Tracey Roberts (Pearce, Australian Labor Party) Share this | Link to this | Hansard source

There is no doubt that casual employment forms a sizeable proportion of the Australian labour market and suits the needs of some employees and employers. However, there are known issues, and we need to address the critical issue of job security and all that entails. As stated previously, almost 19 per cent of workers in Pearce in August 2022 were working in insecure casual work, and although casual employees are generally entitled to receive a loading to compensate for a lack of paid leave entitlements, casual employees generally earn less on average than permanent employees. Importantly, they do not have the same ability to receive benefits such as superannuation. In a modern, progressive, fair society, job security, including paid leave and superannuation benefits, are the minimum we should expect. These are key factors when seeking a mortgage or a loan and for long-term wellbeing. If future generations are looking to live on their superannuation earnings then we need to enable them to accumulate this by providing appropriate employment opportunities.

Part 9 of schedule 1 to the bill would change the defence to misrepresenting employment as an independent contracting arrangement known as 'sham contracting' in subsection 357(2) of the Fair Work Act from a test of recklessness to one of reasonableness. The new test would provide that an employer would not contravene the prohibition on sham contracting in subsection 357(1) of the Fair Work Act if the employee reasonably believes that contract was a contract for services. Part 14 of schedule 1 addresses wage theft, a persistent issue that has plagued our workforce for too long. As the Minister for Employment and Workplace Relations has said:

If a worker steals from the till, it's a criminal offence … But in many parts of the country if an employer steals from a worker's pay packet, it's not.

This injustice must be brought to an end. I'm sure I do not have to remind colleagues that wage theft is a significant issue throughout Australia, with too many reports of underpayment and exploitation of workers, particularly in industries like hospitality, agriculture and retail. The bill introduces a new criminal offence for wage theft, which applies to intentional conduct.

The bill also introduces stricter penalties for employers who intentionally underpay their employees, ensuring that they are held accountable for their actions. Workers deserve to receive their fair wages for their hard work, and this legislation takes a significant step forward in achieving that. Schedule 2 proposes important changes to the Asbestos Safety and Eradication Agency Act 2013. Promoting industrial hygiene involves taking steps to protect the work environment by reducing workers' exposure to substances that impact upon human health, including where workplace exposure to respirable or crystalline silica results in people developing serious health conditions. The new part 1A and item 15 would provide the agency with functions related to silica safety and coordination and monitoring of jurisdictional efforts to eliminate silica related occupational diseases.

Importantly, amendments to the Safety, Rehabilitation and Compensation Act 1988 are intended to improve the physical and mental health outcomes for first responders covered by the Safety, Rehabilitation and Compensation Act, by simplifying their right to workers compensation if they are suffering from post-traumatic stress disorder. It is a timely reminder of the work undertaken by those working in our police force, firefighters, ambulance officers, and emergency services who do such an amazing job protecting and serving our community, often in dangerous circumstances.

Schedule 4 to the bill would strengthen the offences and penalties framework in the Work Health and Safety Act 2011. A new offence of industrial manslaughter would be introduced—and not before time. Jobs in both the construction and resource industries are hard and dangerous. Given this, there is an appropriate expectation that employers will provide their workers with a safe workplace, but we need to do more than that. There must be clear consequences for employers that cut corners and whose employees face the ultimate deadly outcome. Too many families have had to endure the heartache of their loved ones never coming home after an industrial accident. A stronger safety culture needs a regime that ensures that those responsible are prosecuted if things go wrong.

Furthermore, the bill introduces measures to ensure collective bargaining remains a viable option for workers seeking better wages and working conditions. It enhances protections for union representatives, safeguarding their ability to advocate for their members effectively. As the Minister for Employment and Workplace Relations said at the introduction of this bill:

If someone thinks it's reasonable that wage theft not be a crime, defend it.

…   …   …

If someone believes that low-paid workers in the gig economy should have absolutely no minimum standards, they should make that case.

If someone's position is that it's fine for certain companies to agree to minimum rates of pay in an enterprise agreement and then use a loophole to completely undercut them then they should defend the loophole and make that case.

These are the bizarre positions taken by those opposite. I stand here today proudly representing the hardworking families of Pearce, and I urge support for the bill. This is the legislation that will deliver the job security and wages growth for our families in need.

In conclusion, the Fair Work Legislation Amendment (Closing Loopholes) Bill 2023 represents a significant milestone in our pursuit of fair and just working environments for all Australians. It addresses crucial issues such as the gig economy, exploitation, wage theft, workplace harassment and collective bargaining rights. By closing these loopholes we are taking a vital step forward in ensuring that every worker in Australia is treated with the dignity, respect and fairness they deserve. I commend this bill to the House.

Julian Leeser (Berowra, Liberal Party) Share this | Link to this | Hansard source

This bad bill is bad policy and bad economics and it's bad for our country. It demonstrates that this government is not here for the national interest; it's here for the vested interests of big unions and big super. It's a world away from the ethos of the Hawke and Keating Labor governments, which undertook serious economic reform. Those governments had as their legacy an opened economy, businesses unleashed, increased workforce participation and economic growth. It's a situation that continued and was expanded under the Howard government, where 2.2 million new jobs were created thanks to that government's record of economic reform, particularly around tax reform, cutting red tape, industrial reform and Corporations Law reform.

The transformation of Australian business started the transformation of Australia that we saw over the past decades. There was a bipartisan understanding that the engine room of this country is not Canberra, nor is it found in the Public Service or in the parliamentary offices, whether here in this building or dotted around the country. It's found in the productivity of our businesses, and that productivity growth is a quest. John Howard used to describe economic reform as like running a race that has an ever-retreating finish line. In other words, the process of economic reform is never done, and it's such an important process for the future of our country. Productivity has always been the watchword of people on this side of the House. It's productivity that will grow our national pie. It's productivity that is the pathway to a higher wage economy—a higher wage economy that is sustainable.

Recently, the Treasury introduced the latest intergenerational report. The report highlighted the challenges of our aging population, with ongoing low fertility rates and the number of Australians aged between 65 and 85 tripling. That's a wonderful thing, but it's a challenge for any modern economy and it's a challenge for our society. It's a challenge that means ongoing increases in funded welfare payments. Also, with the deteriorating global security environment and the very much more complex geostrategic environment in which Australia finds itself, there is now a much greater need for spending on national security and defence, which will put pressures on the budget into the future. As well, Treasury projections are for productivity to slow and GDP growth to slow. The long-term financial prospects are sobering reading.

The importance of productivity as a watchword and as a focus of economic policy in order to grow the bigger pie is fundamental. If we have a more productive economy, we have more jobs and we have a greater tax take, which can help pay for all the important services that Australians want, whether it is a stronger Defence Force, whether it is better national security, to keep the challenges that Australia faces at bay, or whether it is the important social services that we need—things like health, education, aged care and, particularly, disability. We can only do this with greater productivity and a more strongly growing economy.

Sadly, in this setting, where there are more demands on the federal budget and where productivity is declining, the government has introduced these industrial relations changes. At a time when businesses large and small are lamenting the complexity of the Fair Work system, this legislation makes things worse. This legislation is so complex it needs over 700 pages of explanatory notes. At about 1,000 pages, when you put the bill and the explanatory memorandum together, it's as dry, wordy and inexplicable as some of those monthly essays from Dr Rudd and Dr Chalmers.

The Minister for Employment and Workplace Relations says that this is a modest change. I've heard the word 'modest' elsewhere, on a proposal he and I agree on. That proposal is a 100-word proposed change to the Australian Constitution being voted on next month. One hundred words is modest, but I can't agree that this legislation, which weighs a ton, with roughly 1,000 pages of law and explanatory text, is modest; in fact, it's a PhD in red tape. The only modesty related to this bill is the false modesty of the government in saying that this is a simple bill about closing loopholes. This bill is about more red tape, more costs and more complexity for Australians during a decade in which it is predicted that Australians will need to become so much more competitive.

According to the government's own estimates, these challenges will add an extra $9 billion of costs to the economy more broadly. Those costs, as the minister has acknowledged, will feed themselves into the cost structures of goods and services produced and purchased by Australians every day. This is a new pressure on costs at a time when cost-of-living pressures are hitting Australians at their hardest and when people are feeling the squeeze. This bill makes a complex system even more complex. It will increase compliance instead of increasing productivity. It points Australia back to the 1950s, towards centralised wage fixing. It constrains choice and it puts new compliance pressures on businesses right across this country.

I believe in the importance of enterprise bargaining. I believe it delivers for businesses and it delivers for their workers. We're living in an era of profound skills shortage and of low unemployment. We're at rates of unemployment now that we used to describe as full employment. This is the best time for enterprise agreement-making. The benefit is flexibility for both parties. Enterprise bargaining grows pay packets, improves job security and creates the right mix of incentives and agility, but this bill walks away from all of that.

My first concern is the expansion of the union right-of-entry powers. Most businesses and most workplaces have never seen a union, but this right of entry in any circumstances is a serious legal power which will see unions back again like in the bad old days. This is a power to legally trespass on someone else's property. This bill will enable unions right of entry without notice wherever it relates to wage underpayment. To gain immediate entry, the union only needs to assert to the Fair Work Commission that it suspects a case of underpayment. It needs no evidence, just suspicion. As the National Farmers Federation has said, this is a right to enter farms, which, for many people, are also their homes. We've seen in the past how this power of right of entry can be abused and how regular visits can become a form of bullying.

My second concern relates to casual workers, gig economy workers and independent contractors. These are men and women who want to work in their own time on their own terms: a self-funded retiree who does an afternoon of driving to supplement an income, a student who fits their work around their university timetable or a contractor who wants to be their own boss. The minister has called the gig economy a cancer. Uber drivers getting money to get through uni or retirement is a cancer? Really? Amazon delivery drivers are a cancer? Really? What a posh view of the world. Gig workers are not enemies of the economy; they're the people who help grow our economy. They're people who have given us more choice and have filled skills gaps across so many fields. Unions don't like such workers because mostly they don't join unions. They don't join because the value offering just isn't there. Supporting the lifestyles of union bosses from the Health Services Union to the CFMMEU is not on the list of their life priorities. The changes to gig workers and independent contractors will increase costs, and those costs will be passed on to consumers.

My third concern comes to the same job, same pay issue. When it comes to that issue, this legislation is cumbersome and clunky and goes further than the government's stated intention. The government's unworkable and open ended concepts, like the same job and the same pay, do not compare like with like, and this bill goes much further than the government's original claim that it will just cover labour hire companies. This legislation goes beyond labour hire companies and covers service contractors as well. Service contractors are often engaged to provide a service, often using their own plant and equipment as well as their own skills in the workforce. This bill captures any business that engages service contractors.

Don't believe me on these matters; believe some of the people who are at the coalface. I want to tell you what some of the key stakeholders in this area think. Tania Constable from the Minerals Council of Australia, that great body that represents industries that generate significant wealth for this country, says:

The Albanese Government's latest industrial relations legislation changes are some of the most extreme, interventionist workplace changes that have ever been proposed in Australia.

The changes will inflict immense harm to the economy, the weight of which will fall on the shoulders of the most vulnerable Australians who will pay more for groceries, housing, and energy.

The chief executive of the Australian Chamber of Commerce and Industry, Andrew McKellar, says:

The only winners in this are union chiefs. The only loophole this bad legislation is looking to close is that of plummeting union membership.

This is a continuation of a radical industrial relations agenda, and we are again bracing ourselves for further risky changes to our workplace system.

I am proud, in the electorate of Berowra, to represent over 15,000 small businesses. They are the engine room of our economy—everyone from sole practitioner businesses to local takeaway shops to some of the small industrial plants that are engaged in places like Hornsby, Mount Ku-ring-gai and Dural in the business parks, and in Thornleigh as well. They're represented by the Council of Small Business Organisations Australia, whose chair Matthew Addison had this to say about the bill:

At a time when small businesses are managing increased costs of supply, of rent, of power, of wages; we don't need changes that detract businesses from their sales and service delivery. Small businesses seek to employ and properly reward their workers. They seek to innovate and adopt new technology. We seek IR changes that enhance productivity and opportunity, not broad impacting confusion about what they are and aren't allowed to do.

That's from someone at the coalface of small business, like so many people in my own community of Berowra. And I worry about the job-destroying nature of this bill for many of the families in Berowra. I worry about the effect that this will have on small businesses, with the increased compliance for many of the hardworking small-business people in Berowra, who are just people trying to have a go and who want to do the right thing. But the compliance burden and the idea of unions walking into their business unannounced, on a mere suspicion, frighten the living daylights out of people. This is a terrible, backward-looking bill.

I do want to acknowledge one of the aspects of the bill that the opposition does agree with, and that relates to the changes regarding post-traumatic stress disorder in first responders. Police officers, firefighters, ambulance officers, paramedics and emergency services personnel, of which we have so many in our community, should not need to jump through so many hoops to prove the relationship between PTSD and their employment. This change will mean that, unless proved otherwise, it will be presumed that their employment as a first responder is likely to have contributed to the PTSD they suffer. We agree with this change, as it's common sense. As someone with 27 Rural Fire Service brigades, two SES units, the wonderful St John Ambulance, Fire and Rescue New South Wales and New South Wales Ambulance in their electorate, I see this is a reasonable proposition.

But, more broadly, we on this side of the House oppose the bill because it's impossibly complex. It creates far too much uncertainty. It adds additional costs to business at a time when we shouldn't be adding costs, and it particularly targets small business. It makes Australians pay more at a time of cost-of-living crisis, when the cost of everything is going up. It does nothing to increase productivity, and, as I said earlier, it is an increase in productivity that will provide this country with the ability to deal with the health, welfare, defence and security challenges that face us in the coming decade. It does nothing to enhance competition. Competition helps drive productivity right across our economy. It risks jobs, and that, I think, is the real fruit of this bill. It only rewards the union paymasters of the Labor Party. The Labor Party is the party that is there not to represent working people but to represent the interests of unions, and that is what this bill is really all about. It institutionalises conflict in our workplaces—conflict where there is none today. It is the government saying it's making concessions for business when it hasn't. This bill weakens our economy and makes a bad situation worse at the very time that our economy needs the hit of important productivity improvements.

This is a vital time for Australia. With the cost of living and payments rising, productivity falling and the population ageing, now is not the time to turn back towards the failed approach of the past. This legislation is a 1,000-page dead weight on Australian business. This is not the solution for our times, and that is the reason that we oppose it.

Bill Shorten (Maribyrnong, Australian Labor Party, Minister for the National Disability Insurance Scheme) Share this | Link to this | Hansard source

EN (—) (): In rising to support the Fair Work Legislation Amendment (Closing Loopholes) Bill 2023, I want to have a conversation with the Australian people about why I think this is legislation worth supporting. I'll start with some history, because it's always important to understand where we have been to understand where we're going. Down at the Trades Hall in Victoria, at the top of Lygon Street, just opposite there is a statue with the numbers '888' sitting atop a granite base. These numbers hold up a gilt sphere that represents the globe, the world. On the plinth is a plaque. On the plaque is an inscription:

Eight hours to sleep

Eight bob a day

A fair day's work for a fair day's pay.

They're the words from the anthem of the eight-hour movement, which fought for reduced hours for workers as far back as the second half of the 19th century.

In the 1850s, the striking stonemasons in Melbourne ignited protests across the colony of Victoria and the other Australian colonies over unreasonable hours. They put three main arguments for an eight-hour day. The first: Australia's harsh climate demanded reduced hours. The second: labourers needed time to develop their social and moral condition through education. The third: workers would be better parents, partners and citizens if they were allowed adequate leisure time. Perspiration, aspiration and inspiration—the catalyst for the first laws to protect working people across the world.

With the advent of the eight-hour day, Australia became one of the most progressive labour environments in the world, a new frontier for a new world. Upon fair labour conditions, we established the foundations for a robust middle class. We've done so time and time again with laws that give people a fair go at work: workers' compensation, annual leave, shorter hours, equal pay for women, compulsory superannuation and Medicare which didn't need to be funded out of employers' pockets. But we're losing that edge. The great Australian dream of a large, successful middle class is diminishing into the bleaker reality of a two-speed society of haves and have-nots. Time and time again across the history of this country successive conservative governments have persistently chipped away at the fair go at work. Successive coalition governments did something that was inherently unfair: thwarting wages growth. They even admitted during the Abbott-Turnbull-Morrison years that it was a deliberate design feature of their economic management. Well, no more.

Productive workplace relations are built on the values of a fair go for all. Coincidentally, these are Labor values too. The Albanese Labor government doesn't believe it is fair that the lowest paid Australians should bear the brunt of the current global economic circumstances. We were elected on a promise to get wages moving. Our next set of workplace relations reform to parliament, the Fair Work Legislation Amendment (Closing Loopholes) Bill 2023, builds on the secure jobs, better pay bill that passed both houses of parliament last year. It will close loopholes that allow some, a minority of opportunistic businesses, to undermine job security and fair pay in Australian workplaces.

The loopholes bill has four elements. Much of this policy is not news. I should know; I took it to two federal elections in 2016 and 2019. The first element is to crack down on the labour hire loophole that's used to undercut pay and conditions. Labour hire has legitimate uses. It can provide much-needed surge and specialist workforces, and that will continue to be the case. But some companies bring in a labour hire workforce that is paid less in order to deliberately undercut existing fair rates of pay which have been negotiated in good faith.

The second element of the bill is criminalising wage theft. If an employee steals from the till, it's a criminal offence—fair enough. Stealing is a crime. But why is it not a crime when an employer intentionally steals money from a worker? We want to close that loophole and legislate to criminalise wage theft. To be clear, these laws will only apply to intentional cases of wage theft. Quite often, underpayments are not intentional. Our award system is complex. They can be just an honest mistake. The Fair Work Ombudsman will assist in educating employers on their responsibilities. There are pathways available for employers who self-report and take reasonable steps to repay the correct amount. We are not after the honest mistake. We're looking to stop deliberate, greedy, unethical behaviour.

The third element of the bill is aimed at preventing the exploitation of casuals. There are currently people who work permanent, regular hours just like permanent employees but don't get the benefits of job security. They are stuck classified as casuals. Just as there is a gender pay gap, there is a gender security gap. Women make up the majority of casual workers in Australia. Women make up the majority of workers who have been casual for more than two years. Women make up the majority of underemployed casuals. Women make up the majority of people holding multiple jobs. Women will be the major beneficiaries of the fairer workplace that the closing loopholes bill will create. People in insecure work just don't have the same certainty about their hours or their income. Yes, some people choose that lifestyle, but let's not pretend that we live in some sort of conservative utopia where every casual doesn't want to be permanent. That's not true. The bills that pile up on the kitchen table—the rent, the electricity, the internet, the phone, the insurance, the rego—keep coming even if your pay doesn't. We will legislate a fair, objective definition to determine when an employee can be classified as casual so that casual workers with regular work arrangements can get greater access to leave entitlements and more financial security—if that is what they want. We know that many casuals don't seek to take this up, particularly those who don't have the pressure of paying for the family's households expenses, but 40 per cent of casuals over the age of 35 are more likely to want a secure job. Let me be clear: no-one will be forced to convert from casual to permanent. This bill will give people choice.

The fourth and final element of the bill is to make sure that gig workers don't get ripped off. We know there is a direct link between low rates of pay and safety in place for the gig economy. We cannot deal with the safety issues until we have minimum rates and minimum standards. The government simply wants to legislate minimum standards of pay and safety. As Minister for the National Disability Insurance Scheme, I'm particularly interested in the proposed changes which will go to the responsibility to maintain minimum standards for disability care and support workers. Adhering to minimum standards not only builds a quality workforce and secure workforces but ultimately delivers higher quality, safer services for people with disability. I hear daily from participants and their families about the need for high-quality services, but participants and families should not have to choose between flexibility on the one hand and quality on the other. Many who choose this type of work value its flexibility. There's no intention of turning gig workers into employees, but just because someone chooses gig work shouldn't mean they end up being paid less than they would as an employee. We don't want to get to the destination other countries have, where workers rely on tips to make ends meet and we subsist on a two-class working system in this country.

There's been extensive consultation on the design of these measures. Business groups, unions and the Department of Employment and Workplace Relations led two processes where some 160 organisations made more than 220 written submissions. The government's asked for feedback, and the minister's listened. Australians who need support and a fair go right now are not executives wondering if their bonus will be $2 million or $3 million this year. It's the people who wonder if their pay packet will cover their bills this week. The closing loopholes bill will put an estimated $9 billion into the pockets of workers who are currently being underpaid. This $9 billion represents less than one-tenth of one per cent of the national wages budget. It is a small percentage because most businesses do the right thing. They don't use the loopholes as a business model. For those workers being significantly underpaid, getting a fair day's pay for a fair day's work will be life changing.

To clarify, the money in additional wages does not come at a cost to the economy. None of this money comes to the government; it will go back to local communities. Low-paid workers tend to spend every dollar they get, which generates economic activity in the high streets of Australia's suburbs and towns. If we don't pass this bill, we will cement in a section of the workforce as a permanent underclass in Australia without any minimum standards—a whole section of Australian workers at the mercy of businesses who use loopholes to intentionally underpay them. That section of the workforce is made up of Australians who are just trying to make ends meet, meaning they're forced to keep working multiple jobs and to take risks with their safety to make that extra delivery. These are people who feel powerless to speak up because they know there's always someone else prepared to take lower pay in a race to the bottom. It's bad for Australians. It's bad for Australian businesses paying fair wages. Why should an Australian business be undercut by another business using an unethical business model?

Here is a dose of reality to those who sit in this place and think things can't be that bad for Australians being paid less than their worth. Have you ever had to swallow your pride and ask for an extension on the due date of a power bill? Have you had to go to the Catholic school and say, 'I can't pay the school fees for my kids this month'? Have you ever had to disappoint your children because you don't have that extra money for them to be able to take the camping trip with the school? Have you ever had to call upon the generosity of family and friends to mind your kids just because you cannot afford a babysitter or child care? Have you ever had to think about whether or not this is a pay week or counted down the days in a fortnight to that period of time when you get paid? If this is news to you then speak to someone who has. They're the Australians the Albanese Labor government is focused on with the closing loopholes bill.

Make no mistake: a loophole is not innocuous or trivial. My curiosity about the term 'loophole' led to me to understand why it has negative connotations. It comes from describing the narrow slits in the castle walls of medieval Europe through which projectiles can be launched at enemies without fear of similar objects making their way back through the slits. It was considered an unfair advantage unless you owned the castle. Some businesses in Australia are using loopholes in the law to exploit their unfair advantage and unethical approach to business, safe in the knowledge that the workers have no way of fighting back—well, no more. The Labor government has a way to stand up for people who don't have a voice. It's called the closing loopholes bill. Its goal is to ensure that good, hardworking Australians who do a fair day's work will earn a fair day's pay.

Finally, I want to address the falsity that somehow paying a low-paid worker a few more cents an hour and giving them some minimum rights so that they avoid being exploited will somehow trigger inflation. The reality is that this country has been experiencing supply-side causes of inflation, be it insufficient investment in energy, supply chain challenges overseas or the criminal and illegal war in Ukraine. But we have also seen some of the big food corporations, like Woolies and Coles, who've used the fog of supply-side inflation to camouflage rent-seeking behaviour. We're legislating for those people who shop in their shops. The strange thing is I hear the opposition always complain about a wage rise for a worker but never about the 'greedflation' of big corporations burdening the lives of all Australians. It perhaps make you realise where some people's priorities are.

Angus Taylor (Hume, Liberal Party, Shadow Treasurer) Share this | Link to this | Hansard source

I rise to speak against the Fair Work Legislation Amendment (Closing Loopholes) Bill 2023, this so-called closing loopholes bill, because the only loophole that Labor appears to be closing here is the collapse in union membership. This is a radical reordering of Australian workplace laws, which every business in the country has been pleading with the government not to go ahead with. But they are resolute because there are big bills to be paid, and I'll come back to this point in a moment. Aside from complexity and uncertainty, this is a bill that will hurt our economy and, most importantly, will hurt the real wages of hardworking Australians. After over a year of this Labor government, we see an economy right now that is shuddering to a halt. Of course, we're in a GDP per person recession, real wages are going backwards—I'll outline that a little more in a moment—and Australians are paying a very high price for this government.

This bill will only make this difficult situation worse. It will mean additional costs for businesses, especially small businesses. They're the lifeblood of our economy, and those small businesses are suffering extreme pain right now. It will make Australians pay more in the midst of a cost-of-living crisis. It will drive down productivity, and there is no surer way to drive down real wages than to do that. It will reduce competition, and we on this side of the chamber are deeply concerned about competition. The last speaker said that we aren't concerned about undue or poor behaviour by corporates. I think we've been pretty clear in the last little while about what we think about airlines and some of the practices that we have seen in recent times, and we think those practices are unacceptable. Competition really matters, and this bill will reduce competition and, worst of all, it will weaken our economy. Everybody pays for that because we'll be making a bad situation worse.

What could motivate those opposite to want to proceed with this legislation? They like to talk about debt, but I can tell you that the biggest debt in this country is the debt between the Labor Party and the funding of the Labor Party by the union movement. It's about Labor looking after the most important constituency to them, the one that gets them elected, and that's union officials. It's about the welfare of those union officials, not the welfare of Australians. We won't support reforms that will undermine prosperity and aspiration, which are so central to this country and so central to the economy. We don't need more complexity, more costs and more confusion. This is the last thing we need across Australia right now.

It's extremely important to understand the economic context behind our objection to this bill, and why we believe this is absolutely the wrong legislation for the time. As I said, it's a radical industrial agenda at a time when the economy is struggling, at a time when we need a resumption of the great reforms that were pursued across this parliament—by Hawke and Keating and then Howard. There was a very simple insight right at the heart of those reforms: the idea that, if employer and employee can sit down together and work out how to make a business more successful, they can pay workers more and, in the process, everyone is better off. It was a simple idea, a powerful idea, and it worked. It was supported by all sides of this place, and we are now moving away from that.

Right now, as I said earlier, we are in the midst of a per capita recession. What's a per capita recession? It means every Australian is being made worse off by the economy, on a person-by-person basis—and that's what the economy is about; it's about people. They are worse off. Productivity in this country is in freefall. We've seen labour productivity collapse by 6.6 per cent in the last five quarters. We have never seen this before. This is a diabolical disaster. Those opposite like to say productivity doesn't matter, but it's uncanny how, when you look through the historical data, productivity and real wages are correlated. Right through history, right across the world, we see the same pattern. Guess what! With a 6.6 reduction in labour productivity in the last five quarters, guess how much real wages have gone down for working Australians over the last year—six per cent. That's how it works, but those opposite just don't seem to understand this.

Let's go through those numbers. The member for Parramatta got this all wrong the other day. It's very important to understand this. Over the last 12 months, working Australians have seen a 9.6 per cent increase in their cost of living. The employment living cost index, which is put out by the ABS on a regular basis, shows that working Australians are 9.6 per cent worse off. I have great respect for the member for Parramatta—he's a PhD economist, unlike our 'doctor of spin' Treasurer—but he didn't understand that that's the pain being felt by working Australians. Perhaps he doesn't spend enough time with working Australians to understand this, but a 9.6 per cent increase in the living costs of hardworking Australians is monumental.

Those opposite like to crow about a nominal wages increase of 3.6 per cent. I'm sorry, but that's buying six per cent less in a year. They're worse off under those circumstances. This is at the heart of the economy. Real wages are going backwards, and they're not just going backwards a little bit; they're going backwards at a ferocious rate. The truth of the matter is that hardworking Australians are now in a position where they are struggling to pay for the groceries. They're struggling to pay energy bills, which they were promised would go down by $275, though we've seen them go in exactly the opposite direction. Hardworking Australians are paying 15 per cent more in income tax than they were just over a year ago. Labor loves that! More tax is always a good thing for a Labor government. People are paying 15 per cent more in tax and monumental increases in their mortgages, with 11 interest rate increases under this government. A typical Australian family will pay a couple of thousand dollars more in mortgage costs each month—each month! That is the crisis that we have in our economy right now. The solution to that crisis is simple. It is: let's work together, collaboratively, between employers and employees, to make our workplaces more productive.

This is not about working harder; this is about getting more from the same number of hours. Or, indeed, getting the same amount for fewer hours. That's what productivity is. If I said to any Australian: 'Look, we can do something here. We can make some changes here that mean we get more per hour, and you get paid more as a result. Or, indeed, you can work fewer hours a week and we'll be able to produce the same amount because of the changes we're making in the workplace,' that sounds like a pretty good deal for everybody, including the workers. They should be paid more for that, and they will be paid more for that. That's how the system under a proper enterprise bargaining regime works, but we are moving sharply away from that under this government.

There is no shortage of those out there who are prepared to say that this is absolutely the wrong direction for our industrial relations system. Robert Gottliebsen put it well when he said:

But if anything like the complexity of the proposed legislation passes the Parliament it will dramatically lower productivity in Australia. And that lower productivity will start at the base of household contract services and extend through transport, IT, banking and manufacturing to mining.

Nothing will escape the clutches of those 784 pages of complex legislation and memorandums.

Business groups and employers have also pointed out these changes will smash productivity. I thought the ACCI chief executive, Andrew McKellar, put it well. He's concerned, as he should be, about consumers struggling with the cost-of-living crisis. He said:

"The only winners in this are union chiefs. The only loophole this bad legislation is looking to close is that of plummeting union membership …

  … … …

"The government has not made a case for these changes. It has not been able to outline how this legislation will enhance productivity, lift wages, or make it easier to generate more jobs.

Jennifer Westacott, chief executive of the BCA, has said:

"We need a system that drives productivity, not stifles it, because that will stifle wages growth.

We know this. If you stifle the ability of employers and employees to sit down together collaboratively, work together to work out how to make the workplace a more productive place, then what happens? Real wages cannot go up—and it's real wages that count. It's what your money, your wage can buy that counts.

The Treasurer doesn't seem to understand this. That shouldn't surprise us. He's a doctor of spin, the walking talking point. He focuses on the talking points, not the substance of the issues—the spin, not the substance. But the truth is the only thing that matters to an Australian worker is what their wages can buy, and right now that is going backwards fast. They are all paying a very high price for this government.

I do want to make a final comment about competition. We heard from the member for Maribyrnong a moment ago. I said earlier he thinks that we're not concerned about competition, that we're not concerned to make sure that businesses are in a position where they are competing. They have to compete and they should compete. That's the way we ensure that those productivity gains are passed through to wages. That's the way we make sure that Australians are better off, that they can buy more with the money they earn. The thing about competition is that it doesn't work if you're listening to vested interests, if you're supporting pork-barrelling. We still have absolutely no explanation from those opposite as to why they blocked extra flights to Australia.

I will take the interjection from the member opposite. He has not explained, nor have any of his colleagues, why Australians should pay more for their airfares. He can't explain it. We've heard all sorts of bizarre explanations, and those opposite crow and carry on about how business needs to be disciplined. I'll tell you what: the greatest discipline of all for business is competition. There is no greater regulator of any business than a customer. Put the customer in charge—that's not the thing that those opposite will ever do; they'll put the union officials in charge—and you will get a good deal out of businesses every single time.

They are happy to see airfares up to 50 per cent higher than they were, and they have given no explanation that even begins to get to the heart of why they blocked these flights. Who knows how much of this kind of corporatist stuff we're going to from Labor? Big unions working with big government and big business—this is the Labor way. We had a period back in the eighties when they realised the error of their ways, in letting this get out of control, but not now. They're back to their usual practice of the bad old days.

This bill, with its 284 pages and 520-page explanatory memorandum, will make things harder, not easier, for businesses and all Australians. It will do nothing to improve the freefall we've seen in labour productivity in this country; indeed, it will push it in the wrong direction. It will drive up prices. It will undermine the prosperity of Australians, which is what we all care about. It will undermine the centrepiece of our economy we on this side of this place all want to see, which is aspiration, the ability for Australians to get ahead. That's what we stand for and what we'll always stand for. That's not what this bill is about. The coalition will not be supporting this bill. (Time expired)

Alison Byrnes (Cunningham, Australian Labor Party) Share this | Link to this | Hansard source

I rise today to make a contribution to the Fair Work Legislation Amendment (Closing Loopholes) Bill 2023. At the last election I, like all of my Labor colleagues, made a promise to the Australian community to end the decades of stagnation under the coalition and to get wages moving. To do this, we need to close the loopholes that are undermining wages and conditions in our employment system. That's what this set of workplace relations reform is all about. I have listened to the contributions of those opposite, and, despite the rhetoric we have heard, the bill before us is not making radical changes. All we are doing is making the current system work more effectively. Australia already has a strong workplace relations framework, but by closing the loopholes we are making it stronger and better.

As many speakers before me have outlined, the bill contains four main elements: cracking down on the labour hire loopholes that are used to undercut pay and conditions, criminalising wage theft, properly defining casual work so casuals aren't being exploited and making sure gig workers aren't being ripped off. This approach should not come as a surprise to anyone, as we announced all four of these policies while in opposition, more than two years ago. And I talked about them with my community in the lead-up to the 2022 election. The government has undertaken extensive consultation on the precise design of these measures, including with business groups. This has included written submissions, consultation papers and numerous consultation meetings with a range of stakeholders, including business groups, employers, small-business representatives, unions, academics, state and territory governments, and the rest of our society and community.

Given all of this, I am quite surprised by the comments that have come from those opposite, but I'm not sure the members have actually understood the scale and the impact of the problem that this bill is seeking to address. I can speak to the scale and impact of the problem that we face and the impact that it has had on my local community in the Illawarra. We heard from those opposite last week that this bill will see the cost of living rise. I can say to those opposite that people in casual and insecure work in my community know all too well the impact that these employment arrangements are having on their ability to make ends meet. Rent isn't casual; electricity bills aren't casual; school fees aren't casual—they're all a certainty. But these people in insecure work do not have the same certainty about their hours or their income.

Like those in many parts of Australia, workers in my community have struggled with casualisation and wage theft and with businesses who have chosen not to play by the rules. Thankfully for my region, we have the support of the South Coast Labour Council. The labour council is the peak union body on the South Coast of New South Wales and covers the area from Helensburgh in the north of my electorate all the way to the Victorian border and across to the Southern Highlands and adjoining tablelands in the west. The council represents 25 affiliates across all industries and sectors, and a unionised membership of almost 50,000 workers. Advocating for working people and their rights at work is a principal role of the council.

I must make a special mention of the labour council's President, Tina Smith, and hard-working secretary, Arthur Rorris. Under their leadership, the labour council has been leading the fight against wage theft and worker exploitation in this country. While some of those opposite might find the anecdotes and stories of worker exploitation a shocking revelation, for Tina and Arthur this has been their daily life for decades. They have supported workers who, unfortunately, have been exploited in our community and have not had the know-how or funds to seek justice. Both Arthur and Tina are in this for the long haul. They will not give up until exploited workers get back what is rightfully theirs.

In June this year, the Federal Court made a final decision on costs for Wollongong restaurant workers Midhun Basi and Syed Haider, who, with the support of the labour council, took their former employer to court, after what the judge later found to be a series of egregious and flagrant contraventions of the Fair Work Act. In awarding total costs in the hundreds of thousands of dollars, Justice Halley said that the calculation went beyond the facts of this case. The Illawarra Mercury reported on 22 June that Justice Halley said: 'I am satisfied that, in light of the factors considered below, it is necessary for substantial penalties to be imposed in order to deter the respondents and other employers, particularly in the restaurant industry, from engaging in similar conduct in the future.' This conduct included seeking payments from the employees to cover the business's tax obligations and to cover visa sponsorship costs; and cashback arrangements, for what the employer said were loans but which were never substantiated in legal proceedings. The labour council said at the time said that this was the biggest case of wage theft relating to individual workers in our history. It has raised profoundly disturbing issues about the employment of international visa based workers and how that power imbalance can have shocking outcomes.

This is, unfortunately, not an isolated incident in my community. I want to take a moment to briefly introduce to the chamber the experience of Ashleigh Mounser. Ashleigh was an enrolled student at the University of Wollongong, and, like many students, she was struggling to balance paying the bills and making the most of her studies while working in hospitality businesses. Fed up with the unreliable conditions and with being paid only $10 an hour, Ashleigh posted about her experience on a university chat group, and the response from her fellow students with similar experiences was overwhelming. Armed with this information, Ashleigh decided to compile a list of employers in Wollongong, with the firsthand accounts and contact details of their employees, their hourly rates of pay and cash-in-hand payments. It read like a yellow pages of exploitation. With this census of underpayment, Ashleigh and her fellow students felt it was time to tell their story, with Fairfax media publishing their experiences in 2016.

Now, it might come as a shock to those opposite that these students were not members of a union and that they were not being advised or coached. They knew something was wrong, they knew that they were being taken advantage of, and they knew that there were only a limited number of options open to them to expose this power imbalance and this exploitation of young Australians who only wanted to study, work safely and be paid fairly.

Ashley's yellow pages of exploitation made for some horror reading, with 60 businesses reported by workers, 45 of which are located within a two-kilometre strip of the Wollongong CBD. The mean age of workers was 21; the range was 18 to 32. The average hourly rate of pay was $12.50; the range was $7.50 to $20, and the most common rate of pay was $10 an hour. At least 50 businesses on the list either have been reported or are strongly suspected as paying cash in hand, with a lack of payslips and group certificates being a key indicator.

These numbers are simply unacceptable. No Australian worker should leave home every day seeking to earn a living and instead have their labour not only short-changed but exploited. Nor should businesses who follow the law be forced to compete with businesses who choose to flout it. I think those opposite need to explain to these workers in my community why we should not reform this system, close the loopholes and seek to do all we can to prevent the exploitation that has happened to them also happening to other young people. Those opposite might also want to think of their response to the estimated 236,900 workers in my home state of New South Wales who are stuck as casuals when they actually work permanent, regular hours or to the estimated 231,700 digital platform workers in New South Wales who are expected to be eligible for minimum standards and increased access to dispute resolution for independent contractors.

When it comes to independent contractors, this bill supports more than workers in the gig economy. Of the 3,500 workers in the South Coast coal industry, almost half are labour hire contractors, who are commonly paid tens of thousands of dollars less than permanent employees doing the same job. The legislation in the form that we see it today is because of the hard work and advocacy of unions and unionists, like Mining and Energy Union south-western district secretary Andy Davey, who has for years campaigned for mineworkers in my community for provisions to stop the widespread misuse of labour hire in the coal industry to cut wages. He said:

The Closing Loopholes Bill is a light at the end of the tunnel for mineworkers who have been battling this unfair employment model for years.

The Illawarra is an industrial region, and the workers of the Illawarra understand all too well industrial workplace hazards that need to be managed and eliminated in our industrial processes. We can and must do more to reduce the number of workers developing silicosis and other diseases caused by the inhalation of silica dust. This bill includes provisions for the Asbestos Safety and Eradication Agency to report annually to relevant work health and safety, health and environment ministers on the progress of the Asbestos National Strategic Plan and Silica National Strategic Plan. It will also expand the membership of the agency's council to include appropriate representation of employees and employers and an expert in asbestos or silica related matters.

I have also engaged closely with transport workers in my community and their union, the Transport Workers Union, and its local leadership under Robert Pirc. In this speech, Rob wanted me to reiterate just how much consultation has gone into this legislation. Rob said:

A year ago, a roundtable convened by Workplace Relations Minister Tony Burke comprised of supply chain clients Coles and Woolworths, major transport operators Toll, Team Global Express, Linfox, gig companies Uber and DoorDash, employer associations, workers and academics provided a shared set of principles on reform to set fair, safe and sustainable standards in transport.

He goes on to say:

The Road Transport industry is united in its support of the 'Closing the Loopholes' legislation and particularly, those live-saving reforms which will ensure a safe, sustainable and viable road transport industry.

Every Australian deserves to go home from work healthy and unharmed. This can only be achieved when we have employers, workers and industry experts working in collaboration.

Before concluding, I must acknowledge the many businesses across Australia and in my community who pay their workers well and comply with the Fair Work Act. They are businesses that understand that, if you want to boost productivity, you need to do this by investing in your people and technology, not by making people work harder and longer for less. Unfortunately, not all businesses have chosen to follow the rules, so we need an employment framework that acts as a safety net for everyone and doesn't have loopholes or backdoors to sneak out of. As legislators we must protect the most vulnerable workers in our society. These laws will strengthen the current workplace relations framework and provide certainty, fairness and a level playing field for both businesses and workers.

Debate adjourned.