Trade Unions and Temporary Employment: New Initiatives in Regulation and Representation

Trade unions throughout the advanced capitalist societies face significant challenges in the current period. One central challenge is associated with the persistence and growth of temporary work, ie the varied forms of non-permanent waged work such as fixed-term contracts, seasonal employment, casual employment, employment with temporary agencies and certain types of government employment and training schemes. In responding to this challenge, trade unions operate on at least two fronts – design and implementation of regulatory initiatives and effective representation of temporary workers. Regulatory initiatives can be pursued at different levels and usually involve change to one or another of three main mechanisms restrictions on temporary employment, the level of rights and benefits, and the level of compensation for perceived disadvantages. Both regulation and representation pose dilemmas, including dilemmas of co-ordination with trade union efforts to defend the interests of employee in a continuing (‘permanent’) contract of employment. This paper briefly reviews union initiatives in varied countries. However, it focuses in particular on Australian trade unions and casual employment. Australian trade unions face a particularly severe challenge in this area, because casual employment constitutes – at least potentially – a highly degraded form of temporary employment and because it already constitutes such a large and rapidly growing proportion of the workforce.