By offering only a six-month freeze but making it contingent upon not cutting any of the 500 jobs as is being reported, the unions are putting forward exactly the straw man proposal we warned we wouldn’t accept in the Ministerial statement.
As we said, we are not interested in receiving ‘straw man’ proposals that are burdened with unacceptable caveats and couldn’t possibly be agreed to by any responsible government.
The unions know full well that $15 million doesn’t equal 500 jobs and, therefore, it is a straw man proposition we cannot responsibly accept.
We have been perfectly clear that we are identifying savings that will replace those from our pay freeze, which over a full year are worth around $50 million.
Any proposal that delivered an annual impact of $15 million would undermine the integrity of the Budget to the tune of $35 million.
While we’d prefer an 18-month freeze to save 500 jobs, if the unions put forward 12 or six months with an appropriate jobs offset (that is, 300 or 150) then, of course, we will consider it.
Peter Gutwein, Treasurer
