After months of negotiations, the Greens will back the IR Bill.
We have made a good bill better – and will support this first part of Labor’s industrial relations reforms.
Over extensive talks we have agreed to back the bill after securing significant additional improvements, including giving parents an enforceable right to request unpaid parental leave and protecting the existing Better Off Overall Test.
The Greens strongly back most of what is in this bill, including abolishing the ABCC and multi-employer bargaining, but we wanted to ensure low paid workers wouldn’t go backwards because of some of the changes.
The government’s original bill attempted to remove prospective workers from being considered under the Better Off Overall Test, which could have left some workers being worse off.
This is an important win for all workers, especially low paid workers in the retail and the hospitality industries. The Better Off Overall Test has been preserved.
Workers will now have an enforceable right to unpaid parental leave and better work/life balance.
This is just the start of industrial relations reforms in this Parliament – there’s a lot more to do. We need to get sick leave for casuals, move towards a four day work week, and outlaw insecure work.
That is now the next fight.