ACTU push for increase in hours for part-time workers

The ACTU has joined forces with small business to support changes allowing retailers to increase hours for part-time employees.

ACTU secretary Sally McManus. Picture: AAP

The ACTU has joined forces with small business to support changes allowing retailers to increase hours for part-time employees, under a plan designed to avoid further casualisation of work during the pandemic recovery.

The ACTU-Council of Small Business Organisations Australia alliance is backing a deal between the SDA and Master Grocers Australia to change the Retail Award, which covers 1.2 million workers.

COSBOA chief executive Peter Strong said genuine agreement between unions and employers has always been possible but “not in a process which has been hijacked by ideologues”.

“Small businesses needs strong consumer confidence and to be able to adapt to changing conditions. These new arrangements deliver both by ensuring certainty for working hours but also creating flexibility for businesses to grow permanent jobs as the economy recovers,” Mr Strong said.

Under plans submitted to the Fair Work Commission, retail businesses and workers can agree on increased hours for part-time workers.

The new system would require changes in hours being done by written agreement between employees and employers, including a provision ensuring any sustained increase in hours can be “reviewed and incorporated into workers’ contracted hours”. Employers and workers will have access to arbitration through the Fair Work Commission.

ACTU secretary Sally McManus said getting money into the “hands of working people and giving them the security to spend is the only way out of the pandemic recession”.

“The government’s Omnibus Bill will hurt working people and the economic recovery. Flexibility and fairness can only be achieved by working together, the Omnibus Bill imposes solutions that undermine fairness,” Ms McManus said.

“These new rights will mean greater certainty and protection for working people. More hours when you want and when the business recovers, with secure pay and the guarantee of ongoing work with regular hours and will not leave workers worse off.

“Agreements like this are possible when the needs of ordinary people are put ahead of ideology.”

Ms McManus said underemployment was a “major problem in our economy”.

“We risk the jobs recovery in hard hit sectors becoming entirely casualised, with workers having no chance of permanent jobs with permanent rights and predictable hours,” she said.

Ahead of the JobSeeker coronavirus supplement, JobKeeper and HomeBuilder ceasing at the end of next month, Josh Frydenberg on Sunday flagged that the aviation sector would receive targeted financial support.

“The domestic tourism market is going to pick up, particularly as the vaccine is rolled out confidence comes back, and we don’t see those borders closing as frequently as we saw, over the course of last year,” Mr Frydenberg told Sky News.

“With respect to the government support. We are looking at other measures that we can put in place post JobKeeper to support a range of industries including the aviation sector.”