Abbott backs away from Howard comments

27 Aug 2012, 6:00 pm   -   Source: AAP
Mr Howard said something must be done about unfair dismissals but he would leave the timing and the handling of it to Mr Abbott. (Getty)

Mr Howard said something must be done about unfair dismissals but he would leave the timing and the handling of it to Mr Abbott. (Getty)

Opposition Leader Tony Abbott has backed away from John Howard's comments on Work Choices as Labor called on him to again reject the policy.

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Opposition Leader Tony Abbott has distanced himself from former Liberal prime minister John Howard's call for the coalition to "go back" to individual contracts, which operated under the Work Choices regime.

"Let's face it - John Howard is two prime ministers ago. John Howard is three Liberal leaders ago," Mr Abbott told reporters in Mackay, Queensland on Monday.

"That was then, this is now.

But the Labor government pursued Mr Abbott for an outright repudiation of Mr Howard's statements, with Workplace Minister Bill Shorten and Treasurer Wayne Swan saying a future coalition would return to the policy.

Mr Howard revived the issue - which was blamed for the fall of his government in 2007 - during off-the-record remarks to a Westpac forum in Sydney earlier this month.

"There is no reason why this country should not go back to the workplace system we had between 1996 and 2005 where you had individual contracts," he said, according to The Australian Financial Review.

Mr Howard raised the concerns of small business faced with unfair dismissal claims, but apparently agreed it was a "bad political mistake" to remove the no disadvantage test which prevented workers under individual contracts from being worse off.

Mr Abbott said the individual flexibility agreements in place under Labor's Fair Work Act, which replaced Work Choices, "need to be made more workable".

"But there's no going back to the past ... we want the Fair Work Act to work better," he said.

However, Mr Swan said if Mr Howard was calling for a return to Work Choices, Mr Abbott would not be far behind.

"Liberals do what Liberals always do, which is attack the wages and working conditions of working people and slash their services," he told reporters in Canberra.

Mr Shorten said it was time for Mr Abbott to again rule out a return to Work Choices and promise not to attack penalty rates.

"Mr Abbott needs to make it explicit, does he support what Mr Howard is saying?"

"We all know the opposition, or at least the strategists in the opposition leader's office, think that a workplace relations debate is the equivalent of them eating a bowl of rat poison," Mr Shorten said.

But Liberal MP Steven Ciobo said it was "absurd" employers weren't able to offer individual employment contracts to staff.

"It puts us behind the rest of the world when it comes to labour market flexibility," he told Sky News.

Ahead of the 2010 election, Mr Abbott declared Work Choices "dead, buried and cremated".

Mr Abbott said on Monday any changes to current individual flexibility agreements would be "cautious, careful and responsible".

"We want to solve problems, not be ideological in this area," he said.

But Unions NSW warned of an "ice age for working people" if the coalition wins the next federal election due in late 2013.

"John Howard has made clear what those ex-ministers will do if returned, with his call to reinstate individual contracts and remove unfair dismissal protection," Unions NSW secretary Mark Lennon said.

The Australian Chamber of Commerce and Industry said it wanted a "sensible system" of individual contracts.

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