Productivity Commission draft report: penalties should be same for Saturdays

Unions say the new report by the Productivity Commission confirms their concern that an inquiry into the workplace relations system had been set up by the Abbott government to attack penalty rates.

“We recommended as a restructure to have two separate groups to focus on its primary areas of work – a modern dispute resolution entity and an analytical body addressing significant social and economic questions”, he says. The commission proposes a new form of agreement, an “enterprise contract”, that would fill the gap between enterprise agreements and individual arrangements.

The report says that while penalty rates should be maintained, Sunday rates for cafes, hospitality, entertainment, restaurants and retail should be aligned with Saturday rates. An employee would later be able to lodge a complaint if the agreement breached the no-disadvantage test.

“Tourism and other service sectors need an industrial system suited to the 21st century, not to society as it was 50 years ago, when weekends were sacrosanct and Sunday was a day of rest, when most shops and restaurants were shut”, he said.

The employer would have to lodge the contract with the FWC, but would not have to gain its approval.

In calling for an overhaul of the national workplace umpire, the government’s independent think tank said the process for appointing commissioners is “clearly flawed” and leads to inconsistencies in their decisions.

It recommends tweaking unfair dismissal laws, so employees can only receive compensation when there was no evidence of underperformance or misconduct.

The commission found that migrant workers, especially illegally working migrants, were vulnerable to exploitation and suggested tougher penalties.

It proposes creation of an expert appointments panel, to provide a merit-based shortlist of candidates for appointments.

The commission received 255 submissions including 24 from various unions.

Employment Minister Eric Abetz said once the final report was released the government would consider its recommendations.

Opposition Leader Bill Shorten said this was “just another trip back to WorkChoices”. He’ll be looking at the Productivity Commission report to see how he can use it to do that.

Kate Carnell, chief executive officer of the Australian Chamber of Commerce and Industry, said she was looking forward to meaningful recommendations on the awards system, unfair dismissal, penalty rates and ways to make it easier for small businesses to employ staff.

Harris said he was “pretty confident” the proposed changes to penalty rates would increase overall employment.

ACTU Secretary Dave Oliver said: “The Coalition learned its lesson after being kicked out of government for attacking the rights at work of millions of Australians with its deeply unpopular WorkChoices laws, so now it’s going after workplace rights by stealth. If the government wants to pick up these recommendations, the Australian trade union movement is going to rise up and take them on head on and will fight them in the marginal electorates and ultimately at the ballot box”.

Greens Leader Adam Brandt vowed to make penalty rates an election issue, saying any cuts to penalty rates would be a blow for young people across the country.