Introduction:
The history of Australian trade unions can be unfolded with the help of major role players, the employer, union and government who are the first actors of the industrial relations. They worked on the principles of collective bargaining where conciliation, arbitration and Courts acted as the major decision makers in process of bargaining. Formation of trade unions took place in 1832 when employer associations were also formed in response to it. Trade union was a group of blue collared employees who wanted to have their own rights and duties preserved with the help of a union through which they could stand united and raise their voice against wrong doings of the management. The concept of trade union brought about a major twist in labor laws and it was understood that preserving the rights of workers is also an important part of organizational production and development. It can be said that during the period of recession in 1932 Australia didn’t do that bad because of the policies of trade protection and through the means of improving their productivity. 1980s was a turning point in the history of Australian trade union because the policies and employment relations got revised and it was named as Australia reconstructed by means of which unions were made a part of decision making and labor governing became more managed and demanding. [Ewing, 2005] It was only after the rise in privatization and liberalization that trade union management became even more important so as to protect domestic market and employment. Australia had trade union density of 19% in 2007 whereas Denmark and Sweden had 69% and 71%. The trade union density in 2010 in Australia was only 18%. This means that in long term also Australia has shown no increase in union density and it can be a matter of research as union density is decreasing continuously. The union density has shown regular decline in the previous decades in almost all developed countries of the world. [Australian bureau of statistics, 2012]
The Australian Bureau of Statistics has submitted a report on decline in trade union since August 1992 to August 2011. However there was some rise in the membership of unions during the time of global financial crisis. There was rise in membership in case of male workers which increased to 19% in 2008 and 20% in 2009. Another fact which came into focus from the report of Australian Bureau of Statistics was that there was a rise in full time workers membership during time of recession but the ratio of increase remained constant in case of part time employees at 15% during all such years. Following the global financial crisis, it was also seen that the number of trade union members in private sector is fairly low as compared to membership of workers from public sector. It has been seen that Australian trend of declining membership of trade union is not a new one. It is a common fact for the last 20 years this trend continues due to certain reasons like the involvement of workers in private sector has proportionately increased after privatization, female employees did not find much reasons to be a part of trade unions and part time workers also showed no enthusiasm towards membership in trade union community due to the of fear of job loss or collective bargaining [Meyer, 2012]. It can be said that only full time employees and that too majorly male workers showed some increase in these few years and it was only during the global financial crisis when there was an increase in job loss or production loss chances which made the workers ready for adverse situations and therefore they opted for membership in time of recession. During the World War, many woman workers joined the Australian workforce and got wages equal to male counterparts but then also their percentage in trade union membership was seen to be nearly about 16-17% only. There were many facilities which trade union workers can ask from the management for protection of their rights and security but it could be said that market has seen many changes like the boom in the private sector, high wages for good work, growth of white collar employees over blue collar employees etc. and may be due to a mix of various reasons, such decline took place in membership of trade union in Australia. The downwards trend is an international phenomenon as it shows increase in globalization and development of employment relations within the firm. [ACTU, 2012]
The main reasons for such declining trend can majorly be privatization, globalization and liberalization, the concept of LPG made the market more competitive and introduction of strategic HRM also accelerated the whole scenario where the workers and employees of front line also were not treated as a separate community but a part of the organization itself. The number of women workers grew and even the concept of blue collar workers became less popular in the competitive industrial market. Trade union was a platform for bargaining with the firm, for rights of workers whose rights and safety are at stake when organizations were less professionally managed and systematic. The present day trend of market where all firms abide by the labor laws regarding health, safety and rights of workers and where every firm is focusing on increasing productivity by means of managing the workforce with higher motivation and engagement, in such a market trade union density had to decrease especially where these transformations have taken place as per the global trends. For the countries where development is not yet fully done and management is done according to old principles and values, there the concept of trade union still continues. The changes in trend has also taken place in type of employment being followed nowadays as now in most of the firms the concept of outsourcing the staffing solutions has occurred and this means that the employees or major workforce of manufacturing firms are not company staff but are employees of third party origin. Those third party employees are contract based laborers who work more and get paid more. It is double benefit for the firm as well as the employees as firms gets workers without any liabilities on them and the workers are also paid as per the demand and revenue generation and can easily move from one firm to other in search of better opportunities. This concept of contractual or seasonal or we can say third party recruitment has made the need of trade union membership very low and less. There is another very crucial and integral reason for lesser membership of trade union which is that organizations are turning toward anti-union membership contract of its employees. Nowadays most of firms, specifically private firms have contract with their third party organizations and own employees as well that they can’t enter into any strike or bargaining process with the management and it is legislate to be practiced and followed. The accord between the ACTU & ALP ushered a new concept in industrial relations union became tripartite process and maternity leave, employee state insurance, superannuation and family leave type of concepts became mandatory legislations and this also decreased the scope of unionism. The industry shift from manufacturing based economy to service sector based economy also created a big reason for decline in trade union trends. It was seen that earlier manufacturing based economy was running across the world where the products were produced on large scale, were manufactured and sold to customers with help of distributors, sellers, dealers and retail shops. The market was dominantly working on production based market trends and there was no scope for service being included in manufacturing goods and their sell out. Further it was seen that with the advent of LPG and technological integration like virtual market concept, IT age, online marketing and shopping like eBay and many others, it was seen that rather than production, the major focus was on service rendered to the customers. Service delivery became a dominant factor for success of any firm and even the manufacturing industry transformed itself to customer service delivery industry and just in time management etc concepts became popular. Since then manufacturing has been considered a part of service delivery only. It can also be said that the difference between product and service is minimizing day by day and therefore it also impacted the trade union concept. Manufacturing the product was one of the aspects and companies’ focus shifted to customer satisfaction, analysis of customer demands and accordingly changing the pattern of manufacturing, for that what was needed was competent workforce and highly productive workers therefore companies started motivational programs where monetary benefits were increased to high limits and employees were treated as assets and not liabilities. This made the trade unionism decline in years of development of service industry. [ACTU, 2012]
The response of the union and Australian Council of Trade Union was to some extent towards promoting the membership with help of different campaigns and press releases but hardly could have shown increment in case of membership. The campaigns like “rights at work” & “secure jobs and secure future” and similar campaigns became popular because of the fact that press releases and campaigns were speeded up by the union. It could be said that the movement of industrialization towards private sector left lessened scope for increase of membership due to such campaigns. Private sector growth and motivation relating to money helped the workers gain monetary benefits being associated with industries of private origin. The campaigns promoted facts like private organizations and third party recruitments leaves the workers with very less entitlements’, benefits, insurance and other benefits by the company end. It also enables the firms to take work from the employees without much liability on the organization towards the worker class. Casual employment and part time workers are less prone to changes and getting effected by any such campaigns but the full time workers should consider it as a measure for security and preservation of rights. Today the market is growing volatile and highly insecure, recession and similar reasons are competent enough to throw employees and workers out of the organization without much ado. In order to prevent so and make the worker class aware, such notions were taken by the management of the union but it has not shown any improvement in growth rate till date. It has been seen by the data that one in every four employees is a casual employee in Australia. This figure shows that workers are being deprived of the major securities and benefits which a worker must have from the company where he or she is working. Casual employment decreases the chances of the workers of being employed throughout the year but they get attracted to it because of its short term benefits and casually earned good amount of wages. According to ABS data, more than half of casual labors would prefer full time job if they get a chance, all these things could be availed with the help of unionism being promoted on an increasing scale at least in case of government and public sector organizations if not private sector primarily. Then came the phase where fair work law started being implemented in firms. It is also called as labor law in many countries. As per labor laws, labor were to be considered for health, safety, sanitation and other facilities but this concept is also not implementable in case of private companies were workers are third party and they have no rights of compensation or parental leaves or so. But to some extent with the advent of labor laws, things became more manageable like all factories must have minimum safety standards otherwise license for working will not be permitted, health hazards should be minimum for workers otherwise it is a punishable offence in front of the judiciary. All these things deepened the concept of labor laws and fair work policies but unionism got stagnant due to mandatory legislations being implemented even in private sectors. There is a need for more strategic viewpoint towards declining trend of union membership. It could be accelerated again with the help of various programs like work progress, more recruitment of senior and management officials for union management and implementing new strategies for development of membership through advertising, removing the myth and wrong concepts behind union membership and also by promoting membership with the help of worker development and wage guarantee programs where employee wages will be focused as workers are highly motivated with only one motivation and that is monetary security at its best. Recruitment of new officials will help new strategies being introduced and thought of, new management principles will also motivate the worker class with fresh level of zeal and energy, any change in a concept can be appreciated if it brings development of any sort [External and intra European union trade, 2008]. Apart from this, the second strategy mentioned above i.e. spreading awareness about the employment rates, casual and full time employment difference and similar data will help the workers be aware of the real scenario prevailing and will help them take steps towards membership. As seen that latest development of mandatory laws like health and safety measures and other labor laws, they protect the workers from minimum risks and hazards, but union membership is far wider concept than only safety features. It will help the workers have balanced family and work life it will enable them to fight for their rights with the employer. It will help the workers have a team or group where financial and moral stability is far more than working alone for the employer, it assures the workers of minimum wages guarantee and decent work only, all such attractions could be included in agenda and made a policy framework which will come as a facility under union membership that may help the workers get motivated and be aware about the developments and changes for betterment in union membership [ACTU, 2012].
Conclusion:
It can be concluded that trade unions have decreased in Australia and other developed countries due to the reasons like emergence of private sector, development of fair work laws by the government and HRD Ministry, private sectors having agreements with the workers towards no unionism. Several other reasons like increase in pay due to work efficiency without any liability of the employee, third party recruitments and concept of outsourcing are also behind this decline. All these things have made the trend of union membership decline ever since 1990s and only at times of the financial crisis and recession, workers feel the need for membership otherwise the percentage of membership has always shown the declining trends [ACTU, 2012]. Some factors which came in front are that there is a pattern or trend of union membership which can be transformed with new policies and practices. Some of those trends are women workers show lesser interest towards union membership, casual workers are comparatively used more in companies than the full time workers and casual workers show no motivation for union membership. Full time workers have interest towards membership in union mostly during the time of recession or financial crisis. These factors show that union membership is a concept of merely protecting the workers from losing jobs and is not considered in bigger term than this. These trends could be decreased with the help of new recruitments in union on the post of development manager or policy makers so that they could understand the pattern of membership and lucrates the workers for membership in similar manner which attracts them for being without membership and having better scope. Scope is limited for union membership in the eyes of the workers which could be increased by more campaigns and advertising so that awareness is increased among the workers. Its scope could be increased and made more diversely acceptable for the workers as limitations have to be removed so that workers could feel free to join the union because no worker will like to limit his or her scope for working in private sectors as high payments are drawn from there. It could be considered in a different manner where even the outsourced workers have to be a part of union and then also he or she can develop and flourish more [BIS]. Sometimes it has also been said that union membership decline is a symbol of growth and development of the country as almost all developed countries declining trends of union membership but it could be transformed for betterment because workers are poor and lower income group people. The union membership can help them increase their standard of living for better and in this way the workers can have financial stability, facility for loans and advances through their union itself, family and work life balance and similar benefits. Union membership for workers in Australia can be a great advantage for the worker class and their upliftment as unionism has many advantages and secures the life and work of the workers, it has many such advantages which has not yet much been revealed in front of the workers like it gives the workers chance to go abroad for work and that too in group of workers who are known to each one of them and have better opportunity to earn and return back after the project with full safety and comfort. All such benefits cannot be avoided and in Australian context these can be increased and accelerated with the help of certain management level changes and increase in awareness through campaigning’s and advertising through television or radio media [Goerke and Pennerberg, 2003]. The workforce diversity should also be handled properly as women must also be promoted for union membership by showing them the correct path so that they could be aware of the fact that union membership is equally important for safety and protection of wage rights for women workers as well. By such similar implementation and involvement, membership could be increased in Australian trade unions and workers class problems and financial crisis can also be resolved to a great extent.
References:
1. K.D Ewing, 2005, functions of trade union, industrial law journal, vol-34, no-1,DOI-10.1093/INDLAW/dwi001 retrieved from http://ilj.oxfordjournals.org/content/34/1/1.full.pdf
2. Australian bureau of statistics, decline in trade union membership, 2012, retrieved from http://www.abs.gov.au/ausstats/abs@.nsf/Latestproducts/6310.0Main%20Features3August%202011?opendocument&tabname=Summary&prodno=6310.0&issue=August%202011&num=&view=
3. Henning Meyer, 2012, Europe in 2012, social Europe journal, vol-6, issue-2, retrieved from http://www.social-europe.eu/wp-content/uploads/2012/03/SocialEurope-20.pdf
4. ACTU, 2012, campaigns, retrieved from http://www.actu.org.au/
5. ACTU, 2012, about trade unions, retrieved from http://www.actu.org.au/about/tradeunions/default.aspx
6. External and intra European union trade, 2008 edition, eurostat statistical book, ISSN-1606-3481, Retrieved from http://epp.eurostat.ec.europa.eu/cache/ITY_OFFPUB/KS-CV-07-001/EN/KS-CV-07-001-EN.PDF
7. ACTU, 2012, secure jobs, better future, retrieved from http://www.actu.org.au/Campaigns/SecureJobsBetterFuture/default.aspx
8. ACTU, 2012, work and family, retrieved from http://www.actu.org.au/Issues/WorkandFamily/default.aspx
9. BIS, Trade union membership rights, retrieved from http://www.businesslink.gov.uk/bdotg/action/layer?topicId=1074038852
10. Lazslo Goerke and Markus Pennerberg, 2003, norm based trade union membership, retrieved from http://ftp.iza.org/dp962.pdf
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