Press Conference, Melbourne

E&OE TRANSCRIPT

SARAH WITTY, FEDERAL MEMBER FOR MELBOURNE: Hi, I'm Sarah Witty, the federal member for Melbourne, and I'm excited to be here today with the Minister for Employment and Workplace Relations as we discuss the Labor Government's commitment to workers and ensuring that they get paid appropriately. Thank you.

AMANDA RISHWORTH, MINISTER FOR EMPLOYMENT AND WORKPLACE RELATIONS: It is really wonderful to be here with you, Sarah, and a big congratulations, one of a number of new Labor members joining the Labor team in Canberra. It's also wonderful to have a number of our essential workers behind us that rely on the safety net for their wages and conditions. 

Today, the Government welcomes the Fair Work Commission's decision to award a 3.5 per cent increase to our minimum and award workers. This represents a real wage increase to close to three million workers right across this country. This decision is consistent with the Government's submission where we argued for an economically sustainable real wage increase for our lowest paid workers. 

Now, this decision will have a positive impact on workers like the workers behind me, those that rely on our award system. Workers such as retail workers, early educators, cleaners. These are our essential workers, and this decision will not just help them get by but will start to help them get ahead. 

Now, it will mean for those on the minimum wage, for those working full-time, close to a $1,700 annual increase. Since we've been elected, it has been our top priority to get wages moving again, and this decision is another step in that journey. 

Of course, under our Government, we've seen real wages increase consecutively for the last 18 months. We have seen unemployment stay at historically low levels. We've seen wages growth, close to 1.1 million jobs created under this government and we see inflation coming down. 

This is delivering for the Australian people, and we will continue to remain absolutely focused on our mission to deliver. Of course, this is part of our broader Government's plan, and it is only Labor that has a plan to ensure that people earn more, and they keep more of what they earn. 

I'm now going to pass to Tammy, who's going to talk about, from a personal perspective, the impact that this decision will have for her.

TAMMY, RETAIL WORKER: Hi, my name's Tammy. I'm a retail worker. Today's decision has been absolutely fantastic for me. In my situation, my husband a couple of years ago became quite sick and he was forced to retire earlier than what we had planned. With that retirement came a huge drop in our income. 

And so, we became more and more reliant on my income as a retail worker. And our expenses grew as a part of his illness, so, things like medical expenses. And just the day-to-day cost of living has gone up so much – just bread, milk, eggs, everything's gone up. 

So, to have this pay rise just gives us a little bit of a buffer, especially for minimum wage workers who really, really are doing it tough at the moment. So, it's just been an incredible decision for us. We're very, very happy with this decision today. Thank you.

PREETI, ECEC EDUCATOR: Good morning, everyone. My name is Preeti Soodan and I'm an early childhood educator and currently a student and doing diploma in early childhood education, and I also proudly serve as a delegate of United Workers Union, and I'm also an active member of United Nations where I am volunteering. 

So, like many in this sector, I balance a lot - paying my bills, covering student fees, and supporting my parents both emotionally and financially. Today's announcement of a 3.5 per cent increase to the award, which is not just a number, it's a lifeline. It helps me breathe a little easier and continue doing the work I love without the constant worry of financial pressure. 

The pay rise builds on a significant 15 per cent increase announced last year, and together they show that the Government is listening and committed to supporting early childhood education. These steps are making a real difference, helping to retain educators in the sector and ensuring we are better paid for the essential work we do. And when educators are valued and supported, children and families benefit too. 

Thank you to the Minister and the Government for recognising the importance of our profession and taking me meaningful steps to strengthen it. I hope this is just the beginning of even greater investment in the people who are shaping Australia's future. Its children. Thank you so much.

AMANDA RISHWORTH: Thank you. We'll go to questions now.

JOURNALIST: Hi, Minister. The Commission said today that it had to act because of lower reductions in wages caused by the inflation spike. And if it didn't act, those decreases would be embedded. Is that something the government was concerned about?

AMANDA RISHWORTH: From our perspective when it comes to inflation, we've obviously been working very hard around the inflation challenge, and we now see inflation coming back into the RBA’s band and has been there for some time. But we were very clear in our submission that we did want to see a real wage increase that was economically sustainable. 

And the Commission, in its reasoning for why it settled on 3.5 per cent, was very clear that it took into consideration the needs of our minimum wage workers and also, of course, took into consideration the business conditions as well and landed on what they consider an economically sustainable wage increase of 3.5. 

We certainly welcome that, and we think this is an important step, as I said, to not just helping people get by, but starting to help people get ahead.

JOURNALIST: The employers, of course, are saying that the increase was too high given the productivity rate and will affect investment conditions. What's your response to that?

AMANDA RISHWORTH: Well, my first response is that the Commission did look at labour productivity growth in its decision and considered that. But I would say that the productivity challenge is much broader than the minimum wage and workplace relations. The productivity challenge is something that our Government is absolutely committed to and something that, as you may know, the Treasurer has commissioned the Productivity Commission to look into this. 

What I would say, and echo the words of the Commission, is that paying our minimum workers less does not help with productivity growth. That is not the way to get labour productivity growth in this country. And so therefore it's clear the Commission considered this. 

We are up for tackling the productivity challenges that our country has. But paying [all] people less, and particularly those on the minimum wage, to be quite frank, is not the answer.

JOURNALIST: The Commission's also set out the next program for a gender undervaluation rises, a schedule. Is the Government committed to funding, if necessary, some of those pay rises?

AMANDA RISHWORTH: Let's be really clear. We support the work done by the Fair Work Commission. In fact, it was our Government that put gender as an objective in the act and an objective for the awards. 

So, we very much support the process. Obviously, we'll continue to work with the Commission to work through those provisional decisions and participate in the process.

JOURNALIST: And just, this is probably one of the biggest real wage increases granted by the Commission recently. What's it going to mean for low paid workers, do you think?

AMANDA RISHWORTH: I think this will be really important for our low paid and award workers, those that rely on the safety net. It's important that their wage increases do keep up with other workers in the economy. 

And I think if we look at where wages growth is, this minimum wage increase, the real wages growth is in line with other workers across the economy. Thank you.