Long-Hours Working and Enterprise Bargaining

Abstract

Long-Hours Working and Enterprise Bargaining Mark Woodenecent years have seen growing concern with the large number of hours many Australian employees appear to be working.The Australian Industrial Relations Commission in its decision on the Working Hours Case, handed down on 23 July 2002, for example, highlighted the upward trend in the average working hours of full-time employees over the past two decades.Moreover, the decision drew attention to the many adverse effects for employees, their families and the communities they live in, that could potentially result from working long hours.That the incidence of long hours of work has risen is beyond dispute.Survey data from the Australian Bureau of Statistics (ABS) reveal that while average hours of work have changed very little in recent decades, this is the result of two forces pulling in opposite directions, with growth in the part-time employment share offsetting the rise in the average number of hours being worked by full-time employees.More importantly, it has been widely recognised that this increase in the average number of hours being worked by full-time employees is predominantly the result of an increase in the proportion of the workforce regularly working what might be thought of as excessive or unreasonable hours (for example, Dawkins and Simpson, 1994;Wooden et al, 1994; the Australian Centre for Industrial Relations Research and Training (ACIRRT), 1999; Healy, 2000; Buchanan et al, 2001; Wooden, 2001a).ACIRRT (1999:102) for example, has highlighted the marked increase in the proportion of the full-time workforce working more than 48 hours in the survey week -from around 19 per cent in the late 1970s to 32 per cent in the late 1990s.Many commentators have explicitly connected this extension in working hours to industrial relations reform, and especially the elevation of negotiated settlements (that is, enterprise and workplace agreements) to a position of prominence over arbitrated settlements (that is, industry-and occupation-based awards) in the determination of wages and employment conditions (for example, ACIRRT, 1999;Burgess, 1998;Heiler, 1998;Campbell and Brosnan, 1999).Heiler (1998:86), for example, has argued that the awards system acted to standardise working hours thus effectively taking hours out of competition.In contrast, under enterprise bargaining, decisions about hours are devolved to the enterprise and workplace level, undermining principles of industry and community standards.They also increase the potential for much greater diversity in working time arrangements.Indeed, the available evidence indicates that working time provisions feature prominently in agreements (ACIRRT, 1999;

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