TRANSCRIPT: TV INTERVIEW - THE PROJECT- DEC 9, 2020

E&OE TRANSCRIPT
TELEVISION INTERVIEW
THE PROJECT
THURSDAY, 9 DECEMBER 2020

SUBJECTS: Scott Morrison’s cut to wages and conditions.

WALEED ALY, HOST: We invited the Attorney-General Christian Porter to join us tonight but he declined. So now we’re going to speak to his opposite number, Shadow Industrial Relations Minister Tony Burke. The central controversy seems to be what the government says is focusing really on COVID-effected businesses, who’re going to need more flexibility in order to respond to the recession, that we've had a result of the pandemic. That's a fair argument, isn't it?

TONY BURKE, SHADOW MINISTER FOR INDUSTRIAL RELATIONS: Well, the sort of flexibility they're talking about is a pay cut. And when you say COVID-effected businesses - it's any business that has been effected in any way by COVID. So even if your business has improved over the last year, and some have, not many, but some have - you're still covered. So it's hard to think of a business anywhere in Australia that's not covered by this. And we're not talking about flexibility about giving people different tasks or moving to different sites or anything like that. We're talking about agreements no longer having to be better off for the worker. A situation where you could lose every single penalty rate and shift allowance, and it would still be a legally made agreement.

ALY: Sure. And I understand what you're saying about pay cuts. But that is kind of the point, right? If you have businesses that are hurt as a result of COVID. If they could change the wage structure, for example, they might be able to build quicker and then employ more people. That's the argument. Couldn't you deal with the COVID-effected businesses problem you've identified by tweaking that aspect of the legislation rather than just opposing the whole idea?

BURKE: Well, no, no, the whole concept of it of it is that the Better Off Overall Test goes. And if you think of how this impacts say on an aged care worker, because think of the jobs in particular, where people get their penalties because they work nights and work weekends. An aged care worker could lose $11,000 a year through this, and you'll find similar figures across a whole range of occupations. Now, people have just been through the toughest year, businesses and workers. The government says the economy is doing well enough that businesses no longer need JobKeeper. But then on the other hand they say but it's doing so badly, we need to cut the pay of workers. It's not fair. It's a lousy thing to do to the heroes of the pandemic. And one of the weird things today is when we've asked the government about it, they're not defending what they've done, they’re just pretending they haven't done it when it's there in black and white.

ALY: It's not as though employers can just do what they want, though, on their own. This is talking about agreements between employers and employees, that as I understand the employees would be voting on. So if they come to that agreement, and the employees have voted on it, what's the problem?

BURKE: So if you think of a unionised workplace, where people are represented, where they've got assistance in making sure they get through the agreement, in those workplaces this is less likely to be a problem because the you've got the trade union there giving people advice and helping ensure people aren't exploited. But think of what happens in workplaces that aren't well organised, in workplaces where the workers are feeling more vulnerable and the employer simply says to them, there's going to be a pay cut, that's the only thing I can do, otherwise you lose your jobs, and you're voting on it tomorrow, or you're voting on it at the end of your shift today. Now, we know in those circumstances, vulnerable workers will say if that's my only option, I can't afford to lose my job so I'll take it. The reason we have a Better Off Overall Test is to avoid that sort of exploitation. And what the government’s saying, using the cover of the pandemic, is to say for the next two years that fundamental protection won't be there. And it'll go on even longer than that because those agreements that are brought in next two years have another life of a further two years. So you're talking four years down the track, where pay cuts will still be in place if they get away with this change.

ALY: Tony, thank you very much for your time, we appreciate it.

BURKE: Great to talk.