Department of Labour (Australia)
The Department of Labour was a catalyst for the increase in the national minimum wage and pushed for the equalising of pay rates between men and women.
He was known as an 'accidental feminist' due to his appointment of Mary Gaudron, who argued before the Arbitration Commission for equal pay and working conditions for female employees.
[7][3] Cameron also obtained significant responsibility over the labour reform campaigns prior to the 1972 Australian federal election.
[20] Prior to the 1972 federal election, and as part of the Labor Party’s political campaign, Cameron promised the reduction of strikes and overall disputes.
[19] During this period, the Labor party sided with unions, claiming they understood the perspective of employees and the demand for more labour reforms.
However, due to consequential inflation and increasing unemployment, disputation numbers rose from 1145 in 1960 to 2809 in 1974, proving Cameron's reforms to be ineffective.
[21] Gough Whitlam, with support from the Department of Labour, increased the minimum wage for both men and women subsequent to a conference with the Conciliation and Arbitration Commission.
Labour Minister Clyde Cameron quickly realised wage indexation impacts did not result in a "short [economic] shock" but turned into years of high unemployment.
Economic growth typically places upwards pressure on inflation, innately decreasing unemployment levels.
[24] Former Liberal Prime Minister Malcolm Fraser expressed his concerns for the wage increases, particularly in rural communities.
Fraser stated that wage increases would not contribute to a raise in living standards and quality of life, and would only escalate the general price level in the community.
[2][36] He also expressed that the long term consequences of high inflation can be ‘immensely serious’, and would ‘reduce [financial] support’ given to rural communities.
With domestic industries now unprotected, more than half of Australia’s goods are sourced from countries with extremely low minimum wages.
Businesses could not adjust to the lack of protection, and due to wage indexes, could not compete with manufacturing companies such as China and Japan who obtained higher labour productivity.
[40] This sent Australia’s international competitiveness on a major decline, as labour productivity was outpaced by countries with lower wage costs.
[43] The Department of Labour, convinced Whitlam that retraining workers, and focusing on individual employment would solve the high unemployment predicament.
The shortage of job vacancies left the strategy of upskilling workers ineffective as it did not solve the issue of excess labour supply.
