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Workers' Liberty'the emancipation of the working class must be the act of the working class'Workers' Liberty Australia |
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Government to legislate for discriminationby Leon Parissi Bigotry and prejudice are being served up generously by the Federal Government. Having recently failed to take on the unions directly with its "Third Wave" legislation, but buoyed by the ‘success’ of the G S T, the next logical target is social policy. Prime Minister John Howard’s ‘white picket fence’, white nuclear family, 1950s vision of society is being dusted off and recycled once more. This latest attack began on the 2nd of August 2000 when Howard announced his intention to change the Federal Sex Discrimination Act (SDA) to allow discrimination against single and lesbian women so they could be denied access to assisted reproductive technology such as IVF. By attempting to use the SDA to actually allow discrimination, Howard has signalled his intention to undermine the very purpose of the Act. The proposed change to the Sex Discrimination Act (removing marital status as a basis for claiming discrimination) was a cleverly contrived opening shot. It declared Howard’s hand as to his latest targets among the oppressed in society by embarking on a two pronged strategy, firstly to open a new front on social questions and, just as importantly, to divide the labour movement over the issue. Taking direction from right wing independent Senator Brian Harradine, Howard took advantage of the chance to steal Labor’s limelight during the ALP Federal Conference. The more Conservative ALP Parliamentarians and unionists quickly declared their hand in favour of a conscience vote on the issue of support for Howard’s changes to the SDA. If an ALP split were to happen the amendments would probably get through the Senate even with Democrat opposition. Even more pleasing to the conservatives, a lot of damage would be done to the Federal Opposition along the way. But such was not the case. Kim Beazley held firm in Conference and later with the Federal Executive. ALPers in favour of Howard’s amendments would have to cross the floor and risk expulsion from the Party for breaking Caucus. Using prejudice against lesbians for wider attack The Government was so over-confident in its attempt to remove ‘marital status’ as an basis for claiming discrimination that the amendment was pushed through Cabinet without reference to the Sex Discrimination Commissioner or anybody else. In moving with such haste they tripped. The proposed amendment to the SDA had other effects, and allowed discrimination against de facto couples, depriving them of access to assisted reproductive technology. (Anne Summers writing in the Sydney Morning Herald claims this was a conscious move against de facto couples on the part of the government). As we go to press it seems that the government may decide to impose an arbitrary qualifying period of 5 years on heterosexual de facto couples before they could be allowed to qualify under the amended law. There are no clear guidelines as to how this could be policed. It could easily lead to highly intrusive regulations being enforced by suppliers of the IVF or other assisted reproductive technology service. Already some fertility treatment providers in NSW allow sperm donors to veto lesbians. The proposed changes will allow even more discrimination. The ability to be a good parent is not based on a person’s marital status or sexuality. The move against the SDA came at the same time as the ‘mutual obligation’ assault on welfare recipients who will be forced to stop caring for their families in order to go to work (see other article…ed). The Howard Government also had just spent $12m defending the Gunner and Cabillo ‘Stolen Generation’ case. In denying the existence of the Stolen Generation, Howard seems to be thoroughly uninterested in the rights of black children to be raised by their birth families. For Howard it was ok for Aboriginal children to be taken away and raised as whites. When it comes to lesbian or single women they must by definition be prohibited from bringing children into the world if the law can be used to stop them doing so. The timing of these events should go down in the history books as a fine example of crass bloody-minded hypocrisy on the part of a small-minded conservative government. The heat seems to have gone out of the issue for the moment as the government considers how to make the proposals work. We should not forget that the Sex Discrimination Act and all the related state and federal anti-discrimination laws were not introduced entirely through the good will of politicians. They were fought for through years of effort on the part of women’s gay liberation and other groups in the seventies and finally came into effect in 1984. It looks as though to stop the roll-back of civil liberties in the sphere of anti-discrimination law might take just as much effort as it took to blunt the government’s attacks on the rights of workers to organise under Reith’s "Third Wave" laws. What you can do: IVF & Sex Discrimination Act
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Mutual agreement on who to blameby Janet Burstall Labor supports the Government commissioned McClure report, which proposes to entrench so-called 'mutual obligation' by requiring almost everyone on welfare to orient towards the job market. The report is full of rhetoric which sounds supportive: "it labels us job poor and disempowered people who need to be helped back into the community" (henrietta to Left Links 18 August 2000). And the report proposes an enlarged role for Christian charities in enforcing the compulsion to ‘participate’ in the community. It is a reflection on how far to the right Labor is, that it takes that well-known economics journalist, Ross Gittins, to point out the false premises on which the McClure report is based. (SMH Monday 21 August). Gittins says, "the statistics that have been tossed around so freely to demonstrate a rise in welfare dependency are misleading. For a start, a fair proportion of the apparent increase in dependency is artificial." Gittins accounts for the changes in what the statistics record, as a result of policy changes. For example payments that used to be made to only one adult per family, have been split and shared between two adults in a family. "The next thing we need to think about is the reasons for the increase in the number of working-age people dependent on government benefits. Is it because we're rapidly becoming a nation of bludgers and layabouts? Obviously not ... It's no accident that the marked rise in the number of people on welfare since the mid-1970s coincides perfectly with the period in which our economy has been put through the wringer. The past 25 years have brought dramatic changes…Would it surprise you to be told that, as a result of all these things, the average level of unemployment was a lot higher in the 1990s than it was in the '80s, a lot higher in the '80s than it was in the '70s, and a lot higher in the '70s than the '60s? No? Then why all the shock and horror to be told there are a lot more people on welfare today than there were in the '60s? Higher unemployment accounts for the lion's share of the rise in welfare dependency. The point is, first, that it's illogical and unfair to hold individuals responsible for their failure to be in the workforce like the rest of us and, second, that no amount of encouragement or compulsion will get them to take jobs that aren't there." So even an economics journalist who studies how to make capitalism work can see that the real problem that needs to be addressed is the cause of unemployment. Gittins thinks that with "the belated payoff from micro-economic reform and greatly improved macro-economic management, we're at last seeing a genuine improvement in unemployment". But even if there is a fall in unemployment, it will not get below 4%, and if there is still economic growth, the Reserve Bank will push interest rates up faster, to maintain a reserve army of labour to keep down labour costs, and inflation. While there is unemployment and poverty, we need solidarity among welfare recipients, and the employed who are at risk of relying on welfare if they have a bit of bad luck. Recipients should not have to go through hoops to prove that they are participating in the community or job-seeking. Welfare payments should be raised. Recipients need to have a say in running the services they receive. Workers in the CES and other employment agencies have played the role of policing unemployed and other welfare recipients, which causes mistrust, not solidarity. The Howard Government's privatised Job Network is a debacle, which undermines the accountability of employment assistance, and the wages and conditions of the workers who provide it. In a secular society, churches have no business in receiving government funding to carry out public functions. Workers providing employment services need decent common pay and conditions. Employment services should be reestablished as a direct government service, with no profit or religious motives. |