Bert Kelly, “Doing what comes naturally,”
The Australian, July 1, 1985, p. 11.

Just when I was beginning on my Eccles-imposed task of plodding through the 695 pages of the second volume of the Hancock report, some kind person sent me a newspaper cutting of a statement by the Minister for Employment and Industrial Relations, Mr Willis.

He evidently delivered a caustic attack on armchair critics of the Arbitration Commission, referring particularly to a vocal, arrogant and ignorant group of economists, politicians, and newspaper writers.

When I read this I thought he must have had Eccles in mind, particularly when I reread that comment about arrogant economists.

However, when I rang Eccles to castigate him he countered by saying that Mr Willis probably had me in mind when talking about ignorant newspaper critics who had no experience in industrial relations and were not even members of the Industrial Relations Club.

When I carefully examined my credentials, I had to admit they were not very impressive.

It is true that in the early ’50s, when I was a keen young farmer, I had a rush of blood to the head about producing food for Britain by farming flat out, so we employed three men, my father and myself, on our 2000 acres.

But even then, with all of us inclined to get in one another’s road, I never really gathered any industrial expertise.

I don’t think I ever sacked anyone so I suppose Mr Willis is right, I have a bit of a nerve to write about the subject.

Still, I suppose Mr Willis will allow me to draw a few conclusions as I wander through the industrial relations mess that the experts have left us.

I am reminded of that verse from Annie Get Your Gun which goes like this:

You don’t have to go to a great big school
Not to turn up your bustle to a stubborn mule.
You don’t have to come from a great big town
Not to clean out your stable in an evening gown.
Thaaaat comes naturally!

Let me give three examples of the many industrial relations messes into which I have blundered naturally in my inexpert fashion.

Recently, a real entrepreneur was proudly telling me of a big plant he was beginning to build. He told me that the men working on his building had requested him to ask me not to write anything about the project left the BLF bully-boys got wind of it and used their usual baseball bat diplomacy to force the man to toe the union line and go on strike even if the strike had nothing to do with them.

This is the kind of industrial environment our experts have won for us and of which they seem so proud.

It does not take any great degree of expertise either to understand the loathing in the bush for the union bosses who led the brutal bashings by thugs during the wide-comb shearing dispute, when shearers who were working within their award had to have rifles or pick handles handy.

Nor is it hard to recall the experience on Kangaroo Island when the unions declared black wool shorn by soldier-settler woolgrowers who had the nerve to shear one another’s sheep to save money.

And even now I have been told that the union is trying to prevent weekend shearing when wet weather has prevented shearing through the week, even though shearers, sheep and the owner are desperate to get the wool off and the money in.

You don’t have to be an expert either to understand the mess into which the unions have got wheatgrowers by refusing for years to work more than one shift at the Sydney wheat loading terminal.

This wanton behaviour has left us with wheat in silos which ought to have been delivered and paid for years ago.

I do not pretend that, if I were in Willis’ place, I would be able to quickly clean up the industrial mess we are in.

But one thing I do know, I would not be going about preening myself for being an industrial relations expert, a member of the IR Club.

I would be much more inclined to slink around hoping that no one would recognise me as belonging to a group of experts who have made such a monumental mess of things.