The post-election IR landscape will be the same, but worse – and no one cares: Douglas

There’s only one day to go until we are confronted by two major parties determined to present a small target. It’s a ploy adopted historically by those who have substantial baggage, little to offer and are often kept alive by the natal chord of incumbency.

But here we have two parties that don’t enjoy the obvious benefit of incumbency: the Labor party with an untested leader in government and the Liberals with an untested leader not in government.

Advising business on the future of workplace law has been simple. The Labor party will do the same but perhaps a little worse. The Liberal party will do the same but perhaps a little worse – but won’t tell us how.

It is worth reminding both parties we are emerging from a downturn with a regressive workplace law regime that undermines businesses capacity to develop strategically for the long-term. We have legislation that resists flexibility of engagement at every level.

How can the Liberals simply ignore it – preferring to stay a small target? How can Labor ignore the fact that the system needs improvement, greater flexibility, more business to worker engagement? Why are both sides so determined to avoid the debate in the last week. We have witnessed the puerile attempts to incentivise youth and apprentice labour.

What about the employers? That’s right – why not incentivise the people who create the jobs?

In industrial relations we turned back the clock 20 years with the Fair Work Act. In OHS and workers’ compensation – there was a window of hope. A national system that could streamline, unwind the complexity of state and territory laws and deliver sensible, safe results to employers and workers. Under Labor, the harmonisation legislation has failed small to medium business. It remains prosecutions driven, and now permits state and territory laws to gain leverage based on state and territory self-interest – what a disaster. I suspect workers’ compensation will go the same way.

The Liberals remain unclear in their commitment to national legislation. But why? Businesses who work across state and territory boundaries must have simplicity – the cost of multiple jurisdiction compliance is wasteful and foolish. Surely helping the businesses affected by the current hotchpotch of legislation is the Liberal’s home turf?

Again, why is there no debate? These three areas of legislation – employer/principal- worker/contractor law, OHS and workers’ compensation – represent the major and most difficult-to-measure variables in business.

We have suffered through four weeks of policy and leadership drought. Is this really what we want from the political process? Can they be serious that workplace issues are not worthy of consideration? Can they ignore the levers of workplace engagement in developing, refining and restructuring our economy?

To mangle a John McEnroe exclamation: “They can’t be serious!”

Andrew Douglas is the Managing Director of Douglas LPT, an integrated legal, HR, recruiting and training business. He is the Editor-in-Chief of the loose leaf publication, The OHS Handbook, and writes on workplace law issues such as Industrial Relations, Employment law, OHS, Equal Opportunity, Privacy, Surveillance and Workers Compensation. He is the principal of the legal division of Douglas LPT and appears in courts, tribunals and Commissions throughout Australia.