QUESTIONS WITHOUT NOTICE
Senator WATT (Queensland—Minister for the Environment and Water) (14:21): Thanks to Senator Stewart who, along with every other Labor senator, has a proud record of standing up for working people in Australia. The Albanese Labor government is helping Australians to earn more and keep more of what they earn, with higher wages and more tax cuts. Before the outbreak of the conflict in the Middle East, we saw strong real wage growth for eight consecutive quarters.
We know that enterprise agreements continue to be a key source of wages growth for Australian workers, which is why our efforts to reinvigorate bargaining are so important. For two years in a row now, our government has strongly advocated to the independent Fair Work Commission for an economically sustainable real wage rise for Australia's minimum and award wage workers, many of whom work in the health and aged-care sectors.
The recent decision by the commission to increase the national minimum wage and modern awards by at least 4.75 per cent will deliver a real wage increase from 1 July for almost 2.7 million Australian workers around the country. This is, of course, in stark contrast to the previous Abbott, Turnbull and Morrison coalition governments who for a decade had a policy of deliberately keeping wages low.
Only the Albanese Labor government is committed to increasing the pay packets of working Australians. An article on news.com.au this morning quoted new analysis which looked into how much better off workers in the health sector are under our government. And that analysis found that allied health worker wages have risen by between $8,000 and $13,000 per year as a result of Labor's wage rises, including for workers such as physiotherapists and radiographers.
A further $1,200 per year had come to those workers from Labor's reforms allowing multiemployer bargaining, while gender based undervaluation changes could account for up to an additional $20,000 per year for some classifications. For aged-care workers, it's a similar story. Changes to bargaining were estimated to have accounted for an additional $600; wage theft reforms, a further $1,840; and gender based— The PRESIDENT: Senator Stewart, first supplementary?