Australian workers rally against labor laws

By James Grubel

CANBERRA (Reuters) – Tens of thousands of workers attended
mass rallies across Australia on Wednesday to protest against
new labor laws, which are shaping up as the key political
battleground for next year’s national elections.

Shouting anti-government slogans and carrying banners
calling for the new laws to be scrapped, more than 100,000
workers took to the streets and blocked traffic in the main
cities of Sydney and Melbourne, with smaller rallies in other
centers.

The government passed the new laws late last year, saying
they would improve productivity and weaken union influence in
the workplace by encouraging workers to sign individual work
contracts and abandon union-based award conditions.

But the union movement and opposition Labor Party say the
new laws cut wages and work conditions, make it easier for
employers to sack workers, and decrease job security.

The new laws have re-energized Australia’s union movement,
lifting the union-based Labor party in the polls after a decade
in power by Prime Minister John Howard’s conservative
government.

“This is a battle for ordinary Australian life. This is a
battle for Australian families,” Labor leader Kim Beazley told
the biggest rally of more than 80,000 workers in the southern
city of Melbourne.

The government said the turnout would have disappointed the
unions, as millions of Australians went to work as normal.

“The majority of the 10 million workers in Australia will
go to work today and will get on with their jobs because they
know there are more jobs and higher wages as a result of the
reforms over the last decade,” said Workplace Minister Kevin
Andrews.

Beazley has promised to scrap the new laws if his party
wins power at the next elections, due in the second half of
2007.

Labor has been ahead of the government in the polls for
four of the past six months, although Howard reclaimed a narrow
51 to 49 point lead in mid-June after announcing widespread tax
cuts.

But a Newspoll in mid-June found Beazley’s Labor more
popular on social issues, and ahead 48 percent to 29 percent on
the question of who could best handle workplace laws.

A poll in the Age newspaper on Wednesday said some of
Australia’s biggest companies have so far shunned the new laws,
preferring to promote company-wide employment agreements.