Today, the right-wing media that we are blessed with have wheeled out another one of their favourite little hobby-horses which they repeatedly use to promote the deregulation of the wages system. They are attacking the Government’s roll-back of Work Choices, which is aimed at restoring appropriate wages and conditions for non-standard work. In this specific case, two opinion columnists from the two major publishing houses are claiming that the Government is undermining the future employment prospects of our youth. Well if they had anything new to add by way of evidence it would be good for debate. As it is they both merely recite the dogma from the latest OECD report Jobs for Youth: Australia – and I don’t need to remind readers that that organisation has form. Its reputation in the area of labour market research is somewhat dubious after a series of recants over the last few years when confronted with solid evidence to the contrary. Anyway, here we go again.

The recent policy decisions of the Federal government appears to be in line with those of the previous (insidious) regime when it comes to the unemployed. In expansion packages which have so far totalled more than $A50 billion, there has been an allocation of $650 million for a Jobs Plan and renewed funding for the privatised and failed Jobs Network. You might think that odd given that the unemployed bear the brunt of any economic downturn. I find it obscene. And with the May budget coming up, there will be increasing claims that there is “not enough fiscal room” to do anything more. After all, the Federal Employment Minister has told us “there is no quick fix” despite knowing full well they have the capacity to offer minimum wage public sector jobs to anyone who wanted one. We might take lessons from more enlightened