Tania Lawrence (Hasluck, Australian Labor Party) Share this | Hansard source

I think one thing that completely separates us from the coalition is our position on wage policy. There can be absolutely no other area in which the fact that the Labor government will always back workers is more stark. It's our priority; it always has been and always will be. We know that without ensuring workers have the right to fair pay and safe working conditions and the means to be able to organise to ensure they get their fair entitlements, this country will not be able to grow. It won't be productive, and we won't enjoy the success that we have to date. So I absolutely do thank the member for Lalor for this important motion.

We are completely proud of the fact that we have seen successive, consecutive wage rises for low-paid workers. This government has taken action across many portfolio areas to assist Australians during difficult times: energy bill relief, fee-free TAFE, tax cuts for all. I could go on, and I will: more bulk-billing in Hasluck and around the country—thanks to this government's policies—cheaper child care, cheaper medicines and rent assistance. These are making a difference to every person living in my electorate and across the country.

It is here, in wages policy, that, as I say, we unearth the true difference between the major parties and underscore the hypocrisy of each and every coalition member who stands in this place—or the other—and tries to speak coherently about the cost of living. Leaving aside the fact that the coalition would not have enacted energy bill relief, fee-free TAFE, tax cuts for all or more bulk-billing, it is this crucial area of wages policy, where the government has, from the very outset, supported the wage cases that have seen those three successive increases in the minimum wage, from which the coalition has been completely absent. Where were they for the nine years while wages flatlined and ordinary families were falling behind? Where they were and what they were doing, and failing to do, is well documented by the McKell Institute in a report from April 2022 by Edward Cavanough titled Stuck in Neutral: The Policy Architecture Driving Slow Wage Growth in Australia. Cavanough lists seven deliberate policy choices of the Morrison-Dutton government that he described as having constituted 'a coordinated program of wage suppression', these being: support for a reduction in penalty rates; overseeing a surge in work visas for low-paid temporary migrant workers; inaction on wage theft and underpayment; opposition to increases in minimum wages; public sector wage freezes; changes in the composition of the Fair Work Commission; and allowing a sharp expansion of the unregulated gig economy in which workers have little or no bargaining power.

It is salient indeed that the present government has taken and is taking action across every one of these policy areas. Average workers in Australia have nothing to thank the coalition for after nine years of policies deliberately designed to reduce wages growth. Average workers in Australia were simply worse off after the coalition years. They were in no fit state to face the pandemic when that hit, nor were they in a good position to face the cost-of-living crisis that has followed. If anyone wants to vote for the coalition in the election next year, they will need to find a reason other than their hip pocket, because the coalition let average Aussies down.

In contrast, real wages growth is back under Labor. People are now earning more under this government and, together with our tax cuts for all Australians, they are keeping more of what they earn. There are many reasons why people are earning more. Part of the story is wage growth itself. This is now recovering, after workers found their real purchasing power declining for years under the coalition. Other reasons for earning more include the government's childcare policies, allowing more people to work, and to work for longer hours, if they wish to; fee-free TAFE, allowing people to skill up without worrying about the cost; increases to parenting payments; and, of course, those tax cuts. We have managed this return to reasonable and sensible wages growth while bringing inflation down from the 6.1 per cent high left to us by the coalition. Indeed, our action across child care, rent and energy rebates has had an anti-inflationary effect at a time when this was dearly needed.

The coalition's reflex seems to be to squeeze ordinary people at every turn. Then they show up here and try to pretend that they are concerned about the cost of living. They simply cannot have it both ways. There's an election coming in less than a year. When it does, I hope and trust that the electors of Hasluck and those elsewhere recognise the true and demonstrated support of the Albanese Labor government for working people and that they hold firm against the empty slogans that the coalition has to offer.

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