Showing posts with label industrial relations. Show all posts
Showing posts with label industrial relations. Show all posts

Tuesday 13 February 2024

A simple explanation of the 'right to disconnect' - that is the right to separate your work life from your home & family life


All employees in the national workplace relations system are covered by the National Employment Standards (NES).

This is regardless of the award, registered agreement or employment contract that applies. 


Details can be found at:



Considering that Opposition Leader & LNP MP for Dickson Peter Dutton has vowed to repeal the Albanese government’s newly passed tranche of workplace reforms, including the right to disconnect, if the Coalition was to be re-elected to office next year — here is a simple explanation of how, under the law, workers now have the legal right to ignore phone calls and emails made by their employers out of working hours or demands to work unscheduled unpaid hours if the employer's request can be considered unreasonable. In other words, workers have the right to disconnect their home and family life from their work life.

 

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=zvKfaKR2UAs


Thursday 24 August 2023

More than $847.25 million in wages are estimated to be underpaid each year, affecting 1.38 million workers - in June 2022 that included approx. 16,045 NSW Northern Rivers employees believed to be owed stolen wages of est. $4.8 million


 

Australian workers are dealing with the rising cost

of living, housing market pressures, a rental crisis,

and stagnant wage growth.

Unpaid earnings harm people who worked in good faith for their pay packet and - right now - people are having to carefully count every dollar…

More than $847.25 million in wages are estimated to be underpaid each year, affecting 1.38 million workers, or

about 11.5 per cent of the employed Australian workforce”

[McKell Institute, “Unfinished Business: The Ongoing Battle Against Wage Theft”, August 2023]



Smart Company, 22 August 2023:


Wage theft is costing Australian workers $850 million a year, demonstrating an “ingrained culture” of deliberate underpayment and the need for criminalisation at the federal level, according to a damning new report from the McKell Institute.


A fresh analysis of Fair Work Ombudsman audits stretching back to 2009 shows more than a quarter of audited businesses failed to observe the monetary obligations set out by industry awards or enterprise agreements, according to the think tank.


Its calculations show nearly 27,000 businesses were found to have underpaid approximately 1.3 million Australian workers over that time frame.


The real level of wage underpayment is likely higher, McKell Institute CEO Ed Cavanough said, as the analysis did not cover the underpayment of penalty rates, or circumstances where payment under a different award would have been more appropriate.


This is an extraordinary amount of money being stolen and it’s unacceptable,” Cavanough said in a statement.


Wage underpayment hits businesses big and small

The report arrives against a backdrop of high-profile wage underpayments claims, with Coles, Target, and Bunnings just a few of the major brands to have revealed significant wage underpayments in recent years.


Wage underpayment also stretches deep into the small business sector, with the Fair Work Ombudsman on Tuesday revealing it has levelled nearly $85,000 in penalties against two Victorian businesses accused of underpaying young workers, as a result of its latest investigation.


The Ombudsman recently launched a spate of undercover campaigns targeting small restaurants and food court vendors deemed to offer suspiciously low-cost fare.


The McKell Institute argues laws criminalising wage theft across the board are necessary to discourage employers from deliberately withholding earnings and entitlements.


The report throws its weight behind the federal government’s upcoming industrial relations reform package, which is expected to contain legislation making wage theft a criminal offence across the board….


Read the full article here.



In the NSW Northern Rivers region there are two federal electorates, Page and Richmond.


According to the McKell Institute 29-page analysis of the economic impact of wage theft in Australia, as of June 2022:


  • In the electorate of Page there were est. 1,366 non-compliant business which between them were believed to have stolen wages from 7,023 employees with a total minimum value of $4,289,664.


  • In the electorate of Richmond there were est. 1,754 non-compliant businesses which between them were believed to have stolen wages from 9,022 employees with a total minimum value of $5,510,65.



Sunday 4 June 2023

What Australian Unions declared to be "the largest increase to minimum and Award wages in Australia’s history" occurred on Thursday 1 June 2023 - effective 1 July

 

This was Australian Council of Trade Unions (ACTU) Secretary Sally McManus writing on the Australian Unions website, 2 June 2023:


Today the Fair Work Commission announced that workers on the national minimum wage will receive a pay rise of 8.6 per cent. Workers on Award wages will have their pay increased by 5.75 per cent. Both of those increases will come into effect in the first pay period after 1 July 2023.


The union movement fought hard for this pay increase. Up against us were the big business lobby – who argued for a real-wage cut.


All union members should be proud of this pay rise. It’s the largest increase to minimum and Award wages in Australia’s history.


It’s what unions do – we use our strength in numbers to ensure that working peoples’ pay gets moving again.


Increasing pay is the most important step to reducing the impact of the cost-of-living crisis….


Come July 2023 the approx. 20.5 per cent of Australian employees (est. 2.75 million individuals) who are paid in accordance with minimum wage rates in modern awards and the 0.7 per cent of Australian employees (est. 180,000 individuals) paid the National Minimum Wage – workers who are also much more likely to be low paid, mostly work part-time hours, are predominantly female, almost half being casual employees and probably having no entitled to paid leave – will see more dollars in their pay packets.


According to The Guardian on 2 June 2023, the Fair Work Commission’s statement indicates the minimum wages will increase to $882.80 per week or $23.23 per hour.

This appears to translate to a new hourly rate of $23.21 for those on the National Minimum Wage.


Based on ABS labour force numbers for April 2023, it is expected that up to 21 per cent of the current 13.87 million strong national workforce may benefit from these minimum wage rate rises.


Given that an est. 54,927 employees in Northern Rivers region worked part-time by 2021 and an est. 35,028 were female, there may be quite a few local residents with a little more in their pay packets next month.


However, as most of the modern award-reliant workforce is employed under a relatively small number of modern awards covering specific industries or occupations, the effect of the Fair Work Commission Annual Wage Review 2022-23 Decision differs markedly between industry sectors and, along with the increase in the National Minimum Wage will have a limited effect on the national wages bill.


Which is not to say that employer lobby groups will not be frequenting newspaper, radio and television platforms voicing ‘the sky is falling’ predictions over the next week.


Monday 30 November 2020

Scotty and Josh are riding the superannuation wrecking ball in 2020

 

Josh and Scotty a double act since 2018
IMAGE: The Guardian


Employers are required to fulfil their obligations under the Superannuation Guarantee (Administration) Act 1992 (or under industrial agreements in many cases) to make superannuation contributions on behalf of their employees.


The current statutory rate of employer compulsory superannuation contributions is scheduled to rise incrementally by 10 per cent in 2021 and reach 12 per cent in 2024.


According to the Financial Review on 15 July 2019; Politicians, public servants and academics are among the est. 2 million workers or 18 per cent of all employees who would be unaffected if a scheduled rise in the compulsory Super Guarantee from 9.5 per cent to 10 per cent to 12 per cent did not occur as their existing employer superannuation contribution is already above 12 per cent.


Another est. 300,000 people, or 3 per cent of all employees are not included in the Super Guarantee as they earn less than $450 a month before tax and est. 63 per cent of these workers are female.


Add to this the reportedly 2.2 million employees who do not receive their full super entitlements because their employers unlawfully do not pay all or any employer contributions to eligible workers and, the size of the workforce who might receive a benefit from a 0.5 per cent increase in the Super Guarantee next year has shrunk to est. 8.2 million workers.


Based on full-time average adult weekly earnings in October 2020 an employer’s compulsory superannuation contribution per worker would be est. $651 per month at 9.5% in 2020 and $681 per month at 10% in 2021.


That’s an increase of $30 a month or $7.50 a week next year.


A dollar a day is not going to break either the employer or the worker and, at the end of the 2021-22 financial year there would be an extra $415 in interest payments in that worker's superannuation account – and if that worker has another 30 years before retirement that $415 dollars in interest could represent up to $29,000 more in his/her superannuation account at the end of that time period.


When one considers that an est. 98 per cent of all businesses in Australia employ 20 or less people and as that would only mean an employer contribution increase of $20 or less a day for the vast majority of employers, it is hard to see this as an unreasonable move.


After all, even the Morrison Government admits that superannuation assists middle income earners to smooth their income over their lives, and Without compulsory superannuation, middle income earners would not save enough for retirement.


However, the Abbott-Trunbull- Morrison Government does not fancy 8.2 million workers receiving an extra $30 a month in their super accounts next year.


So Josh Frydenberg is doing a good imitation of Chicken Little and screeching the sky will fall if $1 a day is added to a worker’s superannuation account in 2021. 


He bespoke a study from Treasury to back him up when it comes to not increasing the Super Guarantee this year and moving towards a policy of forcing homeowners on age pensions or retirees with little super to either sell their house or borrow against it in order to fund retirement, so that Scott Morrison can happily continue his personal war on the poor and vulnerable.


Put simply the Morrison Government is arguing that neither workers, their bosses nor the national economy can afford an increase in the amount of money which enters a worker’s superannuation for his/her financial benefit on retirement.


Quite frankly I see no real justification for that stance.


A stance that is also incredibly hypocritical given that by 2007 the Parliamentary Contributory Superannuation Scheme saw newly elected federal parliamentarians receiving government compulsory contributions into their own superannuation accounts at a rate of 15.4 per cent in order to bring superannuation arrangements for parliamentarians in line with current community standards.


The lack of congruence between what federal politicians see as community standards applicable to themselves and community standards as applicable to ordinary workers is so marked that the ordinary voter has begun to notice......


 

Wednesday 2 September 2020

McDonald's & Tantex Holdings spent a lot of money defending the indefensible over the last nine and a half months


Tanya Manteit-Mulcahy owns Tantex Holdings,
which runs several McDonald’s stores in Brisbane
Picture: Jono Searle
Source: News Limited 26 November 2019

The Advocate, 31 August 2020:

A Queensland McDonalds franchisee has been ordered to pay $1000 in compensation to a worker denied toilet and drink breaks.

Tantex Holdings, which operates six of the fast-food restaurants, has been ordered to pay former employee Chiara Staines compensation by the Federal Court on Monday.

In its published reasons for the decisions, the court found Ms Staines had been denied a 10-minute paid drink break on all but three occasions while working at a Queen St Mall restaurant in Brisbane from May 8, 2017 to June 15, 2019.

McDonald's staff have been entitled to paid 10-minute drink breaks under McDonald's Australia Enterprise Agreement 2013, which was approved by the Fair Work Commission on July 24, 2013.

According to the agreement, all employees are entitled to a 10-minute drink break when they work a shift between four to nine hours.

If they work more than nine hours, staff are entitled to two 10-minute breaks.

This is in addition to a meal break if working longer than five hours.

Ms Staines told the court her work was fast-paced, hot with a constant smell of food and the environment was stressful and demanding, physically and mentally.

"Ms Staines was denied a short respite from, what was by its nature, a mentally and physically demanding job," Justice John Logan said.

Brisbane businesswoman Tanya Manteit-Mulcah is the sole director of Tantex Holdings, which conceded it had not provided Ms Staines with the allowed breaks.

"The drink break for which clause 29 of the Agreement provided was a workplace right," Justice Logan found.

"So, too, for reasons explained above, was a right, within the bounds of reasonableness, to pause for a drink of water or to go to the toilet during a shift a workplace right."

This matter appears to have been before the Federal Court - Fair Work Division for the last nine and a half months. 

The Statement of Claim reportedly alleged that Tantex Holdings breached multiple workplace laws and accused managers of engaging in coercion and threatening conduct.

Sunday 21 June 2020

Fair Work Commission announces a staged 1.75% increase to Australian minimum wages. Group 1 from the first full pay period starting on or after 1 July 2020, Group 2 from 1 November 2020 & Group 3 from 1 February 2021. Which group are you in?


Fair Work Commission, media release, 19 June 2020:


The Fair Work Commission has announced a 1.75% increase to minimum wages. This will apply to all award wages.
Increases to awards will start on 3 different dates for different groups of awards. See When will my award increase for information on when the awards will increase.
Most employees are covered by an award. If you’re not sure which award applies, use Find my award.
For anyone not covered by an award or an agreement, the new national minimum wage will be $753.80 per week or $19.84 per hour. This applies from the first full pay period starting on or after 1 July 2020.
You can read the detailed decisionexternal-icon.png on the Fair Work Commission’s website.

What do you need to do?

While we’re working to update our website and tools with more information and the new rates, you can:
  • subscribe to get email updates and we’ll let you know when the new minimum rates are available in our pay tools
  • keep checking our website for updates.
If you’re registered with My account you can subscribe to updates and manage your subscriptions in your account.

Who does the increase apply to?

The 1.75% increase applies to the national minimum wage and will apply to minimum rates in awards in 3 stages. See When will my award increase for information on when the awards will increase.
If you’re covered by a registered agreement, you should check it to see whether this increase affects you.
The increase doesn’t affect employees who already get paid more than their new minimum wage.

Interaction with the JobKeeper payment

The new minimum wage also applies to any work an employee performs while they're in the JobKeeper scheme, if they get their pay rate from an award or the national minimum wage. See JobKeeper and the Annual Wage Review 2020 on our JobKeeper wage subsidy scheme page for more information.

What happens next?

The Commission will issue draft determinations and orders about how this decision affects awards. It will then update the pay rates in each award.  We’re working on updates to our pay tools, information and resources with the new rates.

When will my award increase?

The increase to awards will happen in 3 groups.

Group 1 Awards - from 1 July 2020

  • Frontline Heath Care & Social Assistance Workers
  • Teachers and Child Care
  • Other Essential Services

Group 2 Awards - from 1 November 2020

  • Construction
  • Manufacturing
  • A range of other industries

Group 3 Awards - from 1 February 2021

  • Accommodation and Food Services
  • Arts and Recreation Services
  • Aviation
  • Retail
  • Tourism
See below for a complete list of awards in each group:

Group 1

The new minimum wages will start in the following awards from the first full pay period starting on or after 1 July 2020.
  • Aboriginal Community Controlled Health Services Award
  • Aged Care Award
  • Ambulance and Patient Transport Industry Award
  • Banking, Finance and Insurance Award
  • Cemetery Industry Award
  • Children’s Services Award
  • Cleaning Services Award
  • Corrections and Detention (Private Sector) Award
  • Educational Services (Schools) General Staff Award
  • Educational Services (Teachers) Award
  • Electrical Power Industry Award
  • Fire Fighting Industry Award
  • Funeral Industry Award
  • Gas Industry Award
  • Health Professionals and Support Services Award
  • Medical Practitioners Award
  • Nurses Award
  • Pharmacy Industry Award
  • Social, Community, Home Care and Disability Services Industry Award
  • State Government Agencies Award
  • Water Industry Award

Group 2

The new minimum wages will start in the following awards from the first full pay period starting on or after 1 November 2020.
  • Aluminium Industry Award
  • Animal Care and Veterinary Services Award
  • Aquaculture Industry Award
  • Architects Award
  • Asphalt Industry Award
  • Black Coal Mining Industry Award
  • Book Industry Award
  • Broadcasting, Recorded Entertainment and Cinemas Award
  • Building and Construction General On-site Award
  • Business Equipment Award
  • Car Parking Award
  • Cement, Lime and Quarrying Award
  • Clerks—Private Sector Award
  • Coal Export Terminals Award
  • Concrete Products Award
  • Contract Call Centres Award
  • Cotton Ginning Award
  • Dredging Industry Award
  • Educational Services (Post-Secondary Education) Award
  • Electrical, Electronic and Communications Contracting Award
  • Food, Beverage and Tobacco Manufacturing Award
  • Gardening and Landscaping Services Award
  • Graphic Arts, Printing and Publishing Award
  • Higher Education Industry-Academic Staff-Award
  • Higher Education Industry-General Staff-Award
  • Horticulture Award
  • Hydrocarbons Field Geologists Award
  • Hydrocarbons Industry (Upstream) Award
  • Joinery and Building Trades Award
  • Journalists Published Media Award
  • Labour Market Assistance Industry Award
  • Legal Services Award
  • Local Government Industry Award
  • Manufacturing and Associated Industries and Occupations Award
  • Marine Towage Award
  • Maritime Offshore Oil and Gas Award
  • Market and Social Research Award
  • Meat Industry Award
  • Mining Industry Award
  • Miscellaneous Award
  • Mobile Crane Hiring Award
  • Oil Refining and Manufacturing Award
  • Passenger Vehicle Transportation Award
  • Pastoral Award
  • Pest Control Industry Award
  • Pharmaceutical Industry Award
  • Plumbing and Fire Sprinklers Award
  • Port Authorities Award
  • Ports, Harbours and Enclosed Water Vessels Award
  • Poultry Processing Award
  • Premixed Concrete Award
  • Professional Diving Industry (Industrial) Award
  • Professional Employees Award
  • Rail Industry Award
  • Real Estate Industry Award
  • Road Transport (Long Distance Operations) Award
  • Road Transport and Distribution Award
  • Salt Industry Award
  • Seafood Processing Award
  • Seagoing Industry Award
  • Security Services Award
  • Silviculture Award
  • Stevedoring Industry Award
  • Storage Services and Wholesale Award
  • Sugar Industry Award
  • Supported Employment Services Award
  • Surveying Award
  • Telecommunications Services Award
  • Textile, Clothing, Footwear and Associated Industries Award
  • Timber Industry Award
  • Transport (Cash in Transit) Award
  • Waste Management Award
  • Wool Storage, Sampling and Testing Award

Group 3

The new minimum wages will start in the following awards from the first full pay period starting on or after 1 February 2021.
  • Air Pilots Award
  • Aircraft Cabin Crew Award
  • Airline Operations-Ground Staff Award
  • Airport Employees Award
  • Alpine Resorts Award
  • Amusement, Events and Recreation Award
  • Commercial Sales Award
  • Dry Cleaning and Laundry Industry Award
  • Fast Food Industry Award
  • Fitness Industry Award
  • General Retail Industry Award
  • Hair and Beauty Industry Award
  • Horse and Greyhound Training Award
  • Hospitality Industry (General) Award
  • Live Performance Award
  • Mannequins and Models Award
  • Marine Tourism and Charter Vessels Award
  • Nursery Award
  • Professional Diving Industry (Recreational) Award
  • Racing Clubs Events Award
  • Racing Industry Ground Maintenance Award
  • Registered and Licensed Clubs Award
  • Restaurant Industry Award
  • Sporting Organisations Award
  • Travelling Shows Award
  • Vehicle Repair, Services and Retail Award
  • Wine Industry Award