Anthony Chisholm (Queensland, Australian Labor Party) Share this | Hansard source

It's a pleasure to follow Senator Pratt, who laid out the Labor Party arguments on this Fair Work Amendment (Supporting Australia's Jobs and Economic Recovery) Bill 2021, which have been consistent for a number of months. Increasingly those arguments have actually been taken across Australia—and certainly across regional Queensland, where a number of unions have been out having meetings and talking to people. They've really been giving people the opportunity to understand the damage that this bill will do to their ability to go about their lives and their workplaces.

It's a bill that says so much about this government. It sums up how they operate, what they stand for and how they see life for Australian workers and families into the future. We can start with the name of the bill, 'supporting Australia's jobs and economic recovery'. It's always the cynical, political messaging with this government. They never miss an opportunity; it's politics all the time, and we see that with the title of this bill.

We've also seen it in the way that they've negotiated on this as well, and their positioning. They dropped getting rid of the better off overall test—the BOOT—during the first effort to get the bill passed. But they're prepared to use that to play on the fears of Australians, knowing full well that it was brought in around Work Choices the first time. Let's also think about this moment in time and look at what the world has been dealing with and going through over the last 12 months, then consider what Australians have been going through as well over this period of time. We know that hundreds of thousands of Australians have lost their jobs and that many of those have been relying on JobKeeper, which is due to expire in a couple of weeks.

We know that Australians have a new-found sense of what an essential worker is through what we went through last year. Australians have appreciated those people who were able to provide the support so that many of us could get through, whether it was from frontline health workers—those people behind the scenes in health services who have helped to keep hospitals in shape and enabled us to deal with the pandemic—or those who have been on the frontline in supermarkets. We know how under pressure they've been. The last 12 months have certainly given Australians a new sense of what an essential worker is.

But this bill is the vision of this government. All it is is a series of ideological attacks—long-held beliefs that they've always wanted to pursue and have racked up under cover of dealing with the pandemic. That's what says so much about this government: the fact that they're pursuing long-held beliefs and agendas that they've always wanted to get on with in terms of attacking workers but wrapping these things up in terms of dealing with the pandemic. That is their cynical way of trying to get this through.

Some of the challenges that all workers are facing across the country were in place before the pandemic, such as increasing casualisation. We know that two million people were unemployed or looking for more work and that record low wage growth was well in place before the pandemic. And, sadly, from Queensland's point of view, there was the use of labour hire through many parts of Queensland, particularly through some industries. That's being used to drive down wages and conditions. We can then add onto these existing conditions the pandemic, and that's what the Australian people have been dealing with. But this bill is being presented today as this government's vision for a solution for those challenges that workers are facing.

It's so lacking in vision and it's bereft of any creativity from this government. They're incapable of offering up a better Australia. If this bill is the best they can put up then it's a sad indictment on this government that this is their vision for Australian workers. We actually had a moment, during what Australia went through over the last 12 months, when people did work together. The opposition were prepared to work with the government to try to find solutions to these challenges. Yet here we are, 12 months on, and Australia might have got through the pandemic but the government don't have a vision for what the future looks like. They don't have a vision for a better Australia, and all we see in this legislation is actually going to make things worse. It's going to make things worse for workers and it's going to make things worse for those families as a result of this.

Those challenges I spoke about before—low wage growth, casualisation and people looking for work—were around before the pandemic. They've been accentuated now because of what we've been dealing with, but still the government shows no vision and no creativity. They just revert to the age-old attacks on workers that we've seen since the Howard days. It really is a tragedy that this is the best they can do, given the opportunity that they have had.

So what does this bill do to hurt Australians? It makes it easier for employers to casualise jobs that would otherwise have been permanent. It makes bargaining for better pay and conditions more difficult than it already is. It allows for wage cuts. It weakens wage theft punishments in jurisdictions where wage theft has already been deemed a criminal act, like my home state of Queensland; this is something the state government has been really proud of delivering on, and was something that was seen as a significant factor in the recent election.

I turn to some of the evidence that was placed before the committee hearings. They were truncated committee hearings, because of the government's urgency on this, but it was a great job by Labor senators and others to get some of this evidence on the record. I know the committee spent time in Townsville as well, within Queensland. According to the Centre for Future Work:

Australia has not experienced such a sustained deceleration of both nominal and real wages in its entire post-war history.

The Liberal-National government's plan to get wages growing again is to make it easier to casualise workers. The Senate economics committee looked into the government's bill and heard from workers and other groups. Included in this was the Centre for Future Work, who said that weakening casual labour definitions and increasing employer control over these definitions will suppress wage growth and fuel insecure work:

The worrying expansion of insecure work in Australia is already associated with major economic and social consequences, including the slowest wage growth at any point since the Depression, undermined consumption spending, rising household financial instability, and rising inequality.

This was furthered by Per Capita:

… the Bill is likely to exacerbate, rather than relieve, the insecurity of hours and income experienced by too many workers in Australia.

…   …   …

At its worst interpretation, the new definition and conversion clause could encourage employers to offer casual employment to all new employees, giving them a year of 'try before you buy' employment for all employees, regardless of the eventual hours worked.

This is particularly important given that the growth in employment has been on the back of casual work.

Sixty per cent of all jobs created between May and November last year were casual work, according to the Centre for Future Work. In this period, casual employment grew by 400,000 jobs. Similarly, part-time work has also grown strongly in the same period. Australia's COVID recovery can't be built on the back of more insecure work, and this bill is going to make that worse. It won't improve conditions for casuals. The government even overturned the Federal Court decision on what it means to be a casual, making it harder.

Under these laws, if someone starts a job and agrees to be employed as a casual they remain a casual regardless of their actual work hours and patterns, as long as the employer employs them on the basis that they make no firm advance commitment to continuing in indefinite work according to an agreed pattern of work. Even if a court finds that a casual worker should be permanent, any casual loading they have received is deducted from outstanding permanent entitlements. So they still find a way to punish workers.

There are countless examples of workers doing the same job but being paid less—30 per cent to 40 per cent less on average, it is being reported, than their permanent counterparts. We've seen numerous examples of that in Queensland through the resourcing industry. Not only are they getting less than their full-time counterparts; they will not get what is owed to them even if they are found to be permanent.

This bill does very little to address the permanent-casual problem, something that is rife throughout Queensland and regional Queensland. The provisions don't offer a realistic pathway to permanency, with a loophole of potentially unlimited reasonable grounds that employees will not be able to challenge. The ACTU called the provisions 'essentially meaningless', given that employers are not bound to offer permanency if they do not think it is reasonable and can also refuse to consent to arbitration before the Fair Work Commission.

I think this is a key part of this, particularly from a Queensland point of view, because we have seen this become prevalent throughout regional Queensland. I've spoken about this in the chamber before because, ultimately, what this is doing is driving down the pay and conditions of all workers. But it's also changing the nature of many of these regional towns in terms of regional Queensland being a good place to live, work and raise a family. If the only employment you can rely on is casual, you aren't able to make the same decisions in life as others who have full-time or permanent work. It is changing the nature of these places and making them less attractive for people to live, work, and raise a family as generations of Queenslanders and, indeed, Australians have done.

There is the simplified additional hours agreement. This provision means an employer and a part-time employee can agree to the employee working additional hours at their normal pay rate without the employer paying overtime. The Queensland Nurses and Midwives' Union stated there has been a proliferation of part-time employees who are being treated as casual employees whilst negating the need to pay the 25 per cent loading required for casual employees. It argued: 'Effectively, the employee has limited control over hours worked and loses the benefits of part-time employment. Whilst the employer gains flexibility and reduced hourly rates, expansion of part-time employment practices by employers will further exacerbate insecurity and precarious employment.' The Queensland Nurses and Midwives' Union obviously covers so many vital workers, particularly given the health crisis that we have been dealing with over the last 12 months.

The bill will also weaken wage theft laws in Queensland. The Queensland Council of Unions said in their evidence that the bill considers the penalty for stealing by a worker to be 2½ times worse than stealing by an employer. In contrast, wage theft in Queensland is set at the same corresponding penalty if the stealing is conducted by a clerk or servant in relation to the employer's property. The Queensland government has criticised the wage theft changes. Queensland has a maximum penalty of up to 10 years imprisonment, whereas the Commonwealth regime has a maximum of only four. The Queensland government said in their submission:

The setting of a lower penalty at the Commonwealth level appears to signal that the Commonwealth Government regards wage theft as a less serious act than, for example, the forgery of postage stamps (which attracts a maximum penalty of 10 years imprisonment).

I think that shows the attitude to wage theft of this government, which has been its attitude for years, despite the overwhelming evidence that has been presented for Australian workers being ripped off.

Australia and Australian workers need an economic recovery that benefits all. Labor believes that we need to promote inclusive prosperity, where we create wealth through improved job security and decent wages. Per Capita summarised Australia's recovery well:

Despite a strong recovery in asset prices and a falling headline unemployment rate towards the end of 2020, the reality is that Australia's broader economic recovery threatens to take the shape of a 'K' rather than a 'V': that is, some people will do very well, having retained their jobs and saved money during the lock-downs last year, while others will fall deeper into insecurity and poverty.

The reality of this bill that we are debating today is that it will make that worse. Labor has been consistent since this bill was first introduced that this is bad legislation and it needs to be voted down, and that is what Labor will do. But more than that, it is such a missed opportunity for the country.

At a time when Australians are actually looking for a better vision, looking for something to look forward to that offers hope for their future, the government have turned up and put forward this bill that is going to make Australians and their families worse off. It is a sad indictment on this government that this is the best they can do, but they are so lacking in vision, they are so lacking in creativity, that this bill has to be opposed. I encourage the crossbench to oppose it as well. There is nothing that can be done to improve this. It is something that needs to be voted down, and the Australian people need to punish this government at the next election.