Members, we are now half way through the year with the SDA Tasmanian Branch dealing with attacks on the reduction or abolition of penalty rates – attacks which are becoming more prevalent.
In May, a Select Committee of the Legislative Council resolved to hold and report upon the challenges surrounding the growth of business enterprises within Tasmania, with evidence and submissions forwarded to the Productivity Commission in regard to their inquiry.
The Productivity Commission has recommended that penalty rates be abolished, which has the potential to force an effective pay cut of up to $300 per week for a retail worker, without any offset.
The SDA submitted that the rationale of payment of penalty rates for work performed in unsociable hours such as on evenings, nights and weekends is to compensate employees for the disadvantages to which workers are subject to when working such hours.
The SDA has always supported penalty rates as an integral part of the wages system. The SDA is totally opposed to the abolition of penalty rates in the modern award system.
The view that higher rates ought to be diminished on weekends because of deregulated shop trading hours is flawed and incorrect.
Further, Labor has established the Fair Work Taskforce, a Senate Committee that launched its first Hearing in Launceston on Monday 29 June at the Grand Chancellor Hotel.
Four Senators,including Tasmanian Senators Helen Polley and Catryna Bylick, took submissions from SDA workers who were keen to voice their concerns about the impact the Abbott policies are having on jobs, families and communities as well as important workplace entitlements like penalty rates and the minimum wage.
The majority of workers in Australia working within the lowest-paid industries are predominantly female, young and employed on a casual or part-time basis.
The ability of low-paid individuals to improve their position is limited, and is recognised as such by the ILO Convention to which Australia is a signatory.
Balancing the needs of workers and employers requires a fair and strong system, underpinned by supportive legislation.
The key purpose of the Fair Work Act is to deliver such a system, and our members who gathered at the Taskforce Hearing were able to demonstrate how their incomes would be reduced if the penalties they receive were removed, bringing them almost to the poverty line.