Fair Work Amendment (Protecting Penalty and Overtime Rates) Bill 2025

Mr BURKE (Watson—Minister for the Arts, Minister for Home Affairs, Minister for Cyber Security, Minister for Immigration and Citizenship and Leader of the House) (10:42): I've got to say, the second of the two speeches made more sense than the first. I think it's probably the aspiration of every member of this parliament—if we could be half as good in life as the shadow minister thinks he is, we'd all be doing extraordinarily well.

Talk about not learning a thing! There has never been a pay rise for the Australian workers that they have supported. Never once.

But the arguments are always the same. The arguments that we just heard from the shadow minister were that getting the pay cut is 'the difference in whether you get a job or not'. I remember we heard this last term.

The shadow minister—I'll say a bit more about this later—while he wasn't in this place last term, it seems was listening intently, because he's adopted all the same arguments we heard last time. When we argued that 'same job, same pay' was part of justice in making sure that people's pay wasn't cut, we heard opposite: 'Oh no, no! That will drive inflation up if you give people a pay rise, and people will lose their jobs.' When we argued that you have to have minimum standards for gig workers, those opposite said the same two things.

They said: 'Oh no, no! That will drive prices up, and it will drive unemployment.' When we said that we had to get pay equity for women and made sure gender equality was an objective of the Fair Work Act, those two offered the same two arguments that we've heard here—that it will hit inflation and that it will hit jobs. Right back at the 2022 election campaign, when the now prime minister, Anthony Albanese, as the then leader of the opposition, was asked whether he would support a pay rise for minimum wage earners that made sure they didn't go backwards, he answered with one word: 'Absolutely!' We remember that word.

The response from those opposite was that it must've been a mistake and that it must've been a gaffe. How could anyone possibly have the conviction that workers should not be going backwards? Well, the conviction that people should be going backwards is the only conviction that is consistent for those opposite.

Look at the outcomes. After all the things that they said would drive up inflation, what happened? Inflation went from having a six in front of it to getting back within the Reserve Bank's target band.

What happened to unemployment after all their arguments saying, 'Oh, if you do something good for workers' wages, people will end up without jobs'? What happened? We ended up with the best and the lowest unemployment record of any government.

That's what we had. This side of the House believes that people should be well paid; this side of the House wants people to be in work. But this side of the House will never accept the principle that the pathway to getting a good job is to have your pay cut, and to lose penalty rates is to have your pay cut.

That's exactly what it means. Those opposite said—and I tried to take down so many quotes; I was enjoying the speech I'll concede—they're on the side of empowering Australians to do the best they can. They want to empower people.

No-one thinks a pay cut makes them more powerful. No-one believes that. Penalty rates are the way that people who are working inconvenient hours can hold their lives together.

It's a way they can make ends meet. There has never been a moment— Mr Tim Wilson: What about the inquiry? Mr BURKE: I'll get to the issue of the inquiry in a minute, because my favourite quote was 'sloppy drafting', but, wait, we'll get to that.

Hold that thought for me; work with me here. Penalty rates are the way that people hold their lives together and make sure that they have a pathway of coping with the cost of living. It is no surprise that the example that he hung on to saying, 'Here was an industry that was willing to have a higher base rate in return for getting rid of penalty rates,' was an industry where overwhelming the bulk of the shifts are in penalty rate periods.

Do you really think that proposal was designed for employers to have to pay more? There has never been a time when a transfer of income from profit margins to workers' wages has been supported by those opposite. I guess at one level I'm happy that they still don't get it, but the reality is the cost of living is about the difference between the money that comes into your bank account and the costs that go out.

For three and a bit years now, every time there's something about lowering prices those opposite have opposed it; every time there's something about increasing wages they've opposed it. If you want people to be paid less and for their medicines and expenses to all cost more, that is the worst outcome for the cost of living. That is exactly what those opposite took to the last election, and it's exactly what the shadow minister is pointing to now.

On the full 15 minutes of the shadow minister's speech, I'd remind him that speaking times as listed in the standing orders are a limit, not a target, and, when you run out of things to say, you don't have to keep going. It's okay to stop when you've run out of material. The line that was my favourite—and he kept coming back to it—was 'sloppy drafting', and so I thought, if he's alleging sloppy drafting, maybe we ought to have a look at the motion he's just moved.

Let me tell people what the motion is in front of the House right now. It says: That the Fair Work Amendment (Protecting Penalty and Overtime Rates) Bill 2025 be referred to the Standing Committee on Education and Employment for consideration and an advisory report … So you then go to the Notice Paper and you go to the list of committees. If you look at the Notice Paper—there are copies just there if you need them—on page 14 you get the list of House committees.

He's referring the bill to a committee that doesn't exist. So I'm sort of tempted—we could just vote for this, and it would go nowhere. It would go absolutely nowhere.

It would be like referring the bill to the shadow cabinet. It goes absolutely nowhere. I think it would be fun to have a vote on it because I'd like to see how many of his colleagues would be forced to wander into this chamber to fiercely demand that this bill be referred to a committee of the House of Representatives that does not exist.

I'll let you know now that we're going to vote no. If you want to call the division, you have the second voice. If he leaves, then you're on your own, and it won't happen.

But I'd encourage you—no matter how impossible this motion is, no matter how completely wrong the drafting is and no matter how many times you've got upset and passionate about sloppy drafting. The call is yours now. Does the opposition stand loyally, strongly with their shadow minister and force the whole of the coalition to vote right now that a bill on penalty rates be referred to a committee that does not exist?

I commend the consideration of this resolution to the House. The SPEAKER: The question before the House is that the motion be agreed to.