Justine Keay (Braddon, Australian Labor Party) Share this | Hansard source

I move:

That this House:

(1) notes that:

(a) the retail trades industry is the second largest employment category in Australia, it employs 1.2 million, or one in nine, Australians and 52 per cent of these workers have no post school qualification;

(b) the Fair Work Commission's (FWC's) decision to cut penalty rates in the retail trade will hit those most powerless to change jobs;

(c) the take home pay of hundreds of thousands of workers will be cut because of the FWC decision to cut Sunday and public holiday penalty rates for the retail trade;

(d) workers affected are being treated as second class citizens and their work is not being valued;

(e) whilst a few jobs may be created on the margins of the economy, the removal of these workers' spending power from the economy will override any minimal jobs growth; and

(f) many families will struggle all over the country because of this short sighted decision;

(2) condemns Government Members and Senators who called for cuts to penalty rates and their continuous pressuring of the FWC to reduce penalty rates;

(3) calls on Government Members and Senators to stand with Labor to protect low paid workers take home pay; and

(4) supports Labor's Fair Work Amendment (Protecting Take Home Pay) Bill 2017, to amend the Fair Work Act 2009.

I want to give a personal story about the impact that cuts to penalty rates have had on women and I also want to demonstrate to those opposite who believe in economics over everything else that these cuts are bad for communities. They are bad for regional communities in particular and local economies. They are bad for small business, particularly those in regional Australia.

Katelyn works in retail on Sundays and she will lose about $10 for the day. That might not seem like a lot to many Australians and working Australians, but for her it is a lot of money. Katelyn is saving every cent she has to put towards finding stable accommodation. She cannot pick up any more hours because she is also a student. She works with two other women in the shop on a Sunday. There's no capacity at all to put on any extra shifts or any other employees. The argument that cutting penalty rates will create more jobs is nothing but a fallacy.

As a member of the Australian Jobs Taskforce, Labor's caucus committee, I have spoken to many regional chambers of commerce. We talk to people on the ground from all sectors of society about jobs—the barriers to creating and obtaining jobs, how we grow jobs and how we may solve the systemic failures of our labour market. The fallacy of jobs being created or more work being provided from these cuts was confirmed by the business representatives who I and the task force have spoken to. Many small business operators suggested that, as small business owners generally pay themselves a wage, they will pocket the savings from these penalty rate cuts themselves. How could you blame them for that?

People like Katelyn who are on low wages—and predominantly those in the retail sector are women—spend every cent they have and they spend it locally. The impact of these cuts on regional Australia is staggering. According to the McKell Institute, in my electorate nearly $10 million of lost income will hurt small businesses. People will spend less. They will have reduced confidence to spend, particularly those in the sectors where they now feel they are in jeopardy of the same cuts happening to them, such as in clubs and hairdressers. Some $6½ million of this $10 million of lost income is from retail workers in my electorate.

With the casualisation of work and the increase in insecure work, the positive balance has shifted away from many in our society to just a few. The impacts on society are enormous, and governments should not underestimate these. These figures assume that most employers are larger businesses that are not locally owned, and this is the case in my electorate, which is a regional electorate. This means that any labour savings from these cuts will be moved to the larger cities, not reinvested in regional areas. But if you look at the macroeconomics, weekend penalty rates contribute over $14 billion to the annual income of Australian employees, or 2½ per cent of the total economy. For those sectors that are weekend intensive, such as retail, five per cent of wages from these cuts will be lost.

Women like Katelyn will be impacted the hardest. Lisa is a mum in her 40s living in the northern suburbs of Melbourne. She's a single mum with two teenage daughters. She works in retail and works Sundays. She is now feeling more financial pressure to make ends meet. The amount of money that she will lose from her take-home pay is equivalent to her property rates and charges. She is competing with younger retail workers for shifts and she doesn't have the skills to move on into other sectors. These cuts will increase inequality, and that's according to not just to Labor but over 75 Australian professionals working in economics and related disciplines.

Economic research indicates that overall business activity in retail and hospitality depends on the level of consumer expenditure on these services. By undermining incomes for a group of workers, it will marginally reduce aggregated disposable income. So there we are, again—back at the beginning. So it is clear. If you support women, you will stand with Labor, stand up for women in your community, support our private members' bill and protect the take-home pay of women who need your support more than most.

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