"Federal Government legislation that opens the door to favouring employers who have enterprise agreements with unions for taxpayer-funded procurement services is both deeply alarming and concerning," said Innes Willox, Chief Executive of the national employer association, Australian Industry Group.
"A cornerstone of our workplace relations system is the principle of 'freedom of association', which is the idea that workers a have right to join or not to join a union. Legislation introduced into the parliament today completely risks undermining this vital principle by opening the door to either the current or future governments forcing employers and their employees to strike deals with unions in order to commercially deal with the Government.
"Deliberately distorting government procurement to deliver on the industrial relations objectives of unions has proven disastrous, time and time again, particularly at state level. We don't need to look any further than the parade of scandals and billions of dollars wasted in the construction sector in both Victoria and Queensland to understand that linking government procurement practices with enterprise bargaining is a proven recipe for delays, cost blow outs and union misbehaviour.
"If this bill passes, the risk is that this won't only be an issue for the construction industry. The same problems could arise in other sectors if the Government was able to make the awarding of contracts or funding dependent upon particular enterprise agreement outcomes.
"That the Commonwealth would even consider following failed state approaches of linking procurement to the implementation of union deals beggar belief.
"It is appalling to think that the central requirement for future government spending will not be cost efficiency, or capacity to deliver work for it on time and / or at an appropriate standard. Instead, making unions the gatekeepers of who can and cannot work with government is a slippery slope that should be avoided at all costs.
"The proposition that the Government hasn't yet made any decision about how it may use the new powers it proposes to give itself is no comfort to industry. The legislation should instead continue to guard against inappropriately linking government money and requirements for enterprise bargaining.
"Australia already has a comprehensive workplace relations system that guarantees fair terms and conditions to all workers. We just don't need to give governments another lever to pull in order to drive up employment costs, even if they are the ones that will have to pay for it.
"While we would welcome further discussion with the Government on why it envisages this law is necessary, the real question is why the parliament should make such a controversial change if it is not clear how it will be used. The simplest course would be to just abandon the proposal entirely," Mr Willox said.
