The NSW IRC today handed down a $20-a-week increase in award rates, but increased the state's minimum wage by $27, bringing the minimum Award Review Classification Rate for full time employees to $531.40 per week. Monetary allowances and junior rates will increase by 4%.
Major holes in the Coalition's fairness test are continuing to emerge, with the SDA claiming today - in an argument that would apply to other sectors predominantly state-covered before Work Choices - that the new legislation allows retail employers covered by NAPSAs to offer AWAs that remove all protected award conditions.
The minimalist AWA covering "Billy" highlighted by Prime Minister John Howard when he announced the WorkChoices package in 2005 would fail the fairness test, unless there were exceptional circumstances, DEWR officials told a Senate committee this morning.
The proposed fairness test would effectively eliminate the use of AWAs for on-hire employment by recruitment agencies, according to the Recruitment and Consulting Services Association.
The Coalition's proposed fairness test leaves unclear whether employers would be able to offer entitlements that employees already had as "fair compensation" for conditions that were taken away, according to Flinders University's Professor Andrew Stewart.
The profit share of national income grew to a record high of 28.1% in trend terms after 12 months of Work Choices, while the wages share fell to a 30-year low of 53.3% according to the ABS.
The government's new fairness test should be subject to a review process, possibly within the Workplace Authority, and must be adequately funded to ensure it is timely and proficient, according to the AMMA.
