Mr Tony Burke (Watson, Australian Labor Party, Minister for Employment and Workplace Relations) Share this | Hansard source

that would be part of those negotiations. In any broadening of the definition, what I want to be mindful of—and I've said this before—is that occupations such as early childhood educators, who we definitely want to make sure do get the benefit of multi-employer bargaining, may start in the supported stream but, effectively, if you look at businesses like, for example, the Victorian childcare centres or early childhood education centres that have already engaged in this, they're roughly 16 per cent above the award and they would need a pathway to be able to continue to negotiate. They'd only be able to do that single-enterprise stream, and I want to make sure that any expanded definition doesn't carve them out.

See this speech in context