Susan Lamb (Longman, Australian Labor Party) Share this | Link to this | Hansard source

I move:

That this House:

(1) notes that:

(a) there are over 90,000 people employed in the accommodation sector of the hospitality industry and many of these are women;

(b) full time workers will have their take home pay cut because of the Fair Work Commission's (FWC's) decision to cut Sunday and public holiday penalty rates for the hospitality award;

(c) the base wage for a Level 1 guest service worker is less than $700 a week;

(d) the cut to Sunday penalty rates for these workers is $4.55 an hour, which is more than a fortnight's pay per year; and

(e) those affected are among our most industrially powerless workers in the economy and they have been made poorer;

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

(3) calls on:

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

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

I rise today to move that this House condemns the savage cuts to the take-home pay of hardworking Australians that this government is so eager to pass. Time and time again we are hearing this government saying businesses will now be able to employ more people or that they will stay open longer. I know that the Turnbull government lives by the principle of 'If you repeat something often enough, then people will start believing it.' But no-one is falling for this. If you have a look at the accommodation sector of the hospitality industry as an example, base wage is less than $700 a week, and the cut is $4.55 an hour. This cut will result in the loss of over a fortnight's worth of take-home pay each year for these workers. I ask those opposite: for what? How are you going to attempt to spin this? Why would a hotel employ more people than they need to? Aren't they already employing the amount of people that they need? This does not make sense.

It is not only to the workers that this does not make sense. Just recently, the RSL and Services Clubs Association Queensland released a letter stating that their loyal employees do not deserve to have their pay reduced. Is there an organisation in this country more Australian than the RSL? There is one in every town and state. They are made up of service men and women who fought for the rights of Australians, and here they are now still having to fight for the rights of Australians.

Employers are against these cuts. Employees are against these cuts. If economists were to speak out against these cuts too, the government would have to concede that these cuts are a horrible idea. Do you know what? That is just what economists have done. Just yesterday The Sydney Morning Herald published comments from Richard Denniss, the chief economist from the Australia Institute think tank, whose conservative estimates indicate that cuts to penalty rates would blow a $650 million hole in the budget, through loss of personal income tax revenue and higher welfare costs. It says a lot about the government that they are so determined to attack workers and prey on the vulnerable that they are willing to take down our nation's economy with them. It is unbelievable.

My electorate of Longman is in the beautiful Moreton Bay region. It is one of the fastest-growing regions right across Australia. It is also a region that is home to workers in the electorates of Dickson and Petrie. These electorates are home to young families, new homebuyers, people who are working and living in the area—people who rely upon penalty rates, people who do not deserve a pay cut. I call on the member for Dickson—and I am glad the member for Petrie is here, because I call on him too—to stand with me and stand up for these workers and their families, because they need you. Do not turn your back when the region needs you. Do not turn your back on the workers of this region. They need us.

I challenge the member for Petrie—and I challenge the member for Brisbane as well, while he is here—when you next go back to a hotel, to a retail store, to a pharmacy, talk to the staff there. Talk to the people that you will be hurting if you pursue these changes. Try and look them in the eye when you do it and tell them how this is going to be good for them. Tell them how a cut is going to be good for them and their families, how that is going to help them raise their families, pay their mortgages and put food on the table. Tell them about that. Tell them how taking a cut to their take-home pay is going to be good for them.

Last week Labor introduced a private member's bill into this House which would not only stop the effect of this penalty rate decision but would further ensure that there would be no future decisions by this commission in order to prevent penalty rate cuts in other awards such as the clubs awards or health and beauty. The government have the capacity to stop these cuts and they can do it today. So the question is: why won't they? Why won't they stop these cuts to hardworking Australians in my electorate of Longman and in the electorates of Dickson and Petrie in the Moreton Bay Region? Why won't they stop them? (Time expired)

Sharon Bird (Cunningham, Australian Labor Party, Shadow Minister for Vocational Education) Share this | Link to this | Hansard source

Is the motion seconded?

Matt Keogh (Burt, Australian Labor Party) Share this | Link to this | Hansard source

I second the motion and reserve my right to speak.

Luke Howarth (Petrie, Liberal Party) Share this | Link to this | Hansard source

I reject the motion put forward by the member for Longman, and the numerous assertions she makes in its defence. It is more of the same—grandstanding, scaremongering, and reckless, baseless blocking of practical measures designed to advance the interests of Australians. The member for Longman says no to company tax cuts and relief for employers so that they may create jobs. She says no to equalising penalty rates so that employers may offer additional hours and employ more people.

The Fair Work Commissioner has echoed the Productivity Commission in advocating for the modernising of four of 122 awards as a solution to increased pressure on employers. Essentially, the commissioner has determined that the disutility of working on a Sunday is the same as that of working on a Saturday, and finds both should be compensated. I agree that people should be compensated for working on Sundays. And it is true, isn't it, that working on Saturday or Sunday—working on the weekend—is unlikely to be favoured by the majority without some form of sweetener. As the Tourism Accommodation Australia chair said:

For us the objective was to modernise the award, not to abolish penalty rates, but to make it relevant to the 21st century as a means of employing more Australians.

Just for the record, who is the chair of Tourism Accommodation Australia? Old Labor stalwart, the former head of the ACTU, Martin Ferguson. And he is right; when I talk about compensation for work on the weekend, I am referring to loading under the award. Of course, the majority of workers in the hospitality and retail sectors do not receive penalty rates by method of settling pay, and most are not paid under an award but are instead subject to enterprise agreements. So when the member for Longman hopped into Coles when she was campaigning, to thank staff for working over Easter—and she is here with her little Easter egg, card and all the rest of it—she was much the over-eager bunny. Did she tell those workers who she stopped in to thank that the reason they were not getting a full holiday-pay loading was that the union had ripped the guts out of the award? Did she tell them that? I do not think so. I have to laugh at Will, who says in a Facebook comment:

Did the girl serving you mention that, thanks to the unions, Woolworths and Coles get away with paying their workers time and a half on Sundays with no penalty rates on a Saturday as is?

I bet she did not mention that. But it is not their bosses, not the Fair Work Commission, not the government; it is the unions who seem to take the same position on penalty rates as the Labor Party takes on company tax cuts—they support them, but only if they are the ones doing the cutting. The unions, not workers, have a good friend in the member for Longman, who cannot see the wood for the trees.

Mel Tait, the general manager of the Murrumba Downs tavern located in neighbouring Dickson, gave evidence to the Fair Work Commission. The tavern employs 32 people and, according to Mel, if penalty rates were equalised she could provide longer shifts for existing permanent employees and also have more casual and permanent employees. A stone's throw from Longman, Mel could create jobs for Ms Lamb's own constituents with a little support and relief from those company tax cuts that Labor supports—as long as they are not in opposition.

As highlighted in the report of the Fair Work Commission, employers are struggling to stay afloat. Penalty rate equalisation may put a chink in the budget of a minority of workers, but if their employers cannot continue to trade then all talk of pay rates is academic anyway. The member for Longman should know this—but she is too busy drumming up business in my electorate of Petrie, hauling Cat and Erin—presumably the 'industrial powerless' she referred to earlier—in front of a camera to discuss the impact of penalty rate cuts. I do not know Cat and Erin's particulars, but the interview was conducted outside Westfield North Lakes. Those ladies work for a large retailer, but most in that situation are on EBAs—the same EBAs that the union of the members opposite has cut the guts out of. Did the member for Longman tell Cat and Erin that on public holidays they will still receive double time and a half if casual, and double time and a quarter if full-time or permanent part-time? I am doubtful, and the record shows that Labor and the member for Longman do not like to let the facts get in the way of a good story—not in the community, where they are whipping up fear; not in the parliament, where they rely on convenient stats; not on the member for Longman's Facebook page—where, I am told, I am labelled a crim and—even more pathetically from the member for Longman—where my family is brought into her comments without any moderating from her. This is political pointscoring, forsaking the truth and her own credibility in the process—shame on you. (Time expired)

Matt Keogh (Burt, Australian Labor Party) Share this | Link to this | Hansard source

This government's decision to not defend and protect venerable Australians and take-home pay and to support a reduction in Sunday penalty rates is a travesty. It further illustrates how this government is out of touch and has the wrong priorities for Australia. Meanwhile, this week, they will proceed with giving a $50 billion tax cut to big business, including $7 billion just for the big banks. Penalty rates are fundamental to the Australian way of life. They protect our weekends and provide a way for low-paid workers to get a bit more in their wallets each week, making it easier, although not easy, to make ends meet. Everyone knows one of the biggest battles fought by the union movement was for the five-day week and the eight-hour day. This government talks about flexibilities, but it was unions that delivered it while protecting workers. This was the foundation and basis of penalty rates in Australia; this should never be forgotten. This is why the Labor Party exist—to ensure the legislated protection of Australian workers. It is our raison d'etre.

A key point often overlooked is that the concept and existence of penalty rates underpin the take-home pay of salaried workers. Many Australians earn an annualised salary, trading off overtime and penalty rates to provide greater flexibility to employers but also greater autonomy to employees. Both of these are good things. Indeed, worker autonomy is said to greatly increase worker mental health. However, the quid pro quo here is that these salaries compensate—they compensate for reasonable overtime; they compensate for weekend work—and, on a waged basis, a worker would receive penalty rates.

Many have complained that they work on weekends and do not receive penalty rates, and many of those complaints have been coming from the media. But they forget their salaries compensate for this. No-one claims that this is perfect, but if penalty rates are taken away their salaries will decline in real terms. The same thing goes for those employed in fast food and retail under EBAs. Those agreements include uplifts in base rates so that those working weekends are better off overall. Their produced penalty rates have been calculated against a higher base rate. Together with guaranteed minimum shifts and a raft of conditions agreed to by workers and employers, these staff are better off than under the award. But all of this will be undone by the Fair Work Commission's decision because you cannot negotiate a higher base rate when penalty rates under the award are lower.

Bill Clinton's campaign strategists famously hit the proverbial nail on the head when he said, 'It's the economy, stupid.' Well, stupid this government certainly must be when it comes to economic management. Month after month, the RBA and respected economists have commented on the need to increase consumption here in Australia to see wages, which are stagnant or falling in real terms, increase. Economic growth in this country is perilous as it stands and the government has no plan to fix it. Its one-point plan for jobs and growth will not actually create any growth and now it wants to cut wages for Australia's lowest earners. Everyone knows that those that earn the least spend the highest proportion of their income in the economy. This means, according to analysis in 2009, that for every $100 that an Australian worker loses in penalty rates, they spend $80 to $100 less in the economy. The very shops that are crying for penalty-rate reductions are the ones that will have less money spent in them as a result. Overall, this means a not insignificant amount of money is ripped out of the economy because the savings by business will not go back into the economy necessarily. Not only will they not translate into jobs, or at least anywhere near the same number of value of jobs, but any savings will end up in investments or off-shored profits. They do not help the Australian economy.

Let us look at the economic vandalism that the Turnbull government is supporting: less take-home pay for Australia's lowest-paid workers, less income tax to pay for essential government services, more people on welfare or part-Centrelink payments, less spending in the economy resulting is less GST revenue going back to the states, less payroll tax for the states and less superannuation build-up for low-income workers, meaning increased reliance on pensions in the future. Finally, we think of the worker on the street—the guy working in a cafe on the weekend to pay his rent or the woman working weekends in a small grocery store so she can make ends meet for her family or vice versa or anyone else of many combinations of those that rely on penalty rates. How heartless is this government? It tries to hide behind claims of an independent umpire, while, at the same time, it wants to retrospectively overturn a decision of the full Federal Court on native title law. Last year, it not only overturned a decision of the Road Safety Remuneration Tribunal; it abolished the whole tribunal as well. Get with the program, government members—stand up for low-paid workers and support Labor's bill to protect penalty rates.

Andrew Wallace (Fisher, Liberal Party) Share this | Link to this | Hansard source

In my electorate of Fisher, I have formed a local business advisory council—a group of business leaders in my community who meet to tell me about the issues that are important to them. At the most recent meeting of the council, the very first issue that was raised was the important, positive impact that the Fair Work Commission's decision will have on employment in our region. As the member for Longman should know, tourism and services are among the biggest employers on the Sunshine Coast. With world-class beaches, the magnificent, beautiful hinterland and the very best of coastal food and drink, our community is becoming world renowned as a leisure destination of choice. In 2015 alone, the Sunshine Coast received 5.8 million visitors; those visitors stayed more than eight million nights and spent nearly $1.7 billion.

Tourism is the lifeblood of our economy. Tourists today have rightfully high expectations for the services they receive. In particular, they expect to be able to enjoy the sights and experiences on offer seven days a week, all year round. While they are out and about enjoying our beaches, our bush and our cultural sites, they expect to be able to stop in at any one of our fantastic coffee shops and restaurants.

In Fisher, we live in a truly seven-day economy, but we live with a five-day regulatory framework. Businesses in Fisher must open on Sundays, but consumer expectations dictate that they cannot charge a Sunday premium. If you run one of the very many independent family-owned food outlets in our community, you must pay your staff almost $30 an hour. That is a lot of coffees and sandwiches. The reality is that many businesses are forced to not open, even when they desperately want to. New jobs, new and longer shifts are being lost every Sunday for the people in my electorate, because local businesses simply cannot afford to pay them.

There is a sad irony to this motion being proposed by the member for Longman—let's leave aside the fact that the Fair Work Commission inquiry was set up by the Leader of the Opposition and that its terms of reference and its members were chosen by him; in fact, they were hand-picked—and, that is, the low-paid workers that Labor claim to represent in this motion, and, in particular, the women highlighted by the member for Longman, are among those most affected by the underemployment caused in part by these stratospheric penalty rates. Let's also not forget that many members opposite, including the Leader of the Opposition, negotiated enterprise bargaining agreements that reduced Sunday penalty rates far lower than the Fair Work Commission's decision was.

If the motion is correct in saying that 'those affected are among our most industrially powerless', it is because they are represented by unions which give their workers' rights away at the first sign of a benefit for themselves. These pay agreements not only cut the pay of the workers they claim to represent but reduce further the number of small businesses that can open and the jobs that are available. Because of these pay deals, a local bed and breakfast in my electorate must pay $10 an hour more than a multinational five-star hotel. The local takeaway must pay $8 more than McDonald's. It is no wonder that they cannot afford to open and offer more jobs to local people when the deck has been stacked against them by dodgy union deals made with the blessing of this dodgy Labor Party.

There are more than 700,000 unemployed people in Australia, and many thousands more do not get as many hours as they want. They are the workers we should be thinking of. They are not receiving double time on a Sunday, as many on penalty rates are. They are receiving nothing—nada, zero, zip—because the companies cannot afford to open their doors. It is sad that those opposite just cannot understand this reality. When will you wake up to yourselves? It was your union mates with your unrealistic demands that destroyed car manufacturing in this country, and now you want to destroy the retail sector, you want to destroy fast food and you want to destroy hospitality and pharmacies in my electorate.

Susan Templeman (Macquarie, Australian Labor Party) Share this | Link to this | Hansard source

I came to this place with the belief that there are good people on both sides of this House. That belief was borne out of my experiences in the 1980s as a journalist in the press gallery, where I watched Liberal people like Senators Fred Chaney and Chris Puplick, and the then member for Mackellar, Jim Carlton, support the Hawke government on improving the safety net for the most vulnerable, and in lifting the standard of living for workers. So it is disappointing to see that those opposite are now so relentless in their ideology that they do not seem to stop and think about the consequences of their failure to protect low-paid workers in our community, which is why I am pleased to support the motion by the member for Longman, who has no trouble seeing the impact of the Fair Work Commission's decision to cut Sunday and public holiday penalty rates for the hospitality award, among others.

I would not normally call myself a traditionalist. But, to me, Sundays and public holidays should be protected as a day of rest, or of being with family and friends. My family has always been full of small business people. I grew up with my parents the newsagents, my uncle the pharmacist, my other uncles the real estate agents, and in the next generation we have had a lot of shift workers—my husband is a journalist, and my cousins are junior doctors—and it was not long before some of those shift workers became self-employed in some way. And the third generation—my children and my cousins' children—picked up part-time jobs, which inevitably meant they worked late nights and weekends on top of everything else they did. I understand the need for employers to have access to workers on Sundays and public holidays, and I understand the need for workers to be able to access shifts that mean they may have Monday to Friday clear for other activities, including parenting. But I also understand that Sundays and public holidays are a really important lull or pause in a week where, in fact, family and friends might get a look-in, and where multiple generations of a family can be at the same table at the same time. And if you cannot be there, I think you deserve additional compensation for missing out on the stuff that connects us as humans.

So let's talk specifically about hospitality. The first person to contact me about the impact of the Fair Work Commission's cut was Linda. Linda works at a swish hotel in the upper Blue Mountains. She has not always worked in hospitality but has a retail background, among other things, and has now re-trained as a chef. She works unsociable hours, but the low hourly pay is boosted by the penalty rates on weekends and holidays. Well, no longer—Linda says she is not sure what she will cut. Will it be getting her car serviced? Will it be paying insurance on her house in a bushfire-prone zone? Will it be fixing a broken fridge? Who knows. But here is the mark of a loyal employee: she does not blame her employer for the cut, although she is disappointed that their view is that it will boost profit rather than allow them to employ more people. She recognises that this is the government's fault for failing to stand up for low-paid workers. Another person I have spoken to about this is Robert. He works full-time in retail, and he says that his employer has no intention of putting on extra staff. So this is the message workers are being given by some employers: if we get the chance to pay you less, we will take it.

Of course, it is not the same for all businesses in my electorate. Leah, who owns The Sweetest Thing lolly shop and gelato bar in Springwood, has a different view. With a seven-day-a-week business, Leah is really grateful to her staff for being willing to work on Sundays so she can be with her kids. Leah plans to keep paying the current Sunday and public holiday rates. This view is shared by the Glenbrook liquor store, and I note that in some states the RSL has already come out saying that their loyal workers do not deserve a pay cut. My experience with small business owners is that they want to do the right thing by their employees, even when governments do not.

Let's think about the impact of that $77 per week cut from each worker's Sunday pay packet. Over a year, it is more than $4,000 per worker. In Macquarie, there are around 10,000 workers in the food and accommodation sectors and in retail. They obviously do not all work every Sunday, and they will not all be affected from 1 July. If they are lucky enough to be in a unionised workforce, they will be protected. The data shows that in the retail sector, union-negotiated EBAs have delivered weekly wages $90 higher than the award rates. So they are the sorts of improvements that they already have, plus the protections from this sort of legislation. Over time, it is going to undermine the entire wages structure. From my calculations, it looks to be millions that will come out of the pockets of workers in Macquarie, and that is money we will not have to spend in cafes, restaurants, pharmacies or hairdressers. I worry about that economic contraction in my community.

Craig Kelly (Hughes, Liberal Party) Share this | Link to this | Hansard source

Talk about scaremongering! The member for Petrie drew my attention to an interesting photograph here of the member for Longman standing outside a Coles supermarket saying, 'Thank you for working over Easter.' I wonder if the member for Longman has read through the Fair Work Commission's full bench decision on Hart v Coles Supermarkets of 31 May 2016. In that decision made by Vice President Watson, Deputy President Kovacic and Commissioner Roe—three members all appointed by the Labor Party—what did they say about the Coles deal on penalty rates? They said:

For some employees, particularly those who work primarily at times which attract lower penalty rates …

And why do they attract lower penalty rates? Because the unions have taken away their penalty rates. It goes on:

… under the Agreement when compared to the Award …

So here is the Fair Work Commission saying that workers at Coles get less than what is under the award. It goes on:

… the loss in monetary terms is potentially significant. The potential loss is likely to be of significance for part-time and casual employees.

Where were the Labor Party and the member for Longman? Were they complaining about this deal between Coles and the shop assistants union? Where were they? The Fair Work Commission found that this agreement makes low-paid workers worse off, and we had complete and utter silence from the Labor Party.

What the unions have done is create all these dodgy deals with the largest employers in the country, and the reason they did it is simply so they can get the union fees. So you have these poor employees at Coles working below the award rate, and what do they get for that privilege? They get money taken out of their pay by the union—not even voluntarily. It is taken out automatically by their employer. Is it any wonder these dodgy deals have been done?

This has created a situation where you have a massive unfair competitive disadvantage being faced by small businesses. I will give you a few examples. A family-owned takeaway employing someone on a Sunday under the current award rate pays $29.16 an hour. But under the agreement negotiated by the unions the same worker doing the same work at KFC, where their money is taken out by the union, gets paid only $21.19 an hour for that privilege. That is just one example.

Another example is a family-owned newsagency. They are forced to pay $37.05 under the award, but Officeworks pays $30.05. A family-owned pizza takeaway pays $28.48 on a Sunday under the award, but under the great deal the unions have struck Pizza Hut workers get $20.35—about a 50 per cent difference in cost because of the great deal the unions struck! It goes on and on and on.

Here is another one: the Red Rooster agreement approved by Fair Work Australia. These are weekend rates:

All work performed on a Saturday or on a Sunday during ordinary hours shall be subject to the following penalty rates …

And there is a thing here for Queensland. Guess what it says for Queensland, Member for Longman. What penalty rates do they get? What do they get on a Sunday? Zero—a duck egg. How does someone become better off if they are getting zero penalty rates on a Sunday under a union agreement? How are they possibly better off? We have seen the Fair Work Commission say these are nothing other than dodgy deals where the actual employees are worse off.

Because of this massive competitive disadvantage small business face, many of them are simply not opening their doors. How can you compete in a highly competitive market if you are forced to pay your staff 50 per cent more than the companies that you are competing against? This is the disadvantage that small businesses face, and that is why they are not opening on a Sunday. The unions have taken that away.

Opposition Members:

Opposition members interjecting—

Craig Kelly (Hughes, Liberal Party) Share this | Link to this | Hansard source

They hate the idea that it is the unions that have ripped off workers and ripped off their penalty rates. That is what they cannot stand, because they know the truth. We know that if you give small business a level playing field they will employ more people, they will create more jobs, and ultimately that is what this is about. It is about the person who is currently unemployed and will be given more chance to get a job on a weekend, with small business having more chance to compete. (Time expired)

Sharon Bird (Cunningham, Australian Labor Party, Shadow Minister for Vocational Education) Share this | Link to this | Hansard source

The time allotted for this 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.