Fair Work keeps retail, hospitality penalties
The Fair Work Commission has decided to maintain current penalty rates for retail and hospitality workers.
In its finding, the commission said employers and the industries did not present a compelling case for reducing the Sunday or evening work penalties.
The commission said it took into account that most people working in food services, retail and hospitality were relatively low-paid.
It also decided to reject union-proposed changes to overtime awards.
It says the four-yearly review of awards, scheduled for next year, is better placed to deal with proposed changes to the system.
The Australian Retailers Association has criticised the decision, saying it will further undermine struggling retailers.
It says a recent announcement by the Federal Government to enshrine the awards in the Fair Work Act shows Labor is ignoring small business.
The Australian Chamber of Commerce and Industry has urged the Federal Government to drop its plans to legislate for penalty rates given Fair Work's decision to maintain them.
"That the tribunal has flagged interest in aspects of the employer case means that the Government should, as an absolute minimum, immediately back off legislative intervention and allow the process of arbitration to take its course," said the chamber's chief executive Peter Anderson.
"Only that way can competing arguments of industry and unions be fairly tested in the full award review in 2014."
Unions have welcomed the decision, saying it proves the current penalty rates are fair and relevant.
National Secretary of the Shop, Distributive and Allied Employees Association, Joe de Bruyn, says the commission has made the right move and retailers will not suffer for it.
"The existing penalty rates remain. Retailers have been paying them in the past, they now find they will have to pay them in the future, and I do not for a minute believe that a retailer is going to close his doors on Sunday just because they have to pay a penalty rate," he said.
Source: ABC News, 18 March 2013
