Michael Sukkar (Deakin, Liberal Party, Assistant Treasurer) Share this | Link to this | Hansard source

I move:

That the amendments be agreed to.

Anthony Albanese (Grayndler, Australian Labor Party, Leader of the Opposition) Share this | Link to this | Hansard source

As members would be aware, Labor argued from the very beginning of this crisis that wage subsidies were an essential component of a response to keep people in employment, that what we needed was to keep the relationship between workers and their employer intact. That's why we argued for it when parliament first met and considered what changes would be required. People would remember that JobSeeker was the first response from the government. What they did was send out this message to Australian businesses that, if people missed out and were laid off, they'd get increased income support. Australian businesses got that message. What we saw was Centrelink queues form. Only then, after hundreds of thousands of Australians lost their jobs needlessly, did the government change its position on wage subsidies.

The reason we have to discuss the bill before us today, the Coronavirus Economic Response Package (Jobkeeper Payments) Amendment Bill 2020, is that the government were reluctant; they were dragged kicking and screaming to it. They said, 'Oh, it'll only last until September.' We would snap back, and all support would be withdrawn. In spite of the fact that we had issues with some of JobKeeper and its implementation—the fact that some people were left behind and left out and the fact that other people were paid more than they were paid prior to the pandemic—we voted for it. We were responsible, unlike those opposite during the global financial crisis.

We didn't think it was necessary for the Treasurer to make a $60 billion bungle and we pointed that out when that happened: the biggest fiscal mistake in Australian history. We were also, of course, very concerned that we had now entered into the first recession in 30 years, and the gap between the government announcement and delivery is there for all to see right across the board. Today we asked the question about the $314 billion economic support that the government says they have, and the Treasurer outlined $85 billion in support—a big gap, $85 billion or $314 billion; it's a very different scenario.

Now, with the amendments that were rejected by the government, we have a circumstance of another anomaly that they know they are entrenching, which is that workers will be better off if they work for companies that are doing worse during this recession. Figure that out. If you're working for a company that is in decline, you will still be eligible to receive JobKeeper. But, if you work for a company that has lost JobKeeper, a company that has seen a 10 per cent decline in its revenue, then that business will be able to put people down from working five days a week to three days a week. A young hospitality worker who has two of their days cut could see their income fall from $753 to just over $450 a week. That is $150 less than they would receive if their employer had access to JobKeeper. This makes no sense.

We raise this in good faith. I raised this with the Prime Minister. I talked with the minister about it. The response we got was: 'Oh no, we're comfortable.' I bet they are. But what we see is ideology come through—not missing an opportunity to attack industrial relations and not missing an opportunity to attack superannuation and the previous commitments which have been given. It's a retreat back to the old right-wing conservative frame of mind. They're so uncomfortable with the idea of government support, which is so necessary during a recession, that they have an irrational opposition to what was a very sensible proposition put forward in good faith in the spirit of 'We're all in this together.' When workers are worse off and paid less, it will be completely on this government, which is consciously making the decision to pay people less than they would earn if they were on JobKeeper.

Mr Tony Burke (Watson, Australian Labor Party, Shadow Minister for the Arts) Share this | Link to this | Hansard source

The amendments before us are amendments that the government had to put into the Senate because they rushed the legislation and got something fundamentally wrong. They're amendments to deal with accountants. They were asking accountants to fulfil particular obligations, particular certificates to be issued, which in the view of accountants they were not qualified to do and would not be capable of doing without conducting a full audit. This would then put an incredible cost on businesses at the exact time that they're asking for assistance.

It's not surprising that that sort of mistake is being made. We were given the legislation at the beginning of last week. It was introduced to the House and went through in a day, but it didn't take long for us to notice the need for a different amendment. In fact, as soon as it was presented and we saw the 60 per cent what they call 'floor' on reduction of hours, we thought, 'Hang on, how will this work for someone on a low wage?' If you're on a high wage and you go down to 60 per cent of what you are on, you're still well above the JobKeeper rate. But we've decided during this crisis that there's a minimum wage that people should not fall below. That's what the JobKeeper and JobSeeker supplements are about. That's a decision that the parliament's made. And now the parliament has decided that there is a group that will be excluded from that minimum level of pay rate, and it's the lowest-paid workers in the country. Up until now, when they have been on JobKeeper—if you are on the minimum wage, $753.80 a week. It is not a lot to live on. But with JobKeeper there it meant your pay could only go down by $3.80 a week. Now it can go down by $300 a week.

So, up until now in the crisis, for full-timers who thought they had the security of a full-time job, the decision of the parliament in providing a safety net for them meant that they could only take a $3.80-a-week pay cut. Now, with the reduction in hours, they can lose $300 a week. That's a lousy thing to do and that's why we presumed it was an error, because the legislation was being rushed. Yet we find ourselves now, having approached it in good faith—I've got to say, we offered pretty conciliatory speeches last week when we were asking the government to fix this. We have different styles of speeches, but those was well and truly on the conciliatory end because we presumed enough goodwill that the government would not be deliberately creating a circumstance where the government decides these businesses are no longer worth supporting. But it transfers the obligation to the Australians who are least able to carry a further financial hit and says, 'Well, they can now take a financial hit to the tune of $300.' The government uses the argument: 'This is the way to keep them in a job.' It's the same argument that gets used in the United States against having minimum wages at all. You can always argue, 'Lower the safety net, and people will keep jobs,' but people will be impoverished too.

So we end up, after the debate that happened late last night in the Senate, with this circumstance. Two sets of problems had been raised with the government: a set of problems that was going to hurt low-wage Australians and another set of problems that was going to hurt accountants. The government decided one of those two causes had merit. We don't object to the stuff-up on accountants in the legislation being fixed, and we certainly are not going to stand in the way of the extension of JobKeeper; we called for a wage subsidy. But the reality of what the government has done right now—I don't think this moment can pass without it being squarely understood. Accountants said this legislation would cause significant problems for them, and the government fixed it. Working Australians said, 'This legislation will cut our take-home pay', and the government pushed it through. It teamed up with One Nation in the Senate and pushed it through.

Out of this, there will still be a whole lot of people who get wage subsidies—and that's good; that's why we fought for it. But make no mistake: out of this, there will now be some employees who thought they had a full-time job who will lose the capacity to have control of it only being by mutual agreement. A $300 pay cut is real as a result of the behaviour of this government.

Question agreed to.