Penny Wong (SA, Australian Labor Party, Shadow Minister for Corporate Governance and Responsibility) Share this | Hansard source

Mr President, I ask a supplementary question. Can the minister confirm that, when she stated that the guest workers should get a fair day’s pay for a fair day’s work, she was in fact referring only to the minimum wage under the government’s industrial relations laws and not to relevant certified agreements applying at the workplace? Isn’t the minister’s admission that this use of guest workers is to prevent employees from seeking better wages and conditions simply an indication that the Howard government’s guest worker program is not about dealing with the skills shortage, which has occurred on the Howard government’s watch, but is about ensuring employers have access to cheap sources of labour?