Identify the Criticisms of the Use of Australian Workplace Agreements

Question

Examlex · Accepted Answer

The Answer is Despite assertions and some relatively modest evidence their proponents provide in support, there are critics of AWAs who claim that many enterprises did not use individual contracts to promote positive employment relations. Achieving trust and economic benefits (for employees and enterprises) requires individual contracts that are negotiated genuinely and separately for each individual employee and substantive outcomes (in terms of wages and working conditions) that vary between employees. The critics claim this rarely happened. In terms of procedure, most individual contracts are drafted unilaterally by management and offered to employees on a 'take-it-or-leave-it' basis, with little or no opportunity for genuine negotiation.
There was also little variation in substantive wages and conditions across AWAs within enterprises. In addition, if individual contracts were to be used in a positive fashion to improve employer-employee relations, it would also be expected that either the contracts themselves would contain provisions relating to communication, consultation and other employee-friendly issues, or the employment relations more generally in the enterprises using individual contracts (i.e. beyond the contracts themselves) would be employee-friendly. The evidence on both these issues is mixed, but it generally seems that many individual contracts were not used as their advocates claimed.

Identify the Criticisms of the Use of Australian Workplace Agreements

Definitions: