Unions
ALP: employers have too much power
Australia cannot tackle inequality or build a future of inclusive prosperity without a workplace relations system that is both productive and fair, says Brendan O’Connor.
“The tilt of bargaining power away from workers and to employers has gone too far,” says the ALP’s shadow Minister for Employment and Workplace Relations Brendan O’Connor.
In a speech to the National Press Club, O’Connor said Australia’s industrial relations laws are being “gamed” by employers, “cheered on by a complicit government”.
He cited large companies such as Pizza Hut or Myer using subcontractors on sham contracts to pay employees as little as $6 per hour.
“There is something really wrong when those big, household-name companies apparently feel absolutely no responsibility, or consider themselves immune from reputational risk, for exploitation of the workers on whose labour they make a vast profit,” he said.
“Wage theft appears to be reaching epidemic proportions across our economy. It’s not just 7-Eleven, or Dominos Pizza, or a certain celebrity chef underpaying workers.
“Over the 12 months from June 2015 to July 2016, the Fair Work Ombudsman recovered more than $27 million owed to over 11,000 workers, from almost 30,000 allegations of Fair Work Act breaches.”
O’Connor says the Turnbull government is “clueless” about what to do about these abuses.
“Instead, they obsess about destroying organised labour in all its forms, which will only put downward pressure on wages.”
The federal government’s behaviour as an employer is an insight into its workplace relations policies, he says.
“Look at the way the Turnbull government treats its own workforce: dragging out bargaining, outsourcing jobs, privatising services and fighting every step of the way the efforts of the CPSU (the
main federal public sector union) to protect the pay and conditions of Commonwealth public servants.”
The ALP’s plan to change the rules
In his Press Club speech Brendan O’Connor outlined some of the changes Labor intends to implement to make workplace relations fairer:
- Amend the law to prevent employers forcing their workers into sham contracting arrangements to avoid direct employment.
- Create a National Labor Hire Licensing scheme: a licence would only go to those employers with a clean record of complying with employment, tax and OH&S laws. Licences would be revoked for serious misconduct.
- Increase penalties for employers who systematically underpay workers, make companies responsible for business practices that rely on underpaying workers, and ensure that Australian and temporary overseas workers are not being exploited.