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I'm afraid we're seeing a big political swing against freedom in the workplace. The most obvious driver of this agenda is the Australian Council of Trade Unions.

Essentially, what unions want are changes to the Fair Work Act to force businesses to do deals with unions. The FWA was created by the Rudd Labor government in 2009. But it has not worked to the advantage of the unions in the way unions had expected. The key to union/business deals is that unions offer businesses corrupt deals that either (a) reduce workers' wages and/or (b) make life more difficult for the businesses' competitors. Businesses pay money to unions for this 'service'. More...

Technology is crushing traditional jobs. The command-and-control factory is being replaced by robots. Banks are rapidly removing pen-pusher jobs by the tens of thousands!!! For those with an economic bent, the Milton Friedman-type assumptions about how an economy operates are dead!

What’s taking over is the ‘gig’ economy. But what is it?  It’s pretty simple really.  More...

2017 was a hugely busy and transformational year for Self-Employed Australia on many important fronts.

Since forming in 2000 under the name Independent Contractors Australia, we have focused on one thing—advocacy for the rights of self-employed Australians. In this respect, we have had major successes even though we are entirely a volunteer group. More...

Yes, we have to feel sorry these days for employees who are forced to attend the staff Xmas party. All the merriment has changed.

First, employees have to undergo HR training and briefings on how to behave or not behave. Hugs are banned. Be careful who you smile at and how! No sitting on Santa’s lap. Conversations and greetings must be religiously diversified and non-judgmental. Champagne is replaced with sparkling non-alcoholic lolly water. Sorry, no jokes! More...

Yes, I know. We don’t have much of a reputation for giving praise to the Australian Taxation Office. In fact we’re probably pretty mean. Here’s us calling the ATO lifeless, frozen dinosaurs and that they must think that the world is flat.

Given our comments, we’ve had people ask us how in the world we managed to have the cancelled ABNs reinstated.

Well, first we had great legal leadership. Here’s John and Paige Findley (our primary legal team) with Annette Pike (she’s on the left) from OutScribe shortly after the agreement to reinstate the ABNs was formalized.  More...

You might notice that we haven’t issued a News Alert for about two weeks. That’s been for a very good reason. We’ve been involved in deep and complex negotiations with the Australian Taxation Office over the cancelled ABNs.

You might remember we highlighted this last on the 22nd November where we accused the ATO of being a Frozen Dinosaur—Cold. Lifeless. No connection to reality. Before that we said that The ATO thinks the earth is flat. Yes, that’s perhaps ‘over the top’ of us to refer to the ATO that way.  More...

Looking at politics at the moment one might wonder at how anything functions! And this political dysfunction flows through into government department dysfunction.

Suing the government!
Our truckie friends will be interested in the $600 million class action being organized by farmers over the live cattle export ban in 2011. The Australian’s update is here. More...

We frequently complain about the way the ATO treats small business people.  And we are very pleased that the Parliamentary Inquiry into ATO scrutiny has recommended keeping the scrutiny of the ATO.

But we have seen some improvement. We’ve long been critical of the ATO’s ‘contractor/employee’ decision-making tool. But it’s been reviewed, modified and is now looking pretty reasonable. More...

The Australian Tax Commissioner has been complaining to the Treasurer that the ATO is subject to too much scrutiny. At first, we at ICA thought this was a joke! But no, a parliamentary committee is reviewing whether the ATO needs less scrutiny.

We’re staggered and so we’re responding. We’ve put in a submission saying that, in relation to treatment of small business people, the ATO needs more scrutiny, not less. It’s a long submission but it needs to be.  More...

In a recent news alert we discussed the rise of self-employment in the UK and Canada that is making up most of the new jobs in those countries. We discussed how China is discovering that the self-employed are the ‘happiest’ workers. This is part of the pattern of the ‘gig’ economy: Uber, Airbnb and many others creating a new economy. We call it ‘capitalism of the individual’; self-employment.  

This should be a welcome and exciting progression of human economic development. But, around the world, hugely powerful institutions are in the ‘suppression’ game. These institutions are government-funded and pursue their own agendas in a ‘Yes, Minister’ style of control over the political process. More...