QUESTIONS WITHOUT NOTICE
Ms RISHWORTH (Kingston—Minister for Employment and Workplace Relations) (14:50): I'd like to thank the member for Werriwa for her question and for her longstanding advocacy for getting better pay and conditions for workers in this country. Since coming to government, Labor has been focused on helping Australian workers earn more and keep more of what they earn, from enshrining penalty rates into law to our same job, same pay reforms, we back fair pay for workers.
This government has advocated each and every year to the Fair Work Commission to boost the wages of our low-paid workers, and just yesterday the Fair Work Commission handed down its decision to award a 4.75 per cent wage increase for modern award reliant workers in Australia. In their decision they also recognised that the lowest-paid workers relying on the national minimum wage needed additional support and awarded those workers a six per cent pay increase.
These workers will now be earning more than $1,000 a week. This decision represents a real wage increase, providing real cost-of-living relief for retail workers like Janita. Janita welcomed the decision yesterday and said that this pay rise would 'definitely help us get ahead'.
It will make a difference for support workers like Lika, who said that this pay rise was a win and will assist her and her coworkers with everyday costs. And it will help youth workers like Jordan, who said that these extra dollars mean 'I can spend more time with my family'. This government welcomes the Fair Work decision, because workers like Janita, Lika, Jordan and millions of others deserve a pay increase.
We all know that when those opposite were in government they never once advocated to the commission for a real wage increase, and of course they kept wages deliberately low as part of their economic architecture. You would have thought that, even in opposition, they had learnt their lesson, but they haven't changed their approach. Indeed, Senator Hume made the opposition's position very clear when she said that, if the Fair Work decision comes down at a rate that's higher than inflation, that would be the worst thing for Australians.
Even yesterday in her media release about the decision she failed to back this pay increase for hardworking Australians. When the coalition fails to back workers like Janita, Lika and Jordan, it is our Labor government that has their back. These workers deserve a pay increase and they deserve a government that backs them.