Union call for royal commission into horticulture pay rorts

National union leaders are lobbying federal MPs to support a royal commission into the horticulture industry.

Australian Workers Union national secretary Daniel Walton. Picture: Grant Wells

National union leaders are ­directly lobbying federal MPs to support a royal commission into the horticulture industry, claiming wage theft and exploitation of workers are entrenched in the fruit and vegetable sector.

The heads of the Australian Workers Union, the Transport Workers Union and the Shop Distributive and Allied Employees Association are in Canberra this week, accompanied by workers including a Chinese national who has worked on farms for the past decade.

The worker, who did not want to be identified, said most workers were paid $8 to $10 an hour on ­average but some received as little as $3 an hour.

“You start at six in the morning and you pick fruit until six at night. In summer it’s until nine at night. No breaks. No days off. Saturday and Sunday mean nothing,” he said.

“On the farms I’ve worked at, there are usually just a few toilets for many people. Everyone needs to go when they get up but the wait is too long for many. So workers end up urinating and defecating next to and sometimes on the crops. People are dirty and smelly because there are not enough showers. People don’t know they have rights and even if they did they would be scared to exercise them. If they complain, they get told they will be sacked or sent back home.”

He said recruiters put advertisements in Chinese-language groups on social media promising great working conditions and Australian pay.

“There are so many people from China here who have been tricked into working on farms and now they’re basically trapped,” he said. “What I have been through I would never think could happen in a civilised country like Australia. In a country with democracy and human rights like Australia, it should not happen. ”

AWU national secretary Daniel Walton said wage theft, exploitation and worker abuse were now entrenched and normalised in Australian horticulture. “If we want to change this we need to shine the brightest possible spotlight on the dark corners of the ­industry and that’s why we need a royal commission,” he said.

Agriculture Minister David Littleproud said the federal government had “a zero tolerance for worker exploitation and has taken steps to strengthen the Fair Work Ombudsman and boost penalties”. “Instances of poor practices hurt the reputation of the industry and generalisations of the ­industry are not accurate or productive,” he said.

But he said the government did not support a royal commission into worker exploitation “given the action we have and continue to take to improve work practices in the sector”.

TWU national secretary ­Michael Kaine said consumers and workers must be confident that the food on the shelf or ­delivered to their homes was not there through exploitation.

“In transport we see the power that major retailers have in creating the dynamics through their low-cost contracts which results in truck drivers being ripped off and safety disregarded,” he said.

SDA national secretary Gerard Dwyer said proper wages for fruit and vegetable pickers and proper returns for farmers would mean more money spent in ­regional communities.