Fiona Phillips (Gilmore, Australian Labor Party) Share this | Link to this | Hansard source

My question is to Minister for Workplace Relations. How will the Albanese Labor government's secure jobs, better pay bill help close the gender pay gap? And how has this policy been received?

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

I thank the member for Gilmore and also acknowledge and thank her for her commitment in taking action to close the gender pay gap. The gender pay gap in Australia sits at an unacceptable 4.1 per cent. It won't fix itself. We need to take action in legislation and action in the parliament to be able to close the gender pay gap, and you will find throughout the secure jobs, better pay bill specific measures designed to close the gender pay gap—every one of which those opposite are opposing.

The first thing we're doing is inserting gender equity as an objective of the act so that it's there in the consideration of every decision of the commission. We are then also fully implementing recommendation 28 of the Respect@Work report, something which was put to the parliament in the previous term and which those opposite voted against implementing. This will allow disputes over sexual harassment to be dealt with at the Fair Work Commission, a cheaper jurisdiction, a more practical jurisdiction. And often where you have workplace disputes they involve a number of issues—sexual harassment is one of them—and we've had a situation where people have had to deal with different aspects of the same problem in different jurisdictions. You will now be able to have that simplicity because of the measures within the bill.

Importantly, as well, a prohibition on pay secrecy clauses—how many times has it been the case that these clauses have been used, quite deliberately, so at the same workplace women are paid less than men but no-one can find out? People have a right. If they have a clause where they want to keep their pay secret, they have a right. They don't have an obligation to disclose their own pay, but an employer should never say to a worker, 'You have no right to tell someone how much you're paid.' It's been part of the elaborate story of making sure, at various workplaces—particularly, I have to say, in the finance industry—where women have been paid less than men.

Also, to get wages moving, we need to increase access to bargaining. You look at the moment—we're down to 14 per cent of the workforce that are on agreements that are in date, agreements that get you above the award. The majority of those agreements are in occupations that are viewed as traditionally male dominated. A minority are in jobs that are traditionally female dominated. The current bargaining system won't deliver pay equity, and the rules there need to be changed.

In terms of complexity, we are using three streams which already exist for multi-employer bargaining but getting rid of the complexity so that they can be available and we can move to close the gender pay gap.