For many years the Greens have been concerned that our current laws make it difficult for workers to organise and achieve real improvements in their pay and conditions. We have argued there are problems with the Fair Work Act and that industrial relations reform is needed—in relation to increasing collective bargaining, removing pay secrecy, enabling flexibility at work, reducing job insecurity, lifting minimum wages, narrowing the gender pay gap, lifting wages in the low paid care sector, and ensuring the right to take industrial action. We believe the principle of making no worker worse off should guide reform of workplace relations laws.
There is much that is good within this bill. Many of the amendments to the Fair Work Act contained within the bill respond to long standing issues that the Greens have campaigned to change for years. People in Australia have seen the value of wages go backwards in real terms and low waged workers are suffering. Collective bargaining now occurs in only a small proportion of Australian workplaces. The persistent gender wage gap is an injustice to women, who continue to shoulder the burden of unpaid care for children and other family members, which is of significant economic value, yet is undervalued and negatively impacts women's earning capacity and wealth over their lifetimes.
The Greens commend the amendments that insert the promotion of job security and gender equity as new objects of the Fair Work Act, with the Fair Work Commission needing to take account of this when performing its functions. We have long supported the abolition of the Australian Building and Construction Commission.
The Greens support provisions within the bill that aim to encourage wage growth, which is critically needed in our current context of cost-of-living pressure and high inflation. It is crucial that workers' wages and conditions are protected and improved upon, and that they do not go backwards. Many workers continue to be reliant on awards and it is important that our laws and systems provide a strong floor that cannot be eroded.
During hearings on the bill, examples from the retail industry were shared with the Committee of agreements that failed to pay workers what they would have earned under the equivalent Modern Award and National Employment Standards (NES). The approval of some agreements by the Fair Work Commission were appealed by workers and their representatives and subsequently terminated. These are some of our lowest paid workers and our systems should operate to protect their basic pay and conditions. No one should fall through the safety net.
Despite the concern expressed by employer groups about the potential for this bill to enable and increase industrial action, it remains tightly prescribed and restricted, raising questions about continuing contravention of the basic human right set out by the International Labour Organisation (ILO) to withdraw labour to defend and improve working conditions.
Contract insecurity, in the form of successive fixed term contracts, is restricted in the bill, which is very welcome. However, the Greens are concerned that there are significant exclusions, allowing this practice to continue in some industries and roles. The bill does not attempt to curtail the exceptionally high levels of casual employment in Australia, which is an ongoing issue that needs attention. This remains a high priority for the Greens, reflected in the strong policy we took to the May 2022 election.
The bill's amendments to the NES that expand the circumstances under which an employee can request a flexible working arrangement, strengthen employer obligations in this regard, and introduce a dispute resolution process for requests of this nature, are all important changes and reflect recommendations from the Senate Select Committee on Work and Care's interim report.
Over recent months and across the country, the Senate Select Committee on Work and Care has received a great deal of consistent evidence about the failing architecture of work and care in Australia, and the inadequacy of our workplace laws in this regard.
While this bill inserts a welcome dispute resolution process for requests for flexible work, there remains one NES without a mechanism for appeal or arbitration: the right to request an extension to unpaid parental leave. The Greens are concerned that the lack of appropriate enforcement of this right undermines its effective application. There is no good reason for the absence of review and enforcement of this right, and it is our view the Fair Work Act should be amended in this respect. The fact that two NES rights of such relevance to women have remained unenforceable needs correction: we want to see all rights and especially those supporting working carers appropriately enforced and backed by civil penalties where employers do not do the right thing.
Further areas for reform arising from evidence submitted to the Senate Select Committee on Work and Care include: the need for a right for workers to disconnect from their work outside of paid work hours; and increasing worker rights in rostering practices, specifically with regard predictability and a likely minimum number of hours, so that rosters do not negatively interfere with workers' care commitments. We also believe it is time for an overarching assessment and revaluing of wages across the care sectors given their historic undervaluation. Wages in the care sectors should appropriately reflect in award classification structures the true nature of skills and experience of this work, and appropriately value it in relative terms across aged care, early childhood education and care, and disability care.
Finally, it is worth noting that much of the legal architecture of the existing Fair Work Act was written by Labor as part of the Accord, and was the foundation of enterprise bargaining, of restrictions around the right to strike and of collapsing trade union membership in this country. It is disappointing to see that through this bill the Labor Party does not address the right to strike, which is a basic worker's right. Currently, workers only have a very limited ability to exercise their right to strike, and its well past time to redress the imbalance of power between workers and bosses.
Senator Mehreen FaruqiSenator Barbara Pocock
MemberParticipating member
Greens Senator for New South WalesGreens Senator for South Australia