Simon Birmingham (SA, Liberal Party, Minister for Trade) Share this | Hansard source

I thank the Senate. The government fully understands the intent behind this legislation. There is indeed no excuse for the underpayment of workers and we have in place extensive legislative frameworks to take action against employers who underpay workers, including the Fair Work Act for unpaid wages and the Superannuation Guarantee (Administration) Act for unpaid superannuation.

The Fair Work Ombudsman provides active support and assistance to employers and employees with respect to workplace issues that include underpayment of wages. The Fair Work Ombudsman is continuing to take strong action on behalf of workers, with the agency recovering a record amount of money—some $123 million—for underpaid workers in 2019-20. The government has taken unprecedented action to date to protect vulnerable workers, including by providing more powers and additional resources to the Fair Work Ombudsman and increasing up to tenfold the penalties for lawbreaking employers. The government has committed more than $110 million in new funding to the Fair Work Ombudsman in recent years to complement and drive those increases in penalties and enforcement, and to ensure that employees receive the entitlements to which they are entitled.

However, these amendments would complicate the administration of the JobMaker hiring credit and would also potentially deprive some young Australians of the opportunity to get into new jobs. We have laws to deal with the underpayment of workers by excising businesses from eligibility under this hiring credit. We potentially then narrow the scope of those who may be growing employment, who may be creating new jobs and who, therefore, may be providing that pathway out of unemployment for young Australians. For those reasons, the government opposes these amendments.

The CHAIR: The question is that amendments (1) and (2) on sheet 1064, moved together by leave by Senator Faruqi, be agreed to.