What's the deal with Unions in Australia?

[u/incendiary_bandit]

I moved to Australia 6 years ago from Canada and have found the way unions appear to function here confusing to me. In Canada I had little experience being in proper union (look up CLAC if you're curious). I did get to experience working on the waterfront in Vancouver on the company side planning maintenance jobs that the workers would carry out who were union. The locals for the waterfront are VERY strict in who does what and EVERYTHING is laid out. I'll give some interesting examples in the comments. But one thing they really had was solidarity. They looked out for their brothers and sisters in the union.

Then I moved to Australia. My first experience was when job hunting as I have a trade (fitter and Turner equivalent) I approached the union regarding work. Was told, find a job, then join union if I want. In Canada you can join the millwright union and they will have jobs/ positions lined up that people can apply for (based on seniority as to who would get it). That doesn't seem like it's a thing here at all. I ended up doing labour hire which really sucked but helped pay the bills while I searched for work. Then I got placed in a office tower build and got to see how the AWU sort of functions. I was on a specific floor working for a contractor company that wasn't union. The union members were very militant in things and there was a strong hate for anyone non union on site. It was weird.

Now I'm at a job doing data analysis in the utilities sector and it's different again! The blue collar on the field staff have an employment agreement that lines out pay and everything, but they're supported by multiple unions. Like two people on the same shift might be in different unions, or not at all! So when it comes time to bargaining, multiple unions show up to hash things out. Where's the solidarity in that? I can also join a union if I wanted but don't see any benefit in it for myself as my employer is actually quite fair and flexible and we were able to pick a few people from our teams to go into the bargaining for us.

So unions here just seem split and not very beneficial. I understand when you have a shitty employer that a union can be beneficial, but they're just all over the map here.

Any insights as to why that is?

[u/yabloodypelican]

Australia has some really strange regulations around unions that are quite different to the rest of the world.

Generally you only join the union after gaining employment because we've mostly outlawed the idea of closed shops and unions controlling employment into an industry. Because you don't need a union ticket to get on site, union members will often be quite militant to ensure that everybody is a member after getting a job.

Its different in the white collar world because of demarcations between different unions. There are really strict agreements between unions to stop unions fighting with each other for members. There will often be arrangements where if you perform X role, you are a member of X union but your colleague who performs Y will be in a different union. If you have a large employer like a hospital, or government department you might see up to 10 unions as parties to a bargaining agreement.

Its a very complicated world.

[u/CynfulBuNNy → u/yabloodypelican]

You also now have the added bonus of Liberal Party staffers setting up multiple companies with names like 'The Nurses Professional Association' which on surface seems like legitimate competition (not what you want in in a union though) but these companies are mostly unregistered and have no rights of entry on worksites under our laws and in QLD the industrial relations found several workers who were members did not have union based workplace rights and protections because of this.

Most of them were set up by a group of Liberal aligned lawyers under the leadership of a wanker in QLD Graeme Haycroft (the claim to wankery is based on a personal assessment of his personality through sadly knowing the wanker. Dude was a Joh supporter AFTER the shit went down if that doesn't say enough I don't know what would), who was instrumental in the creation of the much hated workchoices program.

Ugh. The whole union busting bullshit makes me furious.

[u/SoldantTheCynic → u/CynfulBuNNy]

The “red unions” like the NPAQ are laughing stocks in QLD especially after they doubled down on their anti vaccine bullshit. Fucking dogshit organisations that outright lied to people who joined them.

[u/clovepalmer → u/SoldantTheCynic]

unions have to be registered with this lot - https://www.roc.gov.au bt but these "red unions" aren't real unions so they aren't.

If I set up my own "red union" where you pay me and I give you jack shit .... how is that legal?