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In a strange turn of events, major retailers have formed an alliance to support an application made to the Fair Work Commission (FWC) by the Australian Retailers Association (ARA), which seeks to make changes to the General Retail Industry Award 2020 (GRIA).
Backed by an alliance of major retailers – including Woolworths, Coles, Kmart, and Costco – the ARA’s application to the FWC has become a stand-off against unions and employee groups across Australia. The application itself has a total of 17 proposed amendments to the GRIA. According to the Australian Council of Trade Unions (ACTU), one of the 17 proposals seeks to strip any worker earning $53,670 and above on the retail award of their penalty rates.
This means that they would lose their overtime, annual leave loading, allowances, breaks and protections around hours of work in exchange for a 25 per cent increase to buy-out award safeguards.
In a statement, the ARA has claimed that it is pushing to make the amendments in hopes that it will create clarity and dissuade confusion when it comes to the GRIA.
“The ARA recognises that the current award, with 994 individual pay rates spanning 96 pages, is unnecessarily complex and misaligned with the evolving needs of the retail workforce. This leads to employees and employers struggling to understand workplace entitlements and cultivate flexibility within working arrangements,” said the statement.
“The ARA’s proposed variations to the GRIA seek to promote clearer guidelines around working conditions, empowering employees to understand their rights while also fostering greater transparency and flexibility in working arrangements.”
“The proposed changes are focused on creating a more flexible, modern system that better balances the needs of both workers and employers.”
Despite these claims, the ACTU believes Woolworths and Coles are involved because they are seeking to “tear up the rules” around working hours, an issue that saw them underpay their workers by $500 million.
“Australian unions call on all political parties to pledge they will protect the penalty rates of working Australians from this type of corporate greed,” said ACTU assistant secretary Joseph Mitchell.
“Retail workers risked their health to keep supermarkets open during the pandemic. It’s outrageous for big companies like Coles and Woolworths to demand their undervalued workforce work longer hours with reduced protections and lower wages.”
“The retail lobby’s proposals are an attack on retail workers’ ability to deal with cost-of-living pressures. Not only do these workers have to deal with price gouging from the big retailers like everyone else, but now they are also expected to stand by while the supermarket duopoly pushes to strip away their wages and conditions.”
Mitchell believes that Coles’ and Woolworths’ support of the ARA’s amendments is straight out of the Peter Dutton playbook, arguing that if these proposals do, in fact, go through, it will trigger a flood of new loopholes that will severely impact workers.
“The supermarkets are arguing for these cuts to pay and conditions under the guise of ‘workplace flexibility’ – the exact same management-speak used by the Dutton and the Liberals,” he said.
“Make no mistake: big businesses everywhere will use this as a precedent to push for lower wages in other industries, especially if the Coalition wins the election and rips open more loopholes. No one is safe from wage cuts if this goes through.”
“The greed of these giant companies knows no bounds. Unfortunately, this retail plan is part of a broader agenda by big business to maximise profits by making their employees’ lives less financially secure.”
Kace O'Neill
Kace O'Neill is a Graduate Journalist for HR Leader. Kace studied Media Communications and Maori studies at the University of Otago, he has a passion for sports and storytelling.
