Crossbench backflips on penalty rate cuts

The Australian 12:00am March 30, 2017

Joe Kelly

The Senate is today poised to back Labor’s bill to overturn the industrial umpire’s cut to Sunday penalty rates, intensifying the pressure on the Turnbull government as it defends the reductions amid a fierce union-led campaign.

Nick Xenophon, who controls three upper house seats, yesterday joined Derryn Hinch and One ­Nation in backflipping on his previous support for penalty rate cuts to assist small business owners. ACTU leader Sally McManus pledged that unions would “fight back” against the cuts for retail and hospitality workers, while business groups warned the Labor bill flew in the face of years of evidence presented to the Fair Work Commission.

Ai Group chief executive Innes Willox said the opposition’s legislation, if passed, would “adversely impact upon all employers, not just those in the fast-food, retail and hospitality industries”.

“The concept of overturning the penalty rates decision of the ­independent Fair Work Commission needs to be rejected,” Mr Willox said. “The decision was made on the evidence, after two years of hearings and analysis. All members of parliament need to put aside short-term political interests and make decisions in the national interest.”

Senator Xenophon confirmed his team would support Labor’s bill, admitting the position was a “backflip or even a somersault” but argued workers should not have their pay cut in a low-wage environment.

Labor expects its bill to be ­debated tomorrow morning and hopes to secure passage through the Senate by midday with the support of the Greens, One ­Nation, and the Nick Xenophon Team, as well as Derryn Hinch and Jacqui Lambie. Once it passes, the bill will return to the lower house where it is certain to be ­defeated.

Bill Shorten yesterday broadened his penalty rates attack on the government by challenging Malcolm Turnbull to guarantee workers in other sectors would not be hit with reductions in their take-home pay.

“He cannot guarantee that further penalty rates in other industries won’t be cut,” the Opposition Leader said. “Mr Turnbull can put this debate beyond doubt by supporting Labor’s legislation to protect the take-home pay of Australian battlers.”

Mr Shorten also kept up political pressure on Pauline Hanson despite her decision to back his bill. “If politics was a sport she’d be a champion gymnast in terms of taking different positions,” he said. “No doubt she’s feeling a bit of the pressure, being seen as the satellite of the Liberal government.”

Opposition workplace relations spokesman Brendan O’Connor was also scathing of the crossbench. “Given their history supporting cuts to penalty rates, if senators Hanson and Hinch vote for Labor’s bill, it is because they are worried about their future, not the future of workers,” he said.

ACTU secretary Sally McManus said it was “almost unimaginable” that hundreds of thousands of workers were facing a penalty rate pay cut when “even Scott Morrison is saying we need to ­increase wages”.

“We are the Australian trade union movement and when wages are under attack, we stand up,” she said.