Sophie Mirabella (Indi, Liberal Party, Shadow Minister for Early Childhood Education, Childcare, Women and Youth) Share this | Hansard source

That angers some on the other side of the chamber but let us be open about some of these things.

This is a very important issue because there is a big gap between reality—what is happening out there, particularly in smaller communities in rural and regional Australia—and the mythology and ideology consuming the government, particularly the office of the Deputy Prime Minister. We have had the Deputy Prime Minister promise that the government’s so-called award modernisation process would not disadvantage employees or increase costs for employers. Is this some sort of magical doublespeak? This is absolute nonsense. We know that it is not true now and we know that this will not be true in the months and years ahead.

We have seen recently the minister’s concession for the hospitality sector. In effect, this was an admission that the government’s so-called modern award will disadvantage both employers and employees. Well, guess what, I have a message for the government: that is not the only sector in the Australian economy that is going to be disadvantaged. Concessions have been made for restaurants, cafes and catering companies. They have successfully argued that they should be treated differently from hotels, but what about all of the other sectors? We are now hearing from retail and fast-food outlets, from pharmacies and from businesses that exist purely because of tourism—businesses that work outside normal hours of operation. All of these sectors have relevant claims that they will be disadvantaged under the government’s award modernisation.

My electorate in north-east Victoria has ski resorts, important winery regions, the largest concentration of micro breweries and great historic places; places such as Corryong on the Upper Murray—the land of the Man from Snowy River—and Ned Kelly country in Glenrowan, Mansfield, Benalla and Wangaratta, are much visited parts of Australia. Many of our local businesses in certain towns and shires have grown and the local employment market—seasonal as it may be—has depended on developing the tourism product. People whose businesses may have become redundant due to structural reform or changes in the local economy have taken a risk and invested their money in another business, which is based in tourism. And what happens? During an economic downturn they are to be penalised even more.

I have these businesses knocking on my door asking: ‘Sophie, how are we supposed to do this? We can’t afford this. Don’t they understand? Doesn’t the Deputy Prime Minister understand that we only make our money on public holidays and on the weekends—after hours—because that is when people have time to consume a tourism product?’ Surely the Deputy Prime Minister understands this. Surely she can be flexible and the government can look at the reality of what is happening on the ground. We are not talking about the sorts of groups that the Labor Party likes to hate—the megarich, whoever they are; we are talking about your small business, sometimes your microbusiness. These are the people who take the risks, put their own capital behind a venture, employ themselves and often, if they can, employ others, and that is how local economies grow. In rural and regional Australia there is a higher proportion of people employed in small business, so this is going to affect people in rural and regional Australia significantly—some would argue more than the capital centres.

But it is not just the tourism industry. A local independent supermarket owner has contacted me with regard to the new general retail industry award. He is concerned that the new award will have a very serious effect on his business. Many of his employers are working mothers and students who rely on flexible hours and casual work. Isn’t that interesting? At a time when the government is telling students in a declining economy to work more, to work 30 hours a week, it is making it difficult for employers in the retail sector to employ them. Under this so-called modern award this employer will have to pay casual staff $39.48 per hour and $31.58 per hour to full-time staff on a Sunday. This is what he said:

As a concerned employer, I do not want to reduce staff—

which is understandable, he is a local employer; he has relationships with his staff in a small town, as opposed to a metropolitan centre. You do know more people in the town you live in and you do have greater connection to them and their families. He goes on to say:

but I fear that this may be one of the inevitable consequences of the introduction of this new award.

I certainly hope it does not have to get to that stage.

Another area that will be significantly impacted on, and they are starting to gather and organise, is the horticulture industry. Award modernisation is set to impose an enormous increase in costs to horticulture, particularly fruit growers. The award modernisation will greatly affect growers and put additional costs and stress on the business of fruit growing. Even in the relatively high rainfall area of north-east Victoria, where my electorate is situated, we too have suffered from prolonged drought. So what will this so-called award modernisation process do? Well, it is just going to add to that stress. Fruit growers are estimating an increase in costs of up to $10,000 per hectare. What does this government want? Does it want to drive small producers and horticulturalists out of the industry? Where does it expect Australians to buy their fruit from? Are we going to import everything from China? Has the government actually asked the Australian consumer where they want to source their food from? I would say that vast majority would say, ‘We want to buy Australian’. But for how much longer will we be able to afford to buy Australian grown produce when these huge cost imposts are imposed on the producer?

I do not want to be smart, I do not want to be sarcastic, because I know the Deputy Prime Minister is a reasonably intelligent woman, but let me state a few basic facts. Fruit is picked when it needs to be picked and when it needs to be packed, and that could happen on weekends for the wholesale market so it can be ready for chain stores on a Monday. You do not have a choice to employ staff during the so-called cheaper periods. Limits on hours worked by seasonal staff will seriously disadvantage them as well. Strict rules on overtime will mean that employers will have to pay workers overtime if they work more than 38 hours in one week. And guess what? Another basic fact: fruit picking is seasonal work. Fruit does not grow all year round. Even those members in this House who live in capital cities and who might be able to source a particular fruit year round will know, or should know, that that fruit does not come from one part of the world, because fruit is seasonal. So what does that mean? That means that workers earn as much as they can when they can. Employers will now restrict workers so that they do not have to pay expensive overtime rates because it is just not affordable. The same goes for the tourism industry. It is seasonal.

The minister and the government must recognise that these industries, other than hospitality, will suffer under the award modernisation process. Surely some common sense needs to be injected into this whole process, and it is not beyond the government to do so. I urge them, on behalf of the small businesses of my electorate, to please have a look at this again. Those opposite do not want to put people out of business at a time when the estimates for unemployment next year are at one million. Those opposite do not want that figure to go up higher. I certainly do not. No amount of pandering, no amount of paying back certain lobby groups and certain unions is worth an increase in unemployment. It will make the job of recovery even harder and it will mean that, if certain industries close down because it is too expensive to employ labour when they need to do so, then we could lose some of those industries forever because it is very expensive to start up certain businesses from scratch, particularly in the agricultural sector. We may possibly see whole industries close down forever. That reduces our ability as a nation to have an indigenous capacity to make our own goods, to grow our own food, and that is a serious concern, not just for me, as a member who has a rural and regional electorate, but for all Australians.

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