Now I have your attention let's have a look at Costello's latest words of wisdom.
They would be laughable were they not downright offensive. The 'don't get down and dirty' white collar lawyer turned politician/treasurer telling workers that they can work through their breaks. So workers can negotiate away their lunch breaks and tea breaks? Will this happen on the executive floors of major corporations? Can we expect to see no more execs out to lunch in good restaurants because they have negotiated away such fripperies to justify their salaries? Wish....
Costello may not be shooting to kill but he is shooting from the hip. I thought productivity was the watch word from the managerial classes. Taylor and those who followed his science discovered about a hundred years ago the relationship between breaks and increased and sustained productivity through efficiency. Imagine working in a commercial laundry or a foundry with no break. Costello talks about the protection of the negotiating process so that this would happen only if employees wanted it. Now is he talking collective bargaining or not? I thought the Feds wanted individual contracts. I thought they wished to eliminate the workers' right to collective bargaining and the countervailing power which it gives workers. I notice no corrolary legislation being introduced outlawing any collective actions on the part of employers.
The proposed industrial law changes are about swinging the balance of power away from the negotiating table to the unequal power of the employer. Of course, these days we never hear the term "industrial democracy". Anything that establishes a balance of power between employer and employees is perceived by some to diminish the rights of the employer. In economic terms labour is seen as a factor of production. Other factors of production include technology, land, utilities such as fuel. Note none of the other factors of production are human - they are not social, they do not vote, they cannot express how they feel.
Managers are fond of saying that they look after the interests of stakeholders. I have yet to see employees, labour, treated as stakeholders. Perhaps, it is about time that labour was not seen as a factor of production. Employees, staff, human resources or however you choose to designate those who act in a productive capacity for the firm should be seen as stakeholders as should the human communities in which the firm is domiciled or to which the firm is connected. While a broad definition of stakeholding may occur with some firms, it is not widespread. Narrow definitions of stakeholding are linked to narrow ranges of corporate accountability.
The triple bottom line has penetrated corporate consciousness since John Elkington's Cannibals with Forks but has no universal take up - yet. Surely, a complementary goal would be a more socially conscious definition of the firm's stakeholder as a mainstream concept.
