Push to change after-hours pay
PREMIUM pay rates for working outside traditional hours in the retail and hospitality sectors would be changed under potential reforms unveiled by the Business Council of Australia yesterday.
In its landmark paper, Building Australia’s Comparative Advantages, the peak body identifies labour market “rigidities” as needing reform. BCA members in the hospitality and retail sectors reported that “changed social norms and customer expectations are not reflected in the requirement to pay premium rates for work outside of a traditional span of hours”.
“The government should begin a process of amending the span of hours and associated pay rates in awards in these sectors,” it says. “This should start from a position that additional pay should be associated with hours beyond those agreed as standard for the job between the employer and employee.”
The paper suggests an escalation of the campaign to cut Sunday penalty rates. Other groups including the Australian Chamber of Commerce and Industry and Australian Retailers Association have signalled the push to increase customer access to weekend trading.
Also on retail, the paper says governments should set a timetable for harmonising retail trade hours. This is in line with demands by Coles and Woolworths for the patchwork of retail trading hours to be replaced.
The paper calls for extra amendments to the Fair Work Act to cut the range of matters that can be subject to bargaining. The scope of matters that can be bargained has been a particular concern of the business community and was cited in debates over disputes, such as the 2011 move by Qantas management to order the lockout of striking staff.
The call for industrial relations reform was one of a raft of structural reforms aimed at building “innovation infrastructure” in the BCA paper, which also identified higher access to capital as important.
It noted that state-owned enterprises and sovereign wealth funds were playing an increasing role in foreign direct investment.
As well as calling for an increase in the threshold for Foreign Investment Review Board scrutiny of investment to $1.1 billion — the level that applies to US and New Zealand investors — the paper says the FIRB should immediately start publishing monthly online summaries of all decisions.
Over the medium term, pre-approving certain foreign SOEs to invest up to $1.1bn should be investigated.
Source: The Australian - 29th July 2014
