The Electrical Trades Union and the Australian Manufacturing Workers Union are angry that Labor has agreed to support legislation to ratify the Trans-Pacific Partnership (TPP), claiming it represents a “disaster for Australian workers” and threatening to pull support from Labor at the next election. From The Australian:
The Australian Manufacturing Workers Union and the Electrical Trades Union criticised the decision, declaring it beggars belief Labor would sign off on an agreement that was a “disaster” for workers.
AMWU national secretary Paul Bastian said today “it beggars belief that the Labor caucus would sign off on ratifying the TTP given it’s against the party’s own policy”.
“The TPP-11 is a disaster for Australian workers,’’ he said.“The labour mobility provisions would give open access to 6 signatory countries without labour market testing. This has the potential to see huge pressures on our labour market, further downward pressure on wages and conditions, and foreign workers exploited.
He said provisions giving multinational corporations the ability to sue a Government was a grave risk to sovereignty.
“It is clear that Labor knows these are issues — they admit as such, and note that any future trade deals would require labour market testing and a rejection of investor state dispute settlement provisions,’’ he said.
“If these issues are crucial for any future trade deals — why not for the TPP? The TPP must be amended before it is ratified by Parliament.”
ETU national secretary Allen Hicks said the ALP risked losing the support of workers before the federal election if they failed to reverse the decision to “blindly support the deeply-flawed” TPP.
“This dodgy deal is opposed by the majority of the Senate crossbench, meaning it can only pass through the parliament if Labor gives it the green light…
“The TPP is all about looking after the big end of town, maximising profits for multinational corporations at the expense of what is best for the Australian public,” Mr Hicks said.
“These big businesses will be able to bring temporary workers into the country without even advertising those jobs locally, taking away training and employment opportunities for young Australians.
The unions are 100% correct in this instance. As noted yesterday, the TPP has been negotiated in secret without independent scrutiny. At a minimum, the deal should have been referred to the Productivity Commission for expert assessment of the costs and benefits before a parliamentary vote.
That said, the unions are being hypocrites on the issue of foreign workers. If they are so concerned about foreign workers flooding Australia’s labour market, then why did they enter into an immigration compact with the Migration Council and the business lobby? How is supporting the perpetual flood of migrant workers into the labour market via the mass immigration ‘Big Australia’ policy beneficial for ordinary Australian workers? It isn’t.
Clearly, Australia’s union movement is conflicted around the issue of businesses employing foreign workers – both supporting and opposing at the same time.
