Adam Bandt (Melbourne, Australian Greens) Share this | Link to this | Hansard source

I move:

That this bill be now read a second time.

This is a reform whose time has come, because it is clear that in Australia at the moment there is a mismatch between the hours that people actually work and the hours that they want to work. We know that just over half of all workers in this country say that they work more than half a day—more than four hours—more or less than they would prefer to, even taking into account the effect this might have on their income if they worked less. A third of women who work full time would also like to work less, despite the large proportion of working women who already do. Almost half of all fathers living in coupled households work more than they would prefer.

This position, as those statistics indicate, is especially acute for those who have caring responsibilities—not just a limited focus of caring responsibilities as it is currently defined in the Fair Work Act but caring responsibilities more broadly. Increasingly now it is not just the children that one has to look after but also the grandchildren and the parents or even the grandparents. What this also shows is that flexibility that we have seen in our workplace laws has been, by and large, over the last couple of decades a one-way street. Employers have benefited enormously from being able to tailor the hours that people work to the needs of their business but that flexibility has not been met by flexibility from below.

Flexibility needs to become a two-way street. People need to have more control over the hours they work, the location they work in and the arrangement of those working hours. The key to that is to do what this bill proposes and give employees across the board, who have served an appropriate length of time with their employer, an enforceable right to request arrangements that will deliver a better work-life balance. Of course, this must be balanced against legitimate operational needs of employers and that is exactly what this bill will do. It will provide a test that would be easier for carers to meet the bar of but would still nonetheless allow any disputes to be resolved in Fair Work Australia by an independent umpire. This proposal is actually quite a modest proposal by international standards and brings us into line with many other countries. The United Kingdom, the Netherlands and Germany have been doing this for a number of years and their experience is illustrative.

I have no doubt that those who speak against this bill will say it is another layer of regulation for employers and will involve Fair Work overseeing every decision they make. That has not been the international experience. The international experience is that once the laws and the framework change then most employers and employees work these issues out at the workplace themselves. In the Netherlands and Germany, for example, fewer than 30 requests in each of those countries resulted in court action. We are talking about Germany, with a population four times as big as ours. One could quite reasonably expect that if this bill passes we would only end up with a handful of matters going to Fair Work Australia, and that is because most employers and employees will work these matters out themselves.

At the moment, people do not have an enforceable right. At the moment, under Labor's Fair Work Act, you can request a change to your working hours but if the employer says 'no' illegitimately then there is nowhere for you to go. There is no point in having an unenforceable right. That was a point that the ACTU very strongly endorsed during the course of the House Standing Committee on Education and Employment inquiry into this bill. Ultimately, I am pleased to report, the majority of the committee stated in the advisory report that they support the principle embodied in the bill that the right to request flexible working arrangements should be extended to classes of employees other than carers, particularly those affected by domestic and family violence. The committee urged the House to consider this bill once the Fair Work Act review was handed down—that review has been handed down and it made no adverse comments about these proposals—and also after the government's response was released. We are still awaiting the government's response.

It is my hope that, when the government respond, they take into account some of the suggested amendments from the committee and we put into place a reform that will give people greater control over their working lives.

Kirsten Livermore (Capricornia, Australian Labor Party) Share this | Link to this | Hansard source

Is the motion seconded?

Andrew Wilkie (Denison, Independent) Share this | Link to this | Hansard source

I second the motion and reserve my right to speak.

Kirsten Livermore (Capricornia, Australian Labor Party) Share this | Link to this | Hansard source

Thank you. The question is that the bill be now read a second time.

Steve Georganas (Hindmarsh, Australian Labor Party) Share this | Link to this | Hansard source

I am very pleased to speak on the Fair Work Amendment (Better Work/Life Balance) Bill 2012 today, because it discusses an issue that we do not talk enough about here in Australia—and that is the issue of work, life and balancing all of that together. This bill is about whether we are becoming a nation that works to live or just lives to work. When you look at those two phrases, they make a very big difference in our lives.

We work more hours on average per week than just about anywhere else in the world here in Australia—and that is a fact. Yet, remarkably, we have people like Gina Rinehart the other day telling us that we need to work even harder. I do not agree with Gina, and most people on this side of the House do not agree with her—and I would say that most people out in the community do not agree with her either. When I am out in my electorate, people do not tell me that they want to work longer hours and harder so that they can become rich. Certainly, people want to work to be able to pay their bills, feed their families, live a decent lifestyle and feel secure. What they want is more quality time with their families. When I am out talking to mums and dads what they say to me is that they want more quality time with their families and more say in their hours and how they work.

We on this side of the House know that this is a very big issue in millions of Australian households. That is why, as soon as we got into government, we introduced the first laws in Australian history that gave employees the right to request flexible working hours. We scrapped Howard's draconian Work Choices, which the opposition are still pretty desperate to bring back, and it was a huge shift. To channel Fatboy Slim, we've come a long way, together through the hard times and the good. And things are better now. Until we introduced these new laws, employees had no legislated right to request flexible working hours, which was a huge problem for parents in particular. If you needed to leave work early to pick up the kids, for example, or drop them off at school, or if you had to stay home to take care of a sick child for the day, there could be a very uncomfortable conversation with your boss. But we on this side of the House respect the needs of families and get that life is about more than just how much money you make, how many hours you work and how many dollars you add to the economy. It is about our quality of life, and that is the No. 1 most important thing in this debate. It is about taking care of each other and about not missing those important moments and family occasions because you have to be at your desk at work, or in the factory at work, or in the many other workplaces.

So we brought in these new laws which said that, if you are a parent who needs to change your working hours to take care of your kids or work from home, you have the right to ask your employer for that without fear. And if the employer does not agree, they have to give a valid reason—they cannot just say no without justification. That was a huge improvement from the previous situation. So I am very proud to have been part of an Australian Labor government that did that. It means that these families, from all over my electorate—and from all over Australia—are better able to enjoy their lives instead of just enduring the daily grind without any real breaks.

But today we are here because the member for Melbourne—and I applaud him—has proposed some additions to our laws, unlike the opposition, which simply say no to every new idea, and who want to take us backwards to those Work Choices days, not forwards. We make our policy decisions based on merit and what is best for the communities, the workers and the families we represent, not on how well they destroy workers' rights. So I am delighted to consider the proposals the member for Melbourne has put forward, because as a Labor government we know there is always more to do in industrial relations and we must continue to fight hard for the rights of Australian workers so they can have a better life.

Now to the provisions of the bill. First of all, this bill proposes to expand the right to request flexible working arrangements to all employees, including long-time casuals. Second, employers who say no to workers requesting flexible working arrangements will have to give a really good reason and demonstrate that it would severely impact their business. And, third, it gives Fair Work Australia more power to deal with disputes and flexible work arrangements and requests. These all seem like very sensible proposals. Personally, I prefer long-time casuals to be offered permanent positions, and I am working with many of our unions to see how we can encourage this to happen.

I am pleased to see the focus on carers, who are some of the hardest working people I know, who are doing the double shift of working all day and then coming home to take care of a family member who may require a lot of physical assistance. If nothing else, this bill shines a spotlight on one of the most common, everyday worries of how we can all ensure we are having a fulfilling life— (Time expired)

Rowan Ramsey (Grey, Liberal Party) Share this | Link to this | Hansard source

From the outset let me say that I think all people in this place would be in favour of flexible working arrangements that allow people to care for loved ones and for people they have responsibility for. But some of us maintain that such arrangements should be made in a mutually beneficial way to both the employer and the employee. Broadly, when we considered this matter at committee level, we of the opposition—that is me, the member for McPherson and the member for Aston—agreed with the government members in so much as we asked for the deferral of this bill until after the report on the Fair Work review and then the government's response. You always run the risk that, if you alter too many dials on the stove at once, you will end up with your cake completely collapsed and you will not really know why. We do concur with the government, but we were keen to make some comments that we do not necessarily agree with the thrust of the bill put forward by the member for Melbourne.

This continues the path in recent years of moving more and more onus onto the employers with more and more compliance and giving them less and less rights in their own workplace. In particular, part of the bill states that an employer should have to show that their denial of more flexible working arrangements provided serious countervailing business concerns. The question, firstly, arises: what are 'serious countervailing business concerns'? Secondly, just how tough a line is this to reach? In fact, we believe that this disempowers employers and places more and more priority on employees. The best workplaces are where you have mutual agreement. The thrust of the bill is: do we have more stick and less carrot rather than the other way around? We were keen to make that point.

As I tour around my electorate and speak to small and medium business, which I do on a regular basis, they are change fatigued and they are really struggling at the moment. We read about it daily within the press. There are the modern awards which business has to adjust to, as well as the Fair Work Act, the nationalisation bills on the OH&S, the paid parental scheme, the impacts of the high dollar and the low consumer confidence. Retailers are also dealing with a flood of online shopping. I have rarely seen the business community so despondent as they are at the moment. I pick up the national figures and they tell me and the government tells me that the economy is travelling fine, yet business after business is saying that we have never had it so tough and we are putting people off. Somewhere along the line those two arguments will meet and there will be some kind of reckoning where there will be a readjustment of figures. It is impossible to believe, when I talk to my business community, that things are as well and as rosy as the Treasurer would tell us.

This bill by the member for Melbourne, I am sure, is brought forward in good faith but I think it demonstrates once again how the Greens have little understanding of what makes business tick and who supplies the jobs in the real Australia. In fact, if we overload the business community, if we tell them that they have no rights within the workplace then, in fact, we discourage the next round of entrepreneurs, the next round of business people and the next round of people who actually supply the jobs for Australians. As I said, we concur with the government's response in that the bill should be deferred, but we believe that this bill requires serious consideration and some adjustments before it should be passed.

Jamie Briggs (Mayo, Liberal Party, Chairman of the Scrutiny of Government Waste Committee) Share this | Link to this | Hansard source

I rise to support the member for Grey for the position he just articulated very strongly on the Fair Work Amendment (Better Work/Life Balance) Bill 2012. The coalition does not support the approach offered by the member for Melbourne in his private member's bill.

Like the member for Grey, I agree that most members of this House would like to see Australian workplaces more flexible so that work and family arrangements can be better accommodated in the interests of both the employers and employees of this country. Work and family time is difficult to manage at the best of times and, with increased travel times to and from work as people move further into suburbia than before because of the high cost of housing and so forth, it is difficult in our modern world for many families to manage those important times for being together.

We disagree with a heavy, top-down approach from government, which is the Labor and Greens way. We see in this proposal and in the words offered by the member for Hindmarsh, as the Labor spokesperson in the debate on this bill, that the usual approach of Labor and the Greens is that there needs to be government intervention to get an outcome that is fair—so-called—for workers in this country. We argue that that is the wrong approach. The best people to understand the needs of a workplace are those involved in that workplace. With an appropriate safety net there, people should be left to their own means. They should be trusted to look after their own relationships and requirements better than any government can do.

At the heart of this proposal, there are three presumptions that need to be debunked. The first is that the government can regulate relationships in a workplace better than the people involved, that somehow from this place the government, through a tribunal or the old industrial relations club, can work out relationships in a small business operating near Mount Barker in my electorate better than the people can themselves. That is at the heart of what the member for Melbourne is trying to do here by having an additional bureaucracy and a heavy-handed approach by the government to force employers to take on arrangements that in some circumstances would make their businesses unviable. That is the truth of this. Unless it can suit both the employer and the employee, you have an umpire's ruling that makes it more difficult for an employer to manage their business.

The second wrong presumption at the heart of this is that somehow employers are always trying to find a way to take advantage of their workers, that they are not looking after the best interests of their workers and that only the government can somehow protect workers from all these bad employers out there, who, by the way, take the employees on and in many cases use their own capital. Small businesses in the member for Moreton's seat would, I am sure, like to know what he thinks about the fact that they have put their money and their houses up as protection for their business and the effort they put in to build their businesses. The member for Moreton would agree with President Obama that they did not build their businesses but the government did.

The third presumption is that business owners, employers, do not also have families. They also need time for their families. They put their heart and soul into it—

Graham Perrett (Moreton, Australian Labor Party) Share this | Link to this | Hansard source

Gina has children, doesn't she?

Jamie Briggs (Mayo, Liberal Party, Chairman of the Scrutiny of Government Waste Committee) Share this | Link to this | Hansard source

You can talk about Gina Rinehart, Member for Moreton, and all the hatred that pours out of the Labor Party for people who put their lives on the line to try to build a better and more prosperous Australia. They employ thousands of Australians. The bile can come out of the Labor and Greens members all that they like, but it does not take away from the fact that we should be finding ways to support them and not finding ways to make it harder.

This amendment highlights the vast difference between those on the Left, like the member for Moreton and the member for Melbourne, and those of us on this side, who believe in Australians and trust them to look after their own best interests and look for the flexibility they require.

If you give them the freedom to choose, they will work it out with their employer. They are quite capable, they are well educated, they are well trained, they are hard workers and they want a better life. This place should step out of those arrangements. It should be left to the employer and the employee to work out the best way to manage their work and family arrangements. That is why we do not support this amendment bill.

Kelvin Thomson (Wills, Australian Labor Party) Share this | Link to this | Hansard source

The member for Mayo said he wanted to challenge two presumptions behind this debate: firstly, that the government regulates employment relationships better than those involved in the actual workplace itself. I think the member for Mayo fails to take into account, as so many on that side do, inequality of bargaining power and the fact that, if these things are left solely to the workplace, solely to the marketplace, what happens is that workers do get exploited and do not get a fair day's pay for a fair day's work. The second presumption he wanted to rebut was that employers are always trying to take advantage of workers. It is true that employers are not always trying to take advantage of workers, but, unfortunately, we do see examples where this occurs.

There was reference made in this debate to Gina Rinehart, whose personal wealth has grown to $18 billion under the oppressive yoke of socialism, and who recently claimed that Australia is not investment friendly or welcoming enough, citing the example of people working for $2 a day in West Africa. Frankly, it is examples like that which cause this side of the House to believe that there is a role for government in promoting fairness in the workplace. This is something we have done as a party based on the trade union movement. It has been core business for us. Since 2007 we have provided a fair minimum safety net comprising 10 National Employment Standards for employees including penalty rates and overtime, a modern award system, and we brought in a no-disadvantage test to protect workers' rights. We have restored fairness in low-paid industries, including safety rates in trucking, including basic pay and training conditions in cleaning contracts, and including extending the operations of most provisions of the Fair Work Act to contract outworkers in the textile, clothing and footwear industry. We have provided decent working conditions for seafarers by setting minimum requirements for seafarers to work on a ship, and we have provided a compensation system that provides a presumption that, if a firefighter develops a certain form of cancer, it is work related for the purpose of determining their workers compensation claim. We have restored the protections against unfair sackings, and we have broadened the definition of pay equity to allow real progress in closing the gender pay gap. This has been core business for us and will continue to be core business for us.

I want to point out to the House that we are discussing with the Fair Work Amendment (Better Work/Life Balance) Bill 2012 the question of carers. The fact is that the government can point to a great deal in responding to the financial, social and emotional needs of carers. The government's National Carer Strategy, developed through the Minister for Families, Community Services and Indigenous Affairs and the Minister for Health, will support carers in their important role. We enacted the Carer Recognition Act 2010 and released a statement for Australia's carers. We provide assistance to eligible carers through the carer payment, the carer allowance and the $485 million annual carer supplement, which gives carers $600 for each eligible person in their care. We provide automatic eligibility for carer allowance to families and carers of children with type 1 diabetes. We have provided over $10 million until 2013 to continue support for 262 MyTime peer support groups for parents and carers of children with a disability or a chronic medical condition. We provided nearly $10 million in 2011-12 for immediate and short-term respite support of carers of young people with a severe or profound disability, almost $24 million until 2013 to assist young carers who need support to complete their secondary education and money for singles and for couples combined who receive the carer payment as part of our commitment to contribute more than half the revenue from the price of carbon into helping households to meet increased living costs.

We are also laying the foundations for a national disability insurance scheme to better support people with disability, their families and carers. We are proud of our record in relation to carers and we will continue to examine these issues as part of the government's consultation process regarding the Fair Work Act. (Time expired)

Kelly O'Dwyer (Higgins, Liberal Party) Share this | Link to this | Hansard source

We have just heard from the member opposite a litany of examples of how this government is going about re-regulating the labour market. He says he is proud of it. Unfortunately, that is a record of which he should not be proud.

Today we are here to talk about a Greens bill, the Fair Work Amendment (Better Work/Life Balance) Bill, which has been brought forward under the guise that we are discussing flexibility in the workplace. What we hear from those opposite is effectively a bidding war between the Greens and the Labor Party, who both want to impress upon those in the union movement—who donate very heavily to their campaigns—that they will be at the forefront, at the vanguard, of re-regulating the labour market. But of course we know that this is not the right thing to do; it is not the right thing to do in this place and it is certainly not the right thing to do for the Australian people.

It is very important that we do have flexibility in our workplace; there is no question about that. The eloquent speeches delivered by my colleagues the federal member for Mayo and the federal member for Grey outlined how mutually beneficial it can be when workers and employers sit down together and agree upon arrangements that can ensure something that works both for the employer and for the employee.

What we are talking about here today is far beyond that; it is about re-regulating and it is about enshrining this into legislation rather than leaving it for the employer and the employee to discuss amongst themselves. Why do those opposite need to do that, particularly given that this government has brought into effect individual flexibility agreements? They say that these agreements work for flexibility. Already we have heard from so many people that they do not work in practice, because they only apply for 28 days and they can be terminated, either at the behest of the employer or at the behest of the employee, giving no security and no certainty for either the employer or the employee in these arrangements. So, if the government is really serious about this, surely this should be a focus for the government's attention going forward?

When we talk about flexibility, when we talk about what this means in practice, surely the government needs to look at itself and the fact that it has been making it even harder for working women to get back to work through increasing the cost of child care in this country? I think that is quite frankly a disgrace. Before the last election the government promised that it was going to deliver 260 new childcare centres. Of course, it delivered only 38, then it decided to scrap the scheme. It decided that it was going to reregulate the childcare industry by bringing forward new regulations which it said would help deliver better care for our nation's children. Sure, we all believe that delivering the highest possible care for our nation's children should be paramount. But the government decided to put in place a number of regulations based on nothing much in particular to increase the ratio from one to five to one to four, and it said that this would deliver better outcomes for our children. Yet there is no evidence to say this is the case. The childcare minister said it would only increase the cost of child care by something like 57c a week. Modelling done by the Childcare Alliance has already blown that out of the water and said that in fact it is going to increase the cost of child care by between $30 and $50 a week. The Productivity Commission also backed this up.

So for this government to come into this chamber today and talk about flexibility—to simply talk the talk but not walk the walk—is another demonstration of how they have failed: how they have failed the nation's women and how they have failed all of us.

If the government is serious about doing something about flexibility, it needs to look at the tax and transfer system. At the risk of blowing my own trumpet, here, I would highly recommend a piece that I wrote in the Australian Financial Review that goes to this very point.

Finally, I want to place on the record, in my remaining 20 seconds, that if this government is interested in fairness, flexibility and security, then why did it not, during the Grocon dispute, condemn the illegal action that took place there? Instead it went into hiding and said nothing, which of course means that the government is not interested in fairness, flexibility or the security of our nation's workers. (Time expired)

Andrew Leigh (Fraser, Australian Labor Party) Share this | Link to this | Hansard source

Order! I thank the member for Higgins for her contribution. The time allotted for the debate has expired. The debate is adjourned and the resumption of the debate will be made an order of the day for the next sitting.