AWCCs position on the Voice is that we do not have one.
Our view is similar to that of the Association of the Order of Australia who wrote in their membership magazine (May 2023 edition) the following pertaining to their Associations official position on the referendum.
…….Decision on this is a matter for individual members………It would be inappropriate for your (AOofA) Association to take a position on this personal decision that is to be taken by every Australian…………….
AWCC shares this rationale and position.
Ahead of our launch, the AWCC board would like to share a couple of its key drivers in its structure and purpose. It was noted by Ciaran Strachan’s research that many professionals who are responsible for the operational application of labour and related legislation, including Payroll and Employment Technology Providers, lacked a non-partisan and membership owned voice to represent them. It was also noted that along with typical left and right wing associations, many membership and private associations were advocating for political and self interests, including right wing de-regulation agendas at the expense, and potentially in breach of their contract with their members (the constitution).
AWCC will not do this, hence when we launch you will note we have a number of Association firsts in our publicly available Governance, some of which include:
1. A constitution with specific non-partisan requirement clauses for its Directors.
2. A board charter that requires each Director to declare any conflicts of interest, including membership with any political party or Director position with any other Association or Association Councils whilst holding a position of Director with AWCC. Both of which will result an immediate termination of their Directorship.
These and other clauses exist as we do not welcome “professional board hoppers,” and generally, we will only recruit from our industry. Also, we do not want directors using one association to serve the purpose of another associations political agenda. In the past, particularly in the Workforce Compliance space, such an approach has resulted in poor government policy as real world operational solutions were never presented to Government.
There is more, however, we wish to convey that we are not in the business of promoting self or political agenda’s. AWCC is in the business of providing a non-partisan voice for the only experts who operationalise the countries labour and related legislation.
Regards
The AWCC board