Helen Polley (Tasmania, Australian Labor Party) Share this | Hansard source

At least you are consistent, Senator Fisher. Of Senator Cash's contribution, I am not sure that she has actually ever met a worker, let alone someone who has worked in a sweatshop in this country.

This bill aims to address the abuse of the most vulnerable workers and disadvantaged Australians. All the coalition are interested in is the big end of town. They are interested in protecting their mates. They have a record of not speaking up for Australian workers. These changes will promote fairness and ensure a consistent approach to workplace entitlements and protections for a class of workers that is widely recognised as being one of the most vulnerable and exploited in this country.

Let us have a quick look at the history. Despite decades of long restructuring and staff reductions, the textile, clothing and footwear industry remains a significant sector within the Australian economy. My hometown of Launceston, where I live, was the centre of the universe of the textile industry in this country. I had family members working in the textile industry. We had mills. What do we have now? We have one small mill left. What do we have in Tasmania? We have very limited opportunities. So, when I come in and speak about an issue like this, I do so because I can relate to those people that have been exploited, and I think that is part of our responsibility when we come into this chamber.

The most recent large-scale review of the TCF industry found that at May 2008 there were approximately 48,500 direct manufacturing jobs. That figure is not indicative of the significant numbers of additional workers engaged as outworkers within the clothing industry. Given the acknowledged difficulty of finding outworkers within the TCF supply chains, and then quantifying the volume of work they produce, it is impossible to state with precision an accurate total number of persons employed or engaged in the TCF industry. However, based on its knowledge of the industry and its compliance and education work, the Textile, Clothing and Footwear Union of Australia estimates that the ratio of factory based workers to outworkers within the clothing industry currently varies between 1:4 and 1:10, depending on a particular supply chain.

Exploitation has been a persistent feature of the TCF industry for many decades. Workers in the TCF industry, both in the formal and home based sectors, are some of the most vulnerable workers in Australia. A significant percentage of TCF workers are from a non-English-speaking background and have poor English language and literacy skills. If people in this chamber had bothered to go to the media conference that the union organised yesterday and had met those women who actually work in that industry, I am sure even you, Senator Fisher, would have had a heart and recognised that these people have been taken advantage of. Many of these people have worked in the industry for a significant amount of time. In the formal, factory based sector the great majority of workers are dependent on the minimum safety net—the modern award and the NES—and have limited economic power to negotiate enhanced conditions through enterprise bargaining. Even within the formal TCF sector, noncompliance with award and other legal obligations is widespread. Many factories operate under substantially substandard health and safety conditions.

The phenomenon of sweatshops within the TCF industry is not new, but they are increasingly adaptive to the needs of the TCF supply chains. These sweatshops may be considered to be part of the formal TCF sector in one sense but they exist in a type of parallel economy with extremely low levels of scrutiny and transparency of operation. Some sweatshops operate entirely on a cash-in-hand basis, others operate with a mix of workers on the books and those who do not officially exist in time and wage records. Even where a sweatshop operates formally, many employees on the books will be engaged on a casual or periodic basis, which will mirror the surge or drop in orders. So there is no consistency in the amount of money that these people earn.

We know that many of these workers are being ripped off by the contractors. That should not be happening in Australia. Workers in the sweatshops rarely have any say in how they are engaged and how they seek to make a living, and we know that the employment is inconsistent.

As I indicated earlier, sweatshop workers are almost uniformly from a non-English-speaking background and are often unaware of, or feel unable to enforce, their legal rights and entitlements. Many are migrants or refugees who have had no experience of independent unions or the role of government in enforcing minimum conditions of employment. Some have been subjected to imprisonment and oppression in their home countries. Fear of government and authorities is commonplace.

Now, let us have a closer look at a series of studies that have provided a history—evidence that the Howard government ignored. Remember, the Howard government was in power for 11½ years and did nothing. Sorry, it was not nothing; they brought in Work Choices. In July to November 1994, the Textile, Clothing and Footwear Union of Australia conducted a national outwork information campaign targeted at out­workers, their employers and ethnic communities to gather information about the largely hidden outwork sector of the Australian workforce. Over the eight weeks of the campaign, bilingual workers employed by the TCFUA received a total of 3,000 calls from outworkers—an average of 375 calls per week. The campaign found, amongst other things, that (a) the numbers of outworkers in the clothing industry was much larger than the union had realised; (b) outworkers' working conditions had deteriorated; (c) when outworkers did get work, a typical working week involved 12 to 18 hours per day, seven days per week at about one-third of the award rate of pay; (d) outworkers had virtually no access to the minimum conditions enjoyed by factory workers; and (e) abuse and harassment from employers was widespread and had become daily occurrences in some outworkers' lives.

One of the findings of a University of Melbourne study of outworkers in 2001 was that outworkers reported earning an average hourly rate of pay of $3.60. So how those opposite can come into this place and vote down this bill is beyond belief. In that study 75 per cent of outworkers said that they had experienced not receiving wages on time whilst 46 per cent had experienced not receiving wages at all for work performed and 89 per cent said that their family could not manage without their wages.

The study found that the average number of hours worked per day was more than 12 hours; 74 per cent reported working in the range of 12 to 19 hours per day; and 62 per cent reported working seven days per week, with a further 26 per cent working six days per week. Only a small minority worked less than this.

Of those in the study, 65 per cent said that they did not like their work. Most were resigned to working because 'I just have to do it'. The main reasons that were given for doing this type of work were that they could not get a job outside the home—70 per cent of them—and that their English was not good enough to get other work—63 per cent. Of those surveyed, 68 per cent reported relying on family members to help complete work orders. The vast majority—93 per cent—reported that they worked routinely during the school holidays, 91 per cent worked on Saturdays and 87 per cent worked on Sundays and public holidays.

Senator Fisher interjecting—

Before you interject, Senator Fisher, I know you support Work Choices and I know that you accept that those sorts of conditions should be what all Australians have. But the people on this side of the chamber—the government—will never, ever relinquish support for Australian workers.

In 2004, the TCFUA Victorian branch completed a compliance report for the Ethical Clothing Trades Council Victoria as to the level of compliance within the clothing industry in relation to outworkers receiving their lawful entitlements. The union undertook inspections in 151 workplaces and interviewed a group of outworkers. The report's key findings concluded, based on the inspections and interviews, that in the vast majority of cases outworkers were not receiving award rates of pay; outworkers were not receiving award entitlements such as annual leave, long service leave, overtime and public holidays; outworkers were being forced into sham contractor and company arrangements as a systemic method of employers avoiding legal obligations to employees; outworkers were not receiving superannuation—