Penalty rates slashed for hospitality workers

The Fair Work Commission has agreed to cut Sunday penalty rates.

The hospitality industry has been campaigning to have Sunday penalty rates reduced: full-time and part-time level one workers will have Sunday penalty rates reduced from 150% to 125%, but level two and three employees will stay at 150%.

Public holiday rates have also been cut for full-time and part-time hospitality workers from 250% to 225%, but casuals will remain at 250%.

FWC president Iain Ross (pictured right) said there would be a transitional period to help workers adjust to their reduced pay packets: “Many of these employees earn just enough to cover weekly living expenses and saving money is difficult. The immediate implementation of the variation to Sunday penalty rates would inevitably cause some hardship to the employees affected. We have concluded that appropriate transitional arrangements are necessary to mitigate the hardship.

“We have not reached a view as to the form of those arrangements.”

Public Holiday changes will come into effect on July 1, 2017.

The FWC had been considering bids from business and employer groups to lower Sunday rates since 2015.

Business groups argued that adjusting penalty rates will allow small businesses to offer more work and better meet the needs of customers.

Labor and the union for hospitality workers, United Voice, have condemned the move. Labor party leader Bill Shorten told The Courier-Mail “there could not be a worse time to cut penalty rates”.

Shorten said he respected the independence of the Fair Work Commission but “will never support a ­decision that sees workers worse off”.

“We are greatly concerned that if it’s hospitality workers who have their penalty rates cut today, it will be nurses and emergency workers tomorrow.”

However, National Retail Association chief executive Dominique Lamb said the greatest deterrent to employment growth in retail was penalty rates.

“The big players are already on enterprise bargaining agreements, so the businesses this decision will affect are the small to medium enterprises, which are the engine room of the economy, and many of them have had to simply abandon Sunday trading altogether because they just couldn’t find a way to make it viable when paying double time,” she said.