Crisis 'shouldn't influence IR laws'

(AAP) - The Minerals Council of Australia is at odds with a key industry group over whether the government should consider the global financial crisis when rolling out its new workplace laws.

Council boss Mitchell Hooke has told a Senate inquiry into Labor's Fair Work Bill
that the new laws should be flexible enough to allow business to weather any
"external shocks".
Special consideration should not be given to the current market turmoil, he said.
"Because if it (the new regime) is going to exist in perpetuity, then you want
legislation that's going to provide the capacity of businesses to respond to
external shocks whatever the form of those external shocks," Mr Hooke told the
inquiry sitting in Canberra.
"If you try and prescribe for all the permutations and combinations that business is
going to face, then you're missing the fundamental tenet of what we should be all
about."
That tenet, according to the minerals council, is that businesses, not unions,
should be responsible for managing their own affairs.
Mr Hooke's comments contradict views presented to the inquiry in Sydney on Wednesday.
Australian Industry Group chief executive Heather Ridout said the government would
be foolish not to consider the global financial crisis and its impact on business.
The laws were proposed when the Australian economy was robust and the outlook was
positive, she said.
"In the current environment, parliament needs to take great care when legislating to
avoid imposing additional costs or inflexibilities upon employers, which would be at
the expense of jobs.
"This is not a time for taking risks."
Mr Hooke said on Thursday that choice and flexibility was the "holy grail" for his
industry, with direct relationships between employers and employees the priority.
But Labor's proposed industrial relations regime would "mandate" a role for unions,
he said.
"It stands to reengineer the confrontationist (sic) and divisiveness of an era past,
disrupting harmonious workplaces that undermines the culture of cooperation and
collaboration built up over two-and-a-half decades of reform," Mr Hooke told the
inquiry.
The draft laws mandated a role for unions by changing right-of-entry provisions,
giving unions a seat at the bargaining table even if only one employee was a member,
and making unions the default bargaining representative.
Allowing unions to seek good faith bargaining orders during disputes was also a
disaster, he said.
"Somebody who is not invited to be part of the equation is mandated to be part of
the equation.
"It should be a matter between the employer and the employee."
Unions along with bureaucrats from the Department of Education, Employment and
Workplace Relations will give evidence before the inquiry on Thursday afternoon.
The committee has held hearings in every capital city, except Darwin, during the
past two months.
The Canberra session is the last day of evidence, with the committee due to report
by February 27.