuees and supplies to the Tasman Peninsular. AMWUNEWS
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Delegate Profile Ray Hall, AGC, Western Australia
I
’ve been here for 14 years and seen the operation grow from a small company, Ausclad, with 30 blokes to now where we have four structural shops, each with 100 to 200 people. Three are at Kwinana and a shop at Henderson where we build large structures to send north.
I’m Kalgoorlie-born and bred, worked there as a boilermaker-welder. I came to Perth for family reasons. When I first started I noticed the company
didn’t have any apprentices, so I’ve been pushing it ever since, backed by the AMWU. At one point we had 45 apprentices here, after AGC took us over.
company to keep bringing new apprentices in. We’ve trained 115 since I started, they get experience in everything from structural steel, pipe work, tank work, chutes and welding.
I had an accident at work nine years ago and hurt my back, so the company asked if I’d be interested in being their apprentice administrator. I love it. We have 26 now and the aim is to try to get to 40, about 10 in each apprenticeship year. Our union, State Secretary Steve McCartney particularly, has been tremendous in working with the
As a delegate, I look after about 300 members across our four sites and have got used to doing good enterprise agreements. Delegate training opened my eyes to the need to be a good communicator, thinking about the way I talk to management, our members on the floor and our apprentices. It helped me to think strategically before I speak.
We’ve gone from 13% union membership to over 85% in the past nine years and we’ve seen the result – pay rises of 52%, better conditions and 24-hour insurance. The role here is to keep everyone employed and the apprentices turning over. We help a lot stay on when they finish their training while some transfer up north. The reward for me is when I meet former apprentices, one recently shook my hand and introduced me to his wife and family. He just said thanks - it means a lot to do good things.
ESSENTIAL www.amwu.org.au CONTACTS email: amwu@amwu.asn.au AMWU National Office Location: Level 4,133 Parramatta Road, Granville Postal: PO Box 160, Granville, NSW 2142 ............................................. (02) 8868 1500 2nd Floor, 251 Queensberry St, Carlton South, VIC 3053 .............................................. (03) 9230 5700
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