Page 817 - Week 03 - Tuesday, 21 March 2017
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now an Australian Unemployed Workers’ Union, which is specifically addressing the issues of underemployment, casualisation issues and related income insecurity. I had not come across this before. I think the fact that that now exists is a reflection of the fact that this is an increasing issue in our community.
Certainly, when it comes to industries such as retail, pharmacy and hospitality industries, we see them particularly impacted by the cuts to penalty rates. We know that workers in these industries are disproportionately women and young people. It is these people who will likewise be disproportionately impacted by the dramatic reductions in penalty rates decided on by the Fair Work Commission. The impact on women will simply work to widen the gender pay gap that is already prevalent throughout our community. A large proportion of women working in these sectors are working on a part-time basis; so they are reliant on penalty rates to top up their earnings.
Many young people in these sectors are also working on a part-time or casual basis, and these cuts will disproportionately impact on those who have just entered the workforce for the first time, who may be working to support their studies, or often both. Cuts to penalty rates will simply work to create new barriers to young people getting started in the workforce and furthering their career prospects, in addition to the ever-increasing costs to undertake and complete tertiary and vocational studies.
According to the Australian Bureau of Statistics, both the retail sector and the food services sector rank as the industries with the lowest average weekly wages. I believe, and the Greens believe, that further cutting these wages is simply unfair and will add to income insecurity for those Canberrans who are working in these sectors. Certainly, people who are working in these sectors have been reliant on penalty rates to help bridge that gap. It is important to recognise this, in addition to the extra demands of asking people to work overtime on weekends and on public holidays. I think that is something that perhaps has not had exposure in this discussion that I would like to reflect on. It is about thinking about what sort of community we want to live in.
I do believe that we should have space on the weekends for people to stop, for people to engage with their families, to engage in the recreational hobbies that they might have, to volunteer. All of these are very important things. I think that if you are going to work on those days, or if you are going to work unsociable hours when most of the rest of us would rather be at home relaxing, sleeping and doing the other things that we do, then the very point of penalty rates is some reward for the downsides of having to work on weekends or out of hours.
Of course, we are going to have a further discussion about penalty rates tomorrow and I will add further comments at that time. But I think it is important that we reflect on the importance of income security for Canberra shift and weekend workers and that we discuss these matters in this place. Despite the attempts at points of order we saw from the opposition, these are the people in our community that this government has to take responsibility for.
We, through our budget, have to reflect on how we impact on them. We, through the provision of concessions, seek to assist those people who do have insecure incomes.
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