Employment minister confirms penalty rate pledge as ‘top priority’ 

One of the Albanese government’s headline policy commitments throughout the federal election campaign was the enshrinement of penalty – but will it become a reality?

Kicking off the Labor government’s industrial relations agenda, Amanda Rishworth, Minister for Employment and Workplace Relations, has confirmed the move to protect penalty rates, labelling it as “a top priority” for the returning government.

“I would say that these were two very key election commitments. The first is really to protect our safety net in this country. And the award safety net is very important, so that is why we’ve said that we will legislate to protect penalty rates in awards,” said Rishworth.

“Now, that isn’t designed to interfere with enterprise bargaining. Enterprise bargaining is really important and something that, through the laws that we’ve passed, we want to encourage.

“But in our safety net, we want to protect penalty rates. And I would hope that whether you’re the Coalition, the Greens, or the crossbench, that you would be very clear that we were elected at the election to deliver on our election commitments.”

“In terms of penalty rates and protecting penalty rates, that is a top priority of ours. We’ve got to get the legislation drafted and consult on that legislation, but we would like to see that as soon as possible.”

The policy commitment was originally formed after major retailers – including Woolworths, Coles, Kmart, and Costco – supported a potential amendment to the General Retail Industry Award 2020 (GRIA) that unions claimed would strip workers of their penalty rates.

The proposed amendments were part of an Australian Retailers Association (ARA) application to the Fair Work Commission (FWC), which the ARA claimed was to add better clarity to the complexity of the GRIA award.

“The ARA recognises that the current award, with 994 individual pay rates spanning 96 pages, is unnecessarily complex and misaligned with the evolving needs of the retail workforce. This leads to employees and employers struggling to understand workplace entitlements and cultivate flexibility within working arrangements,” said an ARA statement.

At the time, the Australian Council of Trade Unions (ACTU) argued that the amendment would gut workers’ overtime rates, annual leave loading, allowances, breaks, and protections around hours of work – spurring the Labor government into the commitment to enshrine such entitlements.

“Australian unions call on all political parties to pledge they will protect the penalty rates of working Australians from this type of corporate greed,” said ACTU assistant secretary Joseph Mitchell.

The Fair Work Commission has been mulling over the application – which included 17 total proposed amendments – but is now considering delaying the decision after Rishworth contacted commission president Adam Hatcher, alerting him that she would be pursuing enshrining penalty rates right away.

According to The Australian Financial Review, Rishworth’s meddling with the independent commission’s decision was described as a “highly unusual intervention” raising eyebrows among employers.

“It is highly unusual for this sort of intervention in an independent process, particularly in circumstances where no information is being given about what is in any proposed law,” said ARA chief executive Chris Rodwell.

“We look forward to the FWC, as an independent statutory body, getting on with determining the proceeding by the existing legislation that has been in place for at least 15 years.”

The move by Rishworth risks a row with employer groups despite her hope to engage in cooperative discussions with both unions and employers over the next three years.

“I do want to see more cooperative workplaces where workers and unions and employers work together to resolve any disputes that arise. But actually, look at how they can best work together to deliver productive workplaces. I think that is critical in the next three years,” she said.

On Tuesday (3 June), Rishworth led a discussion at a meeting of the National Workplace Relations Consultative Council, attended by ACTU secretary Sally McManus, Ai Group chief executive Innes Willox, Master Builders chief executive Denita Wawn, ACCI chief executive Andrew McKellar, and other unions and employer groups.

The penalty rates discussion and amending the Fair Work Act were at the top of the meeting’s agenda, with Rishworth labelling the meeting as “a productive conversation”.

Despite the contentious agenda topics, McKellar reinforced Rishworth’s claim, stating that: “It was a constructive and positive meeting. The focus of the meeting was around the implementation of the government’s election commitments.”

“From an employer point of view, there was also an opportunity to emphasise the need to ensure that future workplace agreements were strongly aligned to increasing productivity.”