FED: Democrats raise prospect of retrospectivity for bailouts

AAP General News (Australia)
02-14-2000
FED: Democrats raise prospect of retrospectivity for bailouts

CANBERRA, Feb 14 AAP - The Australian Democrats could use their numbers in the Senate
to make legislation retrospective to help other sacked workers, party leader Meg Lees
said today.

Senator Lees said there were huge inconsistencies in who would get financial help,
so retrospectivity was something that could be examined.

She said there was a "very good case for consistency" for the sacked Braybrook Textiles
Company workers in Melbourne and "many others".

"We have some 3,000 companies in Australia that go bankrupt each year and everybody
should be helped to the same degree," she told ABC radio.

Under a safety net package proposed by Workplace Relations minister Peter Reith, workers
would receive entitlements to a maximum of $20,000, but only those employed by companies
that collapsed after January 1 this year.

The Howard government adopted a $4 million rescue package for the Hunter Valley National
Textiles workers but drew the line at helping the Braybrook workers.

Senator Lees said the government had made a rod for its own back by putting off legislation
to introduce an insurance scheme to cover sacked workers for more than 12 months.

"It has been talking about doing something but nothing has actually happened and hopefully
this (controversy over National Textiles) will speed the process up," she said.

Senate National Party leader Ron Boswell conceded this was going to be a tough week
but said Prime Minister John Howard had done nothing wrong and his position was totally
defensible.

He said he did not see a conflict of interest in that Mr Howard's brother Stan was
chairman of National Textiles

"Here is a Liberal prime minister helping out 430 battlers in a depressed area in a
depressed industry," he said on ABC radio.

"If he walked away from them just because of an accident of birth, that his brother
was involved in the company, then the unions would be screaming unfair.

"He did say that he would absent himself (from Cabinet discussions) but the majority
of Cabinet said that wouldn't be necessary. I don't particularly think he should have
left Cabinet if the majority of Cabinet wanted him there.

"It is always easy to be wise after the event. But the main issue is that the government
said it would put in place a safety net, so I believe Mr Howard was trying to honour that
commitment."

AAP mb/lw/bwl

KEYWORD: SACKED DEMOCRATS

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