Support Workers (Pay Equity) Settlements Amendment Bill

Members, the House is in committee on the Support Workers (Pay Equity) Settlements Amendment Bill. Members, we come first to clause 1.

Thank you, Mr Chair. As we know from the debates in the previous readings, this is a very simple bill. There’s a change of date and a change of rates in the Schedules, in order to achieve the purpose, which is to provide protection and a pay increase to support workers, but also to enable to get on with their pay equity claim.

I look forward to the continued examination of the bill in this stage.

Thank you, Mr Chair. I’m happy to take a call on clause 1, the title, and I want to examine some of the comments that the Minister made in his—I think it was his second reading speech, around the Government’s plan to reopen pay equity negotiations with the care and support workers in the context of this bill, this Act, being extended for another 18 months. If that is necessary, why is the Minister calling this the Support Workers (Pay Equity) Settlements Amendment Bill, which amends the Support Workers (Pay Equity) Settlements Act? The label on the tin says we have settled pay equity, and I understand the need to do this, although we’re deeply unhappy with it, but it seems to me that the Government wants to start this process that has been going on for the better part of a decade all over again. I don’t believe that’s either necessary or appropriate.

The initial settlement of more than $2 billion was a settlement that removed the inequity that was perceived in this female-dominated workforce, and yet the Minister made it very clear to the House that the Government’s intention is to start this all over again. I wonder, in addressing the title of the bill, whether he could lay out what the Government’s intentions in that regard are.

Mr Chairman, I’m happy to oblige the member. He refers to clause 1, the title, “Support Workers (Pay Equity) Settlements Amendment Act”. I think, if we’re concerned about labels on the tin that actually don’t reflect what is in the tin—I suspect it’s the inclusion of the words “pay equity”, because what was settled under the 2017 legislation was a legal claim. It was litigation relating to pay equity. What the legislation did not do was legislate for pay equity. It was the opposite. It set up some new pay rates that were to apply to this workforce of now 61,500 people. That’s what it did. But section 8 of the current legislation is very clear. Section 8(1) says, “This section applies to—(a) any claim by on behalf of a support worker under the Equal Pay Act … and (b) any potential claim by or on behalf of a support worker under the Equal Pay Act [etc.]” Section 8(2) says “The claim or potential claim cannot be pursued and must be treated as if it had been withdrawn or is incapable of being lodged.” That’s what section 8 does, and it is time limited. That section applies until 30 June this year. So no action could be taken on pay equity—the very thing that these workers wanted, the very thing that the Government of the day insisted they go all the way to the Supreme Court to get and then sued for peace to achieve this legislation.

So this does enable the workers to get their rates protected in a way they could not do, up till now. And I know all the working class warriors opposite are all saying something should have happened before now.

💬 David Seymour: A working class hero is something to be.

It’s always interesting to hear the most anti-worker party in the Parliament, the ACT Party popping up. It just would help if more members of the intelligence of the likes of David Seymour would understand our industrial history. But the reality is that on this occasion, these workers, this workforce of 61,500 people, an employer force of 1,000—there is no mechanism for them to continue to have rates that are protected that are fair that will continue after the expiry of this legislation. And equally, there is no basis on which they could otherwise pursue a pay equity claim. They now have rates protected, increased and protected, and they will now be able to pursue their pay equity claim.

But to answer the Hon Michael Woodhouse’s question that I think he was asking—why does this have to start all over again?—I just simply say that section 8 didn’t just sort of say, “Pause it, stop it, that’s it.”; it expunged it altogether. The original claim under the Equal Pay Act was completely destroyed and so they now have to start all over again and we are supporting them to do that.

Now, my discussions with the unions and with the providers, both together and individually—everybody is on the same page. We just want to get on and deal with pay equity, and, yep, they would like a higher pay increase. They also know the priority is to get on and do what these workers most want, which is to get their pay equity claim done.

Thank you, Mr Chair. Just picking up on the Minister’s claims to being the sole friend of the working class, I have to say: a working class hero is something to be. But it got me thinking. The Minister also claimed that because he has legislated minimum pay rates for care and support workers and he claims to care about workers, I wonder why it is that in five years, his Government has not legislated pay rates for every sector of the economy. Is he aware of any country that may have tried to do this in the past, and how did it work out?

Thank you, Mr Chair. Look, we’ve had a bit of accusations across the House of a rewrite of history, and I’m desperately trying to avoid descending into that because it’s not actually helpful.

I get what the Minister is saying about the status of the ability to be able to take a pay equity claim in what was an interregnum—a very long interregnum—but I dispute the Minister’s description of that being some kind of punitive imposition on the workers and their bargaining agents.

The reality is: this legislation gave effect to an agreement. Now, when the Government committed to intervening to settle the case, the case itself was not dispensed with by the courts; it was paused. At any time, either party, but probably the—well I’m not sure who was appealing who by then, but basically Bartlett et al could have recommenced the claim in the courts, which, by the way, was not a pay equity claim; it was a ruling that pay equity was part of the Equal Pay Act 1972. It wasn’t a substantive bargaining for more money; it was a very technical question of law.

Now, the reason that is relevant is because the creation of that interregnum was the quid pro quo to a very generous $2 billion - plus settlement where the Crown said, “OK, we’ll make pay equity go away if you agree not to pursue your claims in the court.” The way that was done was through section 8 of the original Act. I do think it’s disingenuous for people in this debate to describe that as some kind of punitive imposition. What the Act said was it settled pay equity, and so, by the way, let’s no longer—because I had introduced a piece of legislation at about the same time called the Pay Equity Bill which was then going to take a new approach that clearly Labour and the Greens didn’t like; that’s fine, that’s history. But the idea that that five-year hiatus on claiming in the courts was some kind of punitive imposition, I think, is a mischaracterisation of what had happened. This was an agreement in good faith with good will to make the problem go away, and as part of that agreement which was legislated, parties agreed—not just the law stated, parties agreed—they would not go back to court. But as the quid pro quo in return for that $2 billion settlement needed to be in writing, it also went into law.

This pay equity claim was settled. That’s why it was called the Support Workers (Pay Equity) Settlements Act 2017 and had the parties and the Government—because clearly if the Government accuses the previous Government of not acting quickly enough, then the same accusation can be laid at the feet of this Government. If the Government had normalised bargaining and commenced negotiations not on 8 May 2022 but on 8 May 2020 or 2019 or 2021 and got around the table with the parties to make sure that there was an appropriate settlement which reflected the current value of these care and support workers, inequity would not have arisen. But Mr Little clearly thinks there is a new inequity that has to go through a whole new process.

I think the Equal Pay Act has been amended now to provide for a framework for that to happen, but, frankly, the first cab off the rank should not be the care and support workers. They were the first cab off the rank before the law was even passed thanks to the negotiated settlement. So it is disingenuous, I think, and a misnomer to say on the one hand we’re going to continue to call this Support Workers (Pay Equity) Settlements Act but act as if pay equity had not been settled.

What the Government is better to do is to get on and bang a few heads together—including their own, frankly—and make sure that bargaining commences for an adjustment to the rates of pay for care and support workers that don’t lead to the very inequities that this original Act eliminated.

Mr Chair, various members’ contributions have been wide-ranging. The debate is technically clause by clause. I wonder if I might simply seek leave that the bill be considered as one part.

Leave is sought for that purpose. Is there any objection? There is none. The question is that clauses 1 to 8 stand part.

Clauses 1 to 8