Labor and unions hit back, saying some Liberals want to ‘relive the glory days of John Howard’s WorkChoices’

This article is more than 1 year old

This article is more than 1 year old

Labor and unions have hit back at calls by a Liberal senator for employers to be able to sack workers if they are not “the right fit”, arguing the Coalition is preparing to gut unfair dismissal laws.

Amanda Stoker – who made the remarks at the Conservative Political Action Conference on Friday – renewed the call on Monday arguing it was “untenable” to ignore industrial relations’ impact on productivity and accusing the Coalition of being “tentative” after John Howard lost the 2007 election in part due to its Work Choices reforms.

But her Liberal colleagues Andrew Bragg and Jason Falinski have warned against adopting an “ideological” approach, telling Guardian Australia the Coalition must search for “practical solutions” or “win-win” propositions to avoid repeating the Howard government’s overreach.

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Bragg, Falinski and fellow Liberal MP Tim Wilson organised a briefing of Coalition MPs by the Australian Chamber of Commerce and Industry to explain the landscape of industrial laws ahead of a review launched by the industrial relations minister, Christian Porter.

On Friday Stoker said that unfair dismissal laws were acting as a “block to growth” because they created “the threat of litigation from a staff member that’s not working out”.

She argued that employers refuse to hire workers in part because of “the risk that they won’t be able to get rid of an underperforming staff member without giving them a handsome payout or enduring the legal costs of defending their call”.

“No one puts off an employee that is truly adding value unless the business is in dire straits. It should be enough, especially in small and medium sized businesses, to make a call that a person isn’t the right fit.”

Stoker described the modern system of award minimum conditions as “unworkably complex”, arguing that while some employers deliberately underpay staff “there’s plenty of evidence that complexity is causing errors that manifest as workers getting short-changed”.

Stoker also argued against labour hire licensing regimes, telling CPAC it was “not clear” why the sector needed special regulation. “It’s not as though it poses a higher risk to safety or a likelihood of exploitation that doesn’t exist elsewhere.”

On Monday Bragg, who caused controversy with his first Senate speech questioning the compulsory superannuation system, called for all employees to have choice of super fund, removing the ability for enterprise agreements to nominate one fund.

Ahead of a speech to the Rice Warner Actuaries Symposium in Canberra, Bragg told Guardian Australia his personal approach on industrial relations will “be guided by practical issues being solved so more people are employed, not ideology”.

Falinski said the Coalition should “free up the [Fair Work] Act so employers can talk to employees and vice versa and see if they can do things better” to improve profitability and wages, suggesting that industrial relations can be “win-win”.

Falinski argued that the right of employer groups and unions to intervene to oppose registration of enterprise agreements is a hurdle that prevents productivity enhancements.

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“It’s not ideological – it’s asking ‘how do we get workplaces to work better’, encouraging better dialogue and innovative thinking … It’s not big bang reform.”

Labor’s industrial relations spokesman, Tony Burke, said the Liberal backbenchers were showing the party’s “true colours” and “Work Choices mach two is on the way”.

“There’s nothing in this that improves rights for workers,” he said. “For the person that feels they don’t have enough security in their job, there is no extra security coming their way from this conservative Liberal government.”

Burke said unfair dismissal laws protect employees like “the person who loses their job because they refuse to go on a date with the boss” or “the person who swears at [their] employer after the employer throws a bucket of water on them”.

The Australian Council of Trade Unions secretary, Sally McManus, accused the Liberals of attempting to “relive the glory days of John Howard’s WorkChoices”, which exempted small business from unfair dismissal laws.

“With their surprise election win, it did not take long for a group of backbenchers to try and abolish protections from being unfairly sacked.

“Those in the Morrison government are simply not on the side of working people.”