Of sweat and dollars
The Clothing and Footwear Union of Australia (TCFUA) is a bit touchy about suggestions it may have its focus on generating union funds rather than representing and tending the dwindling flock of machinists left in Australia.
While the union's righteous indignation is undoubtedly justified, there appears to be grounds for misinterpretation.
The reason is that the union has very publicly concentrated its efforts on copping clothing companies for poor record keeping in relation to contract making-up and outworkers. The union is legally empowered to impose fines, and the payment of those fines goes not into consolidated revenue but into the TCFUA's own funds. Some unreasonable and ignorant observers might think that the union has thus found a more attractive way to accumulate funds than collecting them from members, one at a time, door to door - especially when many of the doors are the domestic front doors of outworkers.
The Queensland branch of the TCFUA has perfected a very effective method of unearthing breaches of the Clothing Trades Award 1999 by Queensland clothing companies. Of course I understand that the purpose of such discoveries is to further the cause of compliance among clothing companies, especially those who are providing work for maybe exploited outworkers. We all shudder at the spectre of sweatshops and poverty-inducing pay rates.
Companies which do not comply are fined by the union (not the cops or the tax man or the OH&S inspector, mark you) to the tune of a possible $10,000 per breach of the award. It is unusual for a company to be guilty of only one breach. A Gold Coast company I spoke to had racked up about 20 breaches by the time the union had finished checking. If this company had been hit with the full penalty possible it would have gone belly up.
To the union's credit it doesn't apply the full penalty, preferring to negotiate a lesser amount and a reasonable time-frame in which to pay the fine. Again an observer might be tempted to think that the union sees no sense in killing the cow you only intend to milk.
The initial reaction of the offenders is to call in their legal cavalry to put the cheeky union in its place. But the union is way ahead of them. Its legal ground is rock solid. It's heard every non-compliance excuse there is. Offenders are usually advised by their solicitors to pay up and shut up.
The correspondence and timing the union uses to reel in non non-compliers could also be misinterpreted.
Clothing companies are not set upon in a surprise dawn raid. There is a first warning in the form of a letter from the union which says 'The Award imposes important obligations on you with which you should be familiar'. Nine times out of ten the subject proprietor is not familiar, nor does he think he has to be familiar, nor does he think he has the time to be familiar. If he does venture into reading the act to become familiar, he could be forgiven for feeling lost in a labyrinth. The usual reaction is to either file the letter or trash it and ignore the advice in the last paragraph which invites him to discuss with a union representative making his business award compliant. This is an escape hatch he too often fails to recognise. Why should he discuss anything, he asks himself? He's got records of all the payments he's made, he's up to date with his GST and his accountant calls every month to keep his books up to date. What more could the union possibly want?
Three months then tick away in which the company can unknowingly pile up breaches.
Then the second letter arrives. It is far more alarming. It announces to the proprietor that an inspection of his company's records is scheduled to take place imminently for the purpose of 'investigating suspected award breaches in relation to certain clauses of the Clothing Trades Award 1999'. The union representative arrives and can discover many transgressions, each potentially worth $10,000 to the union. The best way out is to negotiate a settlement. This involves an admission of guilt, completion or correction of registration and contract records such as production sheets to show sewing times and other details. The proprietor should also make a diary note to apply for re-registration one year hence and make a quarterly return of all outworker production, a copy of which must be sent to the union. Finally, he must agree not to disclose the terms of his settlement.
Any clothing company using contract factories or outworkers should not dismiss letters from the TCFUA, whether they seem threatening or not, as frivolous. Sooner or later the union will run an audit and its eye for non compliance is very sharp indeed.