Interview with Ron Wilson - 2SM Breakfast

RON WILSON, HOST: As the cost of living continues to rise and wage inequality becomes an increasing concern, the Government's new Same Job, Same Pay Policy is now in full force. Workers doing the same job, regardless of their employment status, are guaranteed equal pay. The changes took effect in November last year and are already delivering wage increases for workers across key industries, with some benefiting from increases of up to $35,000 a year. The Minister for Employment and Workplace Relations, Murray Watt, is on the line. Murray, good morning.

MURRAY WATT, MINISTER FOR EMPLOYMENT AND WORKPLACE RELATIONS: G'day, Ron, Good to be with you.

RON WILSON: One of the big issues over the last year, even the last two years with inflation rising and cost of living pressures, has been wage growth. Are we seeing a satisfactory result from this new policy you've introduced?

MURRAY WATT: Yeah, well, certainly we are starting to see some really encouraging news on the wages front, Ron. I think everyone understands that the last couple of years have been really tough for Australians with inflation rising right around the world and that has driven up the cost of living. So, one of the key priorities for our Government, the Albanese Government, has been to get wages moving again so that people can actually afford those costs. And as you were saying in your introduction, as a result of those changes that we've made to our workplace laws, we are seeing wages rise above inflation now in Australia for the first time in years. You might remember when the Coalition was last in power, for ten years they had a policy of deliberately keeping wages low. They seemed to think that that was the way to run an economy. And we said we wanted to turn that around so that the average working person could actually earn more. And as you said earlier, the Same Job, Same Pay Policy on its own is delivering pay rises of up to $35,000 a year for labour hire workers who were being paid less money than the direct employees of companies that they were working alongside, even when they were doing the same work. So you know, we're not going to try and pretend that things are perfectly easy for people at the moment. Things are still really tough for a lot of Australians. But you can see that having a Government that wants to increase wages is starting to make life that little bit easier. And that's the way we want to keep it for people.

RON WILSON: You did mention labour hire companies there. What are the key sectors that are seeing benefits?

MURRAY WATT: Yeah, well, I guess this issue really first came to my attention in the coal mining sector, Ron. Obviously areas like the Hunter Valley in New South Wales and from where I'm from in Queensland, big mining areas. What we were seeing is that the big multinational mining companies were increasingly bringing in people to work for them as labour hire casuals rather than as direct employees. And the reason they were doing that wasn't because they needed them for a short term basis. We always recognised that companies might have labour hire needs or short term employment needs to deal with surges in their production, but really the reason they were doing it was that they were saving money at the expense of their workers.

But the more we dug into it, the more we realised that this was an issue in so many different sectors of the economy. The meat processing sectors, so in abattoirs it's been rife. In aviation even, so Qantas, under its previous management, was employing flight attendants, people you'd see on a plane wearing the same uniform, wearing a Qantas uniform, but actually were hired as labour hire employees and being paid several thousand dollars a year less than Qantas' direct employees. So, what we're seeing is in a range of different sectors now, workers and unions have been able to take advantage of these Same Jobs, Same Pay Laws. And you know, we're not saying that everyone has to be paid exactly the same, of course someone who's more experienced or has a higher skill level will end up being paid more than someone with a lower level of experience. But what you can't do anymore under Australian law is pay someone less simply because they're labour hire. And that's really changing people's lives.

RON WILSON: Well, the other side of the argument, of course, is that if you increase costs, those costs get passed on to consumers and then that leads to further inflation. Is that not an issue?

MURRAY WATT: Yeah, well, I guess one of the really encouraging things we've seen is that we've been able to increase wages and actually increase employment in Australia while bringing inflation down. Since we came to office, we've actually reduced inflation by two thirds of the level that we inherited. It was over six per cent and rising when we were elected and it's now below three per cent and falling. And that's at the same time that we have been able to increase wages. And as well as that, we've actually increased jobs significantly in Australia and unemployment remains low. So, I guess traditionally what we've always thought and what we've been told is that if you're going to increase wages, you're going to be increasing inflation. But what we've been able to do is actually increase wages at the same time as bring down inflation. And that's the way it should be.

RON WILSON: Well, you've got an election coming up and these policies have only been in force for the last two or three months. Is there any way you can entrench them in a way that they might survive the Coalition getting in because they're saying that they would repeal these changes?

MURRAY WATT: Yeah, that's right, Ron. Well, I guess that will be up to your listeners and all Australians when they get to vote this year in the election. And I do think that issues like wages and industrial relations will be a really key issue at the election. Because as I say, we have come out of ten years of the Coalition being in power, deliberately keeping wages low and now we're finally starting to see that turnaround. Even if you leave the Same Job, Same Pay policy aside, if you look across the board, the average Australian full time worker is now earning an extra $150 per week compared to what they were earning when we came to power a bit over two years ago. And again, I recognise things aren't perfect for people, but having those wages rise is so important to being able to deal with cost of living pressures.

And as you say, what we've already seen, from Peter Dutton and the Coalition is that they've said that they would scrap these Same Jobs, Same Pay Laws. They would also go back to the old definition of casual employment, which basically left it to an employer to decide if someone was casual, whether they were really a permanent working permanent hours or not. There's a whole bunch of these laws that we've changed that they've said they would unwind and all that would mean is that people's pay would go backwards. And I don't know about you, but I reckon right now when people need a leg up, the very worst thing they could do is cut pay. But that's what they're promising to do.

RON WILSON: What measures do you have in place to help businesses adjust to the changes?

MURRAY WATT: Well, one of the things we've particularly done, Ron, is recognise that small businesses are in a different category to larger businesses. You know, for starters they don't necessarily have big HR departments to be able to administer changes to the law. And we recognise that a lot of small businesses are themselves doing it tough. So, many of the changes that we've put in place haven't yet commenced for small businesses to give them a bit more time to adjust. But also the Fair Work Ombudsman provides significant amounts of advice to businesses to make sure that they understand changes to the laws. And we've also provided funding to employer associations so that they can help inform their members of the changes that we've made. So, as I say, we've tried to be fair about this and tried to make sure that businesses can continue to grow because, of course, you know, if you don't have successful businesses, you don't have workers at all, you don't have people earning income. But we did think that it was important to get wages moving again, and I'm pleased to see that that's starting to happen. And under a Labor Government, under Anthony Albanese, that's the way it will continue.

RON WILSON: Murray, thank you so much for coming on and speaking with us this morning. I appreciate it very much.

MURRAY WATT: No worries Ron, great to talk.

RON WILSON: Thank you. Murray Watt, he's Minister for Employment, Workplace Relations and talking about Same Jobs Same Pay.