Important Message from the MEAA

Good on you, Neville, for reproducing the letter. Defamatory? What nonsense! This is an industrial relations issue and is pertinent for professional workers in this industry, and I don't understand why it was withdrawn in the first place. Actors, stagehands and other crew have a hard enough time making a decent living out of their art as it is, without being undermined by the Howard Government's fiction of negotiated AWAs and "independent contractors". It is not about besmirching the reputation of the company: it is about upholding the rights of actors and crew to decent remuneration for their work. And it is about protecting the rates and conditions, which people in the industry have worked very hard to obtain. The contracting system (& AWAs) is a pernicious weakening of the bargaining power and the real earning power of all workers because contracting under the new laws leaves employees without a number of protections, including superannuation contributions. Professional companies have got to act professionally: that includes respecting actors' and others' rights to decent pay and conditions, and behaving like they do have that respect. If conditions are being undermined by an AWA or a contracting system, that is disrespectful towards the actors, etc, and unprofessional. This is not a matter of being pro- or anti-Labor. it is about the ethics of employment. Those ethics are laid out in the International Labour Organisation's labour standards. The ILO is an international tripartite (employers/governments/unions) body. The principles apply to employers in the corner shop, the factory, the office, and on the stage. Jim