For several years now Australian unions have been waging campaigns to limit working hours and the growth in casual employment in the name of improving workers’ well-being. Yet these campaigns are little more than an attempt to impose uniform rules on the entire workforce, thereby discouraging workers from opting out of collective bargaining by preventing them from individually negotiating their own pay and conditions. Moreover, the evidence used to support these campaigns does not stand up to closer scrutiny.
The campaign to limit working hours (‘the hours campaign’) is based on the claim that an increasing number of Australians are working longer hours to the detriment of their family life, health and safety. But although the incidence of longer working hours has grown in recent years, studies demonstrate that long hours per se do not adversely affect family life and general well-being. It has also been shown that if working hours were capped, labour costs for employers would most likely increase, forcing them to cut jobs. For low-paid workers, shorter working hours would erode their income by reducing their overtime earnings and destroying their jobs.
The casuals campaign aims to give casual employees the right to convert to permanent employment after six months with the same employer. The assumption is that casual jobs are ‘inferior’ to permanent jobs. But casual employees seem just as satisfied with their jobs as permanent employees while the growth of casual employment appears to reflect workers’ preference for flexibility. Moreover, for the less educated and less skilled, casual employment can serve as a stepping stone to other job prospects. If such a regulation were introduced, employers might stop hiring casuals or replace casuals with fewer permanent employees. The low-skilled unemployed would therefore be further deprived of employment opportunities.
There are, of course, some workers who struggle to balance work and non-work commitments and/or have trouble moving from casual into permanent employment. But introducing uniform regulations to cater for this minority would affect the majority who are currently satisfied with their hours or casual employment arrangements. A less collectivised approach is necessary. Unions must allow individual employers and employees to work out their respective problems at enterprise or workplace levels.
Dr Kayoko Tsumori is a Policy Analyst at The Centre for Independent Studies.