Business calls it a “compliance bomb”, unions want more - either way, Labor’s big industrial relations play is headed for trouble.
Matt Sampson, the head of Aspect Personnel which supplies thousands of highly paid engineers and architects to construction projects, is concerned about the Albanese government’s proposed labour hire reforms expected next year.
“I’ve run this business for 15 years and had tens of thousands of conversations with employers and employees, and it’s never once crossed my radar as being an issue,” he said. The principle is inherently appealing in its perceived fairness. But businesses are concerned it could constrain employment at a time when firms are relying on labour hire firms to source workers in a historically tight labour market.Some labour hire owners have described the laws as an “existential threat”. Others disagree but fear the requirements will be a “compliance bomb” that will stifle the sector.
ACTU assistant secretary Scott Connolly says “labour hire and other rorts have allowed employers to strip away pay and conditions and has created a system where two workers doing the same job can be earning vastly different amounts”.“It’s not fair and it needs to end,” he says. “The principle of ‘same job, same pay’, is one that all Australians understand and know is fair and reasonable.”Labour hire has been a fixture in the labour market in some form or other since the 1950s.
On the face of it, the reforms are likely to have a smoother ride through parliament than the controversial multi-employer bargaining laws, which required several concessions to appease business and a concerned Senate crossbench.Alex Ellinghausen “We’re concerned Labor will make this a very complex piece of legislation that will add further complication and uselessness to the Fair Work Act and that will be used to give more power to unions when what it needs is more accountability.”Resistance over the scope of the bill could set the Albanese government up for a clash with unions and their ambitious demands.Unions’ broad intentions for the reform can be gleaned from their submissions to a Senate inquiry into One Nation’s “same pay” bill.
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