Deborah O'Neill (NSW, Australian Labor Party) Share this | Hansard source

I rise to speak on a very important piece of legislation before the chamber this afternoon, the Fair Work Amendment Bill 2014. I was in the chair when I heard Senator Leyonhjelm making his contribution to this debate, and I want to puncture the myths that seem to surround this all of the time—that the people who are going to be affected by this are kids who are going to earn a little bit of pocket money; that really it is good for them to work on Saturdays and Sundays; that they do not really need it; that they will be able to manage the money; that it is fine; that it does not matter if they are not getting paid for working unsociable hours. That is so far from the reality of so many working Australians.

It is certainly very far from the reality that was reported to the Fair Work Taskforce in Gosford last Friday. I was pleased to be joined there by my colleagues Lisa Chesters, who chairs that taskforce, Senator Chris Ketter, my colleague here in the Senate, and Sharon Claydon, the member for Newcastle, when we took evidence from a range of members of the community. There was Youth Connections, a local group that looks after young people. These young people have a passion, which they articulated so clearly on the day: they want to get to work. They are trying to negotiate the gap between where they are and where they want to be and getting a job. And the sorts of jobs that they will be able to get on the Central Coast will be jobs in retail, hospitality and tourism—the exact sectors that this bill attempts to attack. We heard from them about their aspirations for work. We heard from nurses and midwives about the impact of the loss of penalty rates on the capacity of that profession to even draw people to it.

This is the thin edge of a wedge that we are seeing put before this Senate today. I urge all senators to reject it, in the interests of the nation, and in the interests of fairness, which is what Labor stands up for every single day of the year that we are here in this place.

We heard from Luke Hutchinson representing the USU who said very simply that when you take away penalty rates what you do is: you cut people's take-home pay. You cut their pay. And, if they live in a regional economy, like many Australians do, up and down the coast of this great country, when you take that money out of those pay packets, you take it out of the economy, and it will have a contractionary effect.

The people who are speaking for this bill today swear black and blue that it will create jobs left, right and centre. But they are not going to be held to account on it, and they are saying this simply as a matter of opinion, because the facts do not match that assertion.

The task force's last witness of the day was a business owner who is an ethical employer. And this is what she actually said: 'I would like, as a business owner, when I am making my plan, to take all the emotion out of it. It seems just like the right thing to do. I believe in dealing in facts, not opinion.' And the facts are, for her small business—a retail business in a regional part of Australia—that her penalty rates on a Sunday are less than two per cent of her turnover. She said that she is happy to pay for great staff to come in on a Sunday, to give up time with their families, to make her business successful and sustainable. That is what a good employer will do. They will understand.

We have people who are working in these shops who are mothers. We heard from Liz, a local person who is a single mother. Rent stress is a reality. When you take wages away from working mothers who are on limited hours in the retail, hospitality and tourism sectors, the chance of them actually having enough money to pay their rent is a big problem. When you take away their penalty rates, you take away from their take-home pay—you cut their take-home pay. And you make them vulnerable. We heard about what happens when women on the coast—and it is predominantly women—lose their jobs or lose their wages. They find themselves caught up in homelessness. We heard stories about women who need more hours of work, who are so at risk in the fields of hospitality, tourism and other service industries that they will end up having to sleep in their cars. That is what we heard: evidence of a local woman, who has children, sleeping in her unregistered car near her children's school. That woman, and other women like her, need a job that has decent pay. They are vulnerable. They are working limited hours. And they need this parliament, this Senate, to have people who will stand up for them against the interests of businesses that are unethical—businesses that are only there to secure a profit for themselves and to increase the profit for themselves on the back of the exploitation of very insecure workers.

I want to speak to the reality that we face today with this piece of legislation: that we either make a choice for the great Australian tradition of supporting those who believe in fairness and making sure that those who work unsociable hours get fair recompense for the inconvenience to them and their families, or—

Debate interrupted.