Article tabled for general awareness and to a balance to previous posts by me.

STORY LINK

Business warns of crippling loss of potential
By BRETT FOLEY
Wednesday 9 February 2000

Business and employer groups have warned that while power restrictions have cost Victoria more than $100million in lost productivity, erosion of business confidence could be far more devastating.

They believe damage to business confidence and potential investment in the state will greatly outweigh the value of productivity losses, with some calling for compensation from the State Government.

The Victorian Employers Chamber of Commerce and Industry said that yesterday loomed as the worst day of the dispute, but lower-than-expected temperatures helped them avoid stand-downs.

Yesterday's forecast top of 38degrees was held off by the early arrival of a sea breeze that kept temperatures in the city to the high 20s. Temperatures in some outer northern and eastern suburbs reached the mid to high 30s but most businesses escaped the problems of extreme heat.

The Bracks Government is due to reassess the situation today, with the possibility that restrictions could be in place for the rest of the week and into early next week.

A VECCI spokesman, Mr Mike Griffin, said as well as productivity losses, the damage to business confidence and potential investment in Victoria could be devastating and long-lasting.

"If I were a potential investor looking at Australia you would have to say the severe disruption caused by this dispute, as well as last year's gas crisis, doesn't send a positive message," he said.

Mr Griffin called on the State Government to continue the strong leadership it had shown in the past two days to help restore the faith of investors.

Mr Griffin said the chamber received fewer calls from businesses yesterday as many were now aware of their exemptions and others had enacted contingency plans.

The Victorian director of the Australian Industry Group, Mr Paul Fennelly, said manufacturers had been fortunate that the temperature had stayed low.

He said the power cuts had caught many businesses unaware and the parties in the dispute must resolve their differences so Victorian business did not continue to suffer.

"There have been major costs, both in disruption and in reallocation of work, and from now on the Government must keep business informed of these potential developments," he said.

A spokesman for the Victorian Automobile Chamber of Commerce, Mr David Russell, said power restrictions had caused members to postpone work and give employees more frequent breaks.

Mr Russell said the Government should consider compensation for businesses able to prove they suffered substantial losses as a result of restrictions.

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Comment:
The heatwave brought about much more than a power failure....story-n-saga developing...

Regards from OZ

-- Pieter (zaadz@icisp.net.au), February 08, 2000

Answers

Socialist plunderer governments deserve this and more, as do all of the sheeple who deserve what they tolerate. Union thugs + parasitic looter bureaucrats = moral bankruptcy and nothing but misery for the masses, by definition. End story.

-- Howard Roark (nowork@noeat.com), February 08, 2000.

Howard,

The ultimate goal of management is to mazimize the profits of the shareholders. To do this, they must pay labor as little as possible, and charge as much as possible for their product (revenue less expenses equals profit).

Now, if managment can pit one employee against another and get them to bid on a job (daily, as was the goal in OZ), then the job will go to the lowest bidder, and all labour will all be making minimum wage. There is alsways someone who will do your job for less, and fewer and fewer in short-term-goal-oriented-management today care for quality.

One worker can not stand against the coordinated and planned treachery of a management united in greed. Workers must therefore conspire amongst themselves in order to obtain a balance (or often, just a pittance) of power. This conspiracy (as you would call it) is known as a 'union'.

To equate unions with moral bankruptcy' is equivalent and just as wrong as characterizing management as 'capitalist pigs'. Both organized managment and organized labor have a role in our form of econometrics, and the situation only gets out of hand when one side decides to rid the world of the other, once and for all. This seems to be the case in Australia. You may blame whomever you please, but your equation is too simple by far.

Sincerely,

-- Uhhmmm... (JFCP81A@aol.com), February 08, 2000.