Award wages increase!

By Yasmin Noone

Fair Work Australia (FWA) has ruled that the National Minimum Wage will increase by $19.40 a week to $589.30 or $15.51 an hour, from 1 July this year.

While the Australian Council of Trade Unions welcome the increase, it believes that the new minimum wage does not go far enough to help the lowest paid in the country keep up with cost of living expenses.

United Voice assistant national secretary, Sue Lines, said that the 3.4 per cent increase is too low. The union will therefore use the increase as further fuel for its low paid authorisation application currently before FWA and continue with the fight for more money on behalf of those in residential aged care.

“The increase is just too low,” Ms Lines said.

“It doesn’t help people to pay for increased power costs and other costs of living.

“Also, when you factor in that in many SACS (Social and Community Services) workers work part-time, the increase won’t end up being that amount, so it won’t be very much.”

The low paid authorisation case, currently before FWA, seeks to use the new low paid bargaining powers of the Fair Work Act, to increase the wage of residential aged care union members.

In early May, FWA deemed that the application would only apply to the union’s award waged members, excluding those covered by enterprise bargaining agreements.

In its decision, the full bench instructed the applicants to re-filed and circulate an amended list of respondents to its application which excludes those employers to whom an enterprise agreement applied within 30 days of FWA’s May ruling.

Ms Lines said that the union has sought an extension to June 17. Final submissions are due around August.