Clothing Industry in Tatters

Exactly what's going on in the clothing industry?  Just recently another two icon clothing brands, Hugo Boss and Holeproof announced plant closures with 300 Victorians losing their jobs.  Thousands of clothing industry jobs have now been lost in the last few years.  There's a crisis and the industry is in terminal collapse.

Most blame international competition but that's just an excuse!  Farmers face as a tough an environment as the clothing industry yet they get out there and win.  No, the clothing industry has been hit with a severe case of Australian wowserism that's doing great harm.

Since about 1996 a coalition of church, union and activist "community" groups with heavy doses of government funding has waged war against the domestic clothing industry.  Under accusations that clothing outworkers are earning $2 an hour they have picketed clothing stores, conducted strip sessions in stores, and sought to damage the brand names of major manufacturers.  Country Road for example has been severely hurt.

This anti-industry campaigning has come out at a recent Victorian Parliamentary inquiry into outworkers.  The campaigning has successfully convinced governments to introduce legislation and regulation that ties the industry in knots.  The clothing award is the only award never simplified and runs to more than 850 clauses.  Manufacturers have been heavied into signing "Codes of Conduct" and price-controlling legislation has been introduced that stops competition.  More legislation is proposed.

The outcome is that barely any clothing item can be made without manufacturers having to keep boxes of records tracing every transaction.  The union has an automatic right to and does inspect sensitive commercial records.  Outworkers privacy is invaded because names must be provided to the union without outworkers consent.

But are outworkers exploited?  Last week I had dinner in Springvale with a group of Cambodian friends.  Half were outworkers.  The rest have parents who were outworkers.  The building in which we ate was owned by Chinese outworkers.  The Vietnamese restaurant was run by ex-outworkers.  Most of my outworker friends own several houses.  They wanted to know where this $2 an hour business comes from.  They thought it was a great joke because their children will not baby-sit for that rate.

These outworkers pay tax, have ABNs and don't rort the social security system.  They know of outworkers who don't pay tax and collect social security without declaring income.  Perhaps they suggest these are the $2 an hour people?  However none know anyone who would be prepared to work at these rates.

So where does this anti-industry campaigning come from and how is it controlled?  At the Victorian Parliamentary inquiry the organization, Fairwear indicated they "facilitate" the campaigning but don't take responsibility.  When asked about outworker membership they stated, "there are no outworkers on our committee".  The Uniting Church and the clothing union back Fairwear.  Where are the outworkers?

My outworker friends say the industry is dying.  They say that soon accusations of exploitation will disappear because in a few years no clothing will be made in Australia.  We're a strange country!

ADVERTISEMENT