Prostitution Would've Been More Dignified

Barbara Bennett, makes more than you do and probably has a very nice AWA.

BUFFED and coiffed, with the tightly wired friendliness of an actress on Desperate Housewives, Barbara Bennett is the soft-focus spruiker of the Federal Government's industrial relations hard sell.

The director of the Workplace Authority, Ms Bennett is now appearing in lounge rooms across Australia, turning the idea of public service independence on its ear by taking part in the prime-time multimillion-dollar television, print and radio advertising blitz aimed at countering the ACTU's apparently successful "your rights at work" campaign.

Her participation has annoyed public servants and incensed Labor figures so much that she would be unlikely to survive in the event of a Labor victory in the election.

Ms Bennett has worked in Canberra's corridors of power since she joined the workforce 25 years ago, and lives a stone's throw from Parliament House in a home in Forrest, Canberra's most expensive suburb, with her husband, Stephen Anderson, a political lobbyist, and their two teenage daughters. The couple are renovating their home, and Canberra wags have suggested she needed the pay rise to pay the builders.

Well I don't know about you but this woman's life experience TOTALLY SPEAKS TO ME!!! I too have worked in corridors and live in a house, well unit, but still! I'm sure she'll tell us more about how she manages her work and family thanks to her shiny, lemon scented AWA in a glossy magazine article that's no doubt rushing to print!

"WORKChoices is something I believe in very much or else I wouldn't have accepted the job," she said. "Young people are very much the target of the campaign, and we know they watch television, and so this is a way of reaching them."

SMH

Them newfangled moving pichurs is all the rage with the youngfolk nowday. Look at that, she believes in WORKchoices so much she even signed up to do it for free! (for given values of free and believe). I wonder how much she's being paid to be the govt.'s bukkake buddy? Must be a lot!

Meanwhile, in real life:

THE Federal Government has intensified pressure on universities to use Australian Workplace Agreements, with a new threat to withhold funding if they do not further embrace the employment contracts.

The Education Department has sent a memo to the University of New England advising it to adjust its policies so it has the power to offer jobs solely via AWAs, instead of giving employees the choice of a collective agreement. The university has until August 31 to comply.

Universities were required to offer AWAs to all staff last year when the Federal Government tied $400 million in funding to their compliance with certain workplace provisions, known as the Higher Education Workplace Relations Requirements.

But only 3 per cent of staff have taken up the offer, and the Federal Government's rhetoric about providing employees with "choice" appears to have backfired, with the Minister for Education, Julie Bishop, asking universities to reconsider the clause in their enterprise bargaining agreements that says staff can choose between collective agreements and AWAs.

SMH

Hang on workers! Ms Bennett's just getting the semen out of her armour and trying to remember where she left the horse.