Employer groups step up campaign to allow staff to work shorter shifts

Employer groups are stepping up their case against changes to national awards that mean workers must be rostered on for a minimum of three hours and have been blamed for the sacking of several students who worked two-hour after-school shifts.

Business lobby groups including the Australian Industry Group and the Australian Chamber of Commerce and Industry have announced they will appeal against a Fair Work Australia ruling which has set the minimum shift for retail workers at three hours.

This has had a particular impact on employers and workers in Victoria, South Australia and Western Australia, where two-hour minimum retail shifts were previously allowed under state-based awards.

Several entrepreneurs in regional areas have complained that they have been forced to dismiss students who had been working two-hour shifts in after-school or before-school jobs.

While this appeal is set to be heard on August 18, the Victorian Employers Chamber of Commerce and Industry has launched an even more ambitious push.

It has applied to Fair Work Australia to vary 81 different Modern Awards after receiving complaints from members about the minimum hour laws.

VECCI wants to include what it is calling an “individual facilitative term” within these awards that would allow employees to initiate a reduction in hours specified by the minimum-shift rules.

VECCI’s manager of workplace relations policy, Alexandra Marriott, says the current awards are not flexible enough for employers and employees.

“If VEECI’s proposed provisions are included in the 81 awards that prescribe minimum engagement terms, it will mean school students, mature age workers, those with a disability and primary carers will be able to get jobs, on their own terms, where employers can offer different conditions, such as shorter hours of work,” she says.

“This action is in no way intended to remove the safety net that exists within Modern Awards, but as a way to get more people employed, at the same time as helping employers improve productivity and improve diversity in the workforce.”

While VECCI says its members are regularly expressing frustrations with the lack of flexibility available under the Fair Work Act’s, it remains to be seen whether the group will actually succeed.

Last month, Fair Work Australia dismissed an application from employer groups to allow two-hour shifts for school-age workers, while retaining a minimum of three-hour shifts for other workers.

While FWA vice-president Graeme Watson conceded some students had been impacted by the minimum shift change, he said there was “very limited evidence of the impact and its extent is unknown”.

The ACTU has dismissed VECCI’s push as “another stunt by the business lobby” and says any reduction in minimum shift rules would affect two million workers.