The Accord: A Post-Mortem

Abstract

The recent election rout of the Australian Labor Party (ALP) and the industrial decline of the unions should provoke a renewed questioning of the Accord. This article argues that the Accord contributed to the industrial decline of the unions and, ultimately, the electoral decline of the ALP. The Accord was caught in the contradiction between an economic liberal approach to industrial adjustment policy, pursued by the ALP in government, and the interests of the ALP's own working class constituency. The Accord drifted away from policy approaches that could have corresponded more closely to these interests, including in particular an interventionist and comprehensive industry policy. The inability or unwillingness of the ALP Government to deliver on this part of the first Accord, and the failure of the union leadership to rescind the agreement despite this, placed the burden of industrial adjustment on workers. Thus the Accord's subsequent incarnations were fatally flawed, since they associated the union leadership with policies that attacked the interests of union members. Shut out of political participation in the Accord, yet bearing the effects of policies it apparently condoned, many workers opted out of unions and voted for Labor's political opponents.