Whenever anyone says the rich don't pay enough tax or wants to cut back his generous grants to top private schools, John Howard always accuses them of trying to take us back to the bad old, long-gone days of class conflict.
But, though it's had remarkably little acknowledgment from commentators, his own industrial relations changes are an undisguised assault on the Liberal Party's traditional class enemies: the unions, unionised workers and workers generally.
By hitting so hard at the long-hated union movement, Mr Howard is also striking a blow against his political opponents of the past 30 years, the Labor Party. This consequence has escaped many people; you can be sure it hasn't escaped the most successful - and thus most carefully calculating - politician of his generation.
And it didn't escape Senator Andrew Murray of the Democrats: "From Coalition questions [at the Senate inquiry into the WorkChoices bill] it has been obvious there is a political motive in play. It is apparent that the bill will disadvantage the ALP, the Coalition's main competitor.
"There are several elements of the bill that will ultimately weaken the union movement and quite possibly see a decline in membership. Given that unions are one of the ALP's largest donors, reduction in union membership will impact financially on the ALP," he said.
Almost all reasonably objective expert observers have noted that the changes aim to increase the bargaining power of employers relative to employees. All pretence of even-handedness - so carefully maintained in the Workplace Relations Act of 1996 - has been abandoned.
During the days of the prices and incomes accord, Mr Howard used to complain bitterly about the influence it gave the unions with the Labor Government. But at least that special relationship was on the table for all to see - and it didn't stop Labor from consulting business and employer groups.
Though it goes quite unacknowledged, it seems clear the Business Council, the Australian Chamber of Commerce and Industry and various big commercial law firms have been closely involved behind the scenes in the design and drafting of WorkChoices.
Before it was launched last month, the Government held a special briefing for employers groups - but didn't invite the unions, the Opposition, the media, the churches or any other interest groups.
Just a few examples of the bill's lack of even-handedness: although it outlaws pattern bargaining by unions, it does nothing to prevent employers presenting individual workers with identical Australian workplace agreements to sign.
Although it makes it much harder for unions to organise a legally protected strike, it does nothing to hinder employer lockouts. Although employers may, should they wish to, bargain with their employees collectively, their employees may not bargain collectively should they wish to though their employer doesn't.
WorkChoices is so one-sided it's quite mistaken to think of it as "deregulation" of the labour market. Employers may have been deregulated but unions have been subjected to more, highly prescriptive regulation.
The new act will be more voluminous, there'll be more work for lawyers, no tribunals will be abolished but additional ones created, and the minister will be given greatly increased discretion to intervene in union affairs.
I doubt the public has any appreciation of just how anti-union WorkChoices is. Neither the ACTU nor Labor has sought to draw much attention to this aspect. That's because unions have been so demonised over the years that Labor never likes to be seen going in to bat for them and the ACTU knows there's precious little public sympathy for unions as opposed to workers.
Rather, the labour movement's chosen to highlight the more emotive and easily personalised aspects of the changes: the removal of protection against unfair dismissal, the threat to weekend, public holiday and overtime penalty payments, and what the ominously named Fair Pay Commission might do to minimum wages.
The emasculation of the Industrial Relations Commission and the diminished role of awards will weaken the position of the unions and their members - not to mention all the ununionised workers who've been protected by the old system without really knowing it.
But the most rabidly anti-worker aspect of the changes - and the thing that will make our wage-fixing arrangements more doctrinaire than anything in America or other developed countries - is the effort to discourage collective bargaining.
Only in Australia will employees be denied the right to bargain collectively if that's what a majority of them want. Almost equally amazing is the provision that will allow employers to unilaterally terminate agreements (whether collectively bargained or individual) after their nominal expiry date, provided only that they give 90 days' notice.
When that happens, workers won't fall back on the provisions of their awards, they'll fall back on nothing more than the Government's five minimum conditions - the minimum wage set by the Fair Pay Commission, four weeks annual leave, 10 days sick leave, 12 months unpaid maternity leave and ordinary hours of work averaging 38 hours a week.
Could anything be more calculated to weaken unionised workers' bargaining power? But that's not all. The right to strike has been greatly curtailed. It's made explicit that strikes outside the bargaining period are not protected against legal actions for damages but strikes during the bargaining period will take several weeks to approve via officially supervised secret ballots.
It will be easier for employers to sue for damages caused by unprotected strikes, and protected strikes won't be as protected as they are now. It will be easier to get the Industrial Relations Commission to terminate the bargaining period if third parties are threatened with significant harm or to suspend it if someone thinks a cooling-off period desirable.
And it's now possible for the minister to terminate the bargaining period where strikes affect essential services or are likely to cause significant damage to the economy.
Then there's the "prohibited content" that may not be included in agreements - with the minister free to add to the list - and quite onerous restrictions on unions' ability to recruit and enter the workplace.
It's not at all clear this single-minded attempt to discourage collective bargaining (and hamstring unions in the process) will lead to increased employment, increased productivity or higher wages.
Grossly unequal bargaining power is a form of market failure. And when the law permits employers to drive a harder bargain and lower wage costs (say, because workers are no longer able to set a higher reservation price for work on weekends, public holidays or at other unsociable times), you get higher profits but no gain in productivity (which is a real not a monetary concept: output per unit of input).
In other words, there's no overall gain to the economy, just a transfer of income from one part of the economy (workers) to another part (employers).
It may even be the economy is left worse off because efforts to cut wage costs can be a substitute for efforts to raise the productivity of labour by increased training or the provision of better machines.
No, the dominant motive for much of the content of WorkChoices is to strike a blow against the Liberals' class enemies.
Ross Gittins is the Herald's Economics Editor.
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