Penalty rates decision will be a disaster for Tasmania

Tasmanians who work in hospitality, fast-food and retail and rely on penalty rates will be devastated by today’s decision to cut Sunday rates.

The decision follows unseemly cheerleading from Tasmania’s Liberals, lobbying over years to cut the pay of hard-working Tasmanians.

Senator Eric Abetz’ comments today welcoming the decision is a slap in the face to Tasmanians who rely on Sunday penalty rates.

Just yesterday it was revealed that annual wage growth has fallen to its lowest rate since the ABS first published the Wage Price Index in 1998. Now low paid workers will suffer a pay cut.

Tasmania’s Liberals are condemned for pushing a cut in penalty rates for hard-working Tasmanians.

With almost 5000 full-time jobs lost in Tasmania over the last year, more and more workers in our state are in casual and part-time employment.

Today’s decision will hit these workers hard. This means a reduction in wages circulating in the Northern economy.

Tasmanians will also rightly note that our State Liberal Government can launch an extraordinary attack on local councils but have been absolutely silent on penalty rates.

Tasmania’s hospitality industries already face crippling skills shortages and cuts to Sunday pay will only exacerbate this problem.

Research by UniSA has also found that many Australians who work unsocial hours in these industries would stop working those shifts if they no longer received penalty rates.

On this basis the cut to penalty rates is not only bad for Tasmanian workers it is bad for business too.

A McKell Institute research paper estimated that in Tasmania a partial abolition of penalty rates in the retail and hospitality sectors would result in a loss in disposable income of between $15 million per annum and $29.4 million per annum to local economies in Tasmania.

This means that our local economy and small communities will suffer.

Labor will keep up the fight for penalty rates and do everything we can to stop this cut.

Instead of cutting penalty rates the Government should focus on jobs and economic growth through investing in skills and training, infrastructure, innovation and entrepreneurship, something which will enable our whole community to benefit from.
ROSS HART MP FEDERAL MEMBER FOR BASS