Chris Ketter (Queensland, Australian Labor Party) Share this | Link to this | Hansard source

I rise tonight to talk about the issue of penalty rates and also briefly talk about an issue which the government sometimes claims is on the backburner but which is surely waiting in the wings for the right time to re-emerge. Penalty rates are, of course, a very important part of the take-home pay of low-paid workers. These days, employers argue that penalty rates are anachronistic in our modern economy. But I can assure you that, for the workers in receipt of those penalty rates, those penalty rates are definitely not anachronistic. They help to put food on the table and assist low-paid families to meet the cost of living.

The alarm bells are ringing on this issue of penalty rates at the moment, partially because of the comments that have been made by a number of coalition members in recent times. I particularly draw the attention of the Senate to the comments of the Prime Minister, on 6 September, when he ruled out lowering or abolishing weekend penalty rates. When it comes to penalty rates and indeed a range of other issues that impact upon ordinary working people, we know that we cannot trust what this Prime Minister has to say. By way of context, I wish to give something of a background to the form that the coalition has in reverting to type on its core beliefs: in introducing the GP tax and in delaying superannuation increases. We have two textbook coalition examples of how to bring in policy through the back door without first taking it to an election.

On the GP tax we first saw the Prime Minister's former health adviser quietly sneak the idea out in October last year, just a month after the election. It was then worked into the Commission of Audit before becoming a cornerstone of this friendless budget—a tired budget, which was still wondering these corridors, in September, in search of somewhere to have a good lie down and be put to rest.

With regard to superannuation, the Prime Minister and the Treasurer were a little less subtle on how they reneged on their promises to the Australian public. The coalition have talked themselves into a standstill over the last 18 months, swearing that no changes to superannuation were being contemplated. This was before the events of the last sitting week, during which the dirty deal was done, when legislation delaying the increase in superannuation contributions to 12 per cent was rammed through this parliament.

What have the government said on penalty rates in recent weeks? We have seen the Assistant Minister for Infrastructure and Regional Development, as reported in The Australian Financial Review on 13 August, saying:

This is an area we must reform …

And further:

We cannot accept that on New Year's Eve you can't attend your favourite restaurant because it is impossible for that restaurant to pay its staff to open up.

On 3 September, Senator Abetz said that workplace laws remained a 'top priority' for the coalition, as he promised further changes to IR laws in a second-term Abbott government. Alex Hawke, on ABC radio, on 4 September, said:

I think given that Sundays are no longer sacrosanct, the idea of Sunday, having to pay a 75 per cent loading was an old concept. There's no real reason or modern defence for paying such a loading on a same trading day as any other.

In The Courier-Mail on 10 September, Senator James McGrath stated: 'We should be encouraging people to work, not hit employers with penalty rates.' The most damning quote of all comes from the Minister for Employment himself, who stated that workplace relations have been:

… cooled down substantially, temperature wise, which is if I might be so bold … exactly what the Coalition wanted … if you want your changes to last you've got to do it in evolutionary steps, not revolutionary steps.

There we have it. So we can all be absolutely certain what these evolutionary steps are, let us spell it out: the minister will first be increasingly letting his backbenchers off the leash to say what they really think about penalty rates; then, when the Productivity Commission gets around to it, the minister will claim some sort of groundswell of public opposition to penalty rates. You can bet that the last step will be a feigned change of heart, requiring the government to revisit their solemn promises to not tamper with penalty rates. I reiterate my point that penalty rates are extremely important to low-paid workers and I would urge this government to stop putting its hands in the pockets of those who are— (Time expired)