Recommendation 1

1.27

The committee recommends that the Senate adopt the following resolution:

That the time for the presentation of the final report of the Select Committee on Job Security be extended to 30 March 2022, so that the committee may inquire into possible privilege matters, including to:

investigate allegations raised in relation to the treatment of seasonal workers who gave evidence at the committee's public hearing on 2 February 2022;

ascertain the facts in the matter; and

report any findings to the Senate.

Recommendation 2

2.137

The committee recommends that the Australian Government provides funding and support to the Australian Bureau of Statistics (ABS) to enable the ABS to reconcile information from the Characteristics of Employment, Labour Account, and Jobs in Australia releases in order to provide clearer and more coherent information on labour hire employment in Australia.

The revised labour hire information should be published on the ABS website and include:

data reconciling the number of people who are registered with a labour hire firm or employment agency with industry level estimates of people employed directly by those businesses; and

data and graphs/tables showing changes in labour hire employment over time.

Recommendation 3

3.67

The committee recommends that the Australian Government reviews the Model WHS Laws and associated Regulations to provide a greater emphasis on supporting workers' psychological safety in the workplace, and include 'job insecurity' as a workplace hazard in the appropriate laws and regulations.

Recommendation 4

3.68

The committee recommends that the Australian Government provides ongoing support and funding to MATES in Construction, and similar evidence-based, industry-focused suicide prevention and mental health and well-being programs—especially in industries where non-standard work arrangements are common, and those heavily-impacted by the pandemic, such as health, aged and disability care, hospitality, retail, the arts and tourism.

Recommendation 5

3.69

The committee recommends that the Australian Government commits to providing an adequate financial and social safety net for all, including by:

ensuring that the JobSeeker payment is sufficient to help unemployed Australians focus on upskilling or obtaining employment;

ensuring that the industries and cohorts most impacted by COVID-19 receive financial and other supports to rebuild and recover; and

by focussing government funding and policy efforts towards initiatives that address the impacts of the pandemic on mental health and well‑being.

Recommendation 6

7.43

The committee recommends that the Australian Government urgently assesses the performance of the Fair Work Amendment (Supporting Australia's Jobs and Economic Recovery) Act 2021. As the data collected through this inquiry suggests, the amendment has not had a positive impact on job security, and it should be repealed and replaced with a new statutory definition of casual employment that reflects the true nature of the employment relationship―rather than a definition which relies upon the employer's description of the relationship in an employment contract―and a new casual conversion provision.

Recommendation 7

7.55

The committee recommends that the Australian Government undertakes a review of the current portable leave schemes operating in Australia, and examines where such schemes could be extended to workers in other industries. This should be done in consultation with employer and employee groups, and state and territory governments.

Recommendation 8

7.67

The committee recommends that the Australian Government provides encouragement and incentives for businesses to hire permanent staff instead of casuals through investigating the use of:

education campaigns around the benefits of ongoing employment for businesses and employers;

training and employment subsidies with secure, ongoing employment requirements attached to the funding;

increasing reporting requirements for publicly-listed companies in relation to work status, pay and conditions; and

introducing a procurement framework to prioritise firms that favour a permanent, directly engaged workforce.

Recommendation 9

7.68

The committee recommends that the Australian Government provides increased resources for the Fair Work Ombudsman, unions and employer associations to provide tripartite support and education to small businesses about their regulatory obligations―and their employees about their industrial rights―in order to increase the proportion of permanent employment in the small business sector.

Recommendation 10

8.98

The committee recommends that the Australian Government amends the Fair Work Act 2009, expanding the scope of the Act to encompass all forms of work, and empowering the Fair Work Commission to:

determine fair rates and conditions for all categories of workers, including contractors;

arbitrate on contracts with independent contractors that are unfair or harsh; and

make orders and determinations for groups or classes of workers.

Recommendation 11

8.100

The committee recommends that the Australian Government supports independent contractors who are sole traders by establishing and promoting accessible low-cost pathways for dispute resolution.

Recommendation 12

8.132

The committee recommends that the Australian Bureau of Statistics consults with relevant migrant and international student community groups, community leaders, unions, employer associations and experts to ensure that its methods for data collection in relation to the on-demand platform workforce include effective and appropriate approaches to collecting data from key worker cohorts.

Recommendation 13

9.36

The committee recommends that the Australian Government urgently clarifies, by way of regulation, which persons or entities owe a duty of care as a person conducting a business or undertaking (PCBU) under the Model Work Health and Safety laws in relation to individual support workers engaged through on-demand platforms like Mable. The law should make it clear that:

any platform that engages workers to provide support work under the NDIS, or similar schemes, is a PCBU and owes a duty of care to those workers, regardless of workers' work status (employee or contractor), or their visa status; and

platform companies cannot transfer their obligations as a PCBU onto other parties.

Recommendation 14

9.66

The committee recommends that the Australian Government amends the National Disability Insurance Scheme Act 2013 to provide that all workers engaged to provide support as part of the National Disability Insurance Scheme must be covered by the Social, Community, Home Care and Disability Services Industry Award, or receive pay and conditions at least equivalent to that Award.

Recommendation 15

9.71

The committee recommends that the Senate give consideration to the referral of an inquiry to the Community Affairs References Committee, examining:

The extent and impact of on‑demand platform employment, increasing casualisation, use of labour hire/agency work, and contract labour in aged care, disability care, social services and health care more broadly, with specific regard to:

impacts of on-demand platform employment models on care workers' experiences of work and sense of job satisfaction;

pay and conditions for workers engaged through platforms, labour hire and agency roles, and casual staff, compared with permanent staff;

training and career progression for on-demand platform workers and labour hire/agency workers;

impacts of work status and worker experiences on retention and motivation to stay in the sector;

the interactions of gender and migration/visa status with work status in the care sectors;

any evidence regarding the impacts of different employment models on pay rates and conditions across the sectors more broadly; and

any related matters.

If such an inquiry were referred, that the committee or any subcommittee have power to consider and make use of the evidence and records of the former Select Committee on Job Security appointed during the 46th Parliament.

Recommendation 16

11.15

The committee recommends that the Australian Government amends the Fair Work Act 2009 by inserting the words 'job security' and 'gender equity' into the principal Object of the Act (section 3), and adding 'job security' and 'gender equity' into the list of matters that need to be taken into account as part of 'The modern awards objective' (section 134) in the Fair Work Act 2009.

Recommendation 17

11.21

The committee recommends that the Australian Government considers developing a tool for evaluating and rating policy proposals in respect of their potential impacts (positive and/or negative) on job security, and makes assessment against the tool mandatory for all relevant new policy proposals. Policy initiatives that are likely to lead to the creation of insecure jobs should be redesigned.

Recommendation 18

11.23

The committee recommends that the Australian Government provides increased resources for the Fair Work Ombudsman to investigate and penalise employers and companies for contraventions of workplace laws and obligations, drawing on the Ombudsman's enhanced powers provided under the Fair Work Amendment (Protecting Vulnerable Workers) Act 2017.

Recommendation 19

11.24

The committee recommends that the Australian Government accepts Recommendation 23 of the National Agricultural Labour Advisory Committee, which read:

'The Committee recommends that the Australian Government require all 417 and 462 visa holders, prior to arrival in Australia, to apply for an Australian tax file number. Information should be provided to 417 and 462 visa holders in their own language, on their rights and entitlements as migrant workers in Australian workplaces, and on how to take action if they are not being treated ethically and lawfully.'

Recommendation 20

11.29

The committee recommends that the Senate give consideration to the referral of an inquiry to the Education and Employment References Committee, examining:

The extent, growth and impact of insecure work in Australia, with specific regard to:

definitions and measures of insecure and precarious work, and the need to develop national measures, and a national data set, to understand changes over time;

the growth in insecure work since the 1970s and the impacts of government policies on this growth;

the impacts of the pandemic on the growth of insecure and precarious jobs, including those in the on-demand platform sector;

job insecurity among vulnerable workers, including migrants and temporary residents;

the experiences of workers in insecure jobs, their pay and conditions, and the impacts on their health, wellbeing, social connection and prosperity;

perspectives of employers on the use of casual, fixed-term contract, labour hire and platform workforce arrangements;

impacts on the level of casual and insecure work of the reforms made in 2021 to the Fair Work Act 2009 through the Fair Work Amendment (Supporting Australia’s Jobs and Economic Recovery) Act 2021, particularly those concerning casual conversion;

the adequacy of existing legislative and regulatory regimes to address the challenges of insecure and precarious work; and