A TRANSPORT Department proposal to allow foreign-flagged ships to compete for freight transport work will threatens the viability of the interstate rail freight sector and put thousands of jobs at risk in regional Australia.

The Rail Tram and Bus Union (RTBU) has blown the whistle on the proposal, which was quietly recommended in a recent departmental discussion paper.

The discussion paper proposed a series of reforms that would lead to greater use of overseas-based ships for the transport of domestic freight, including: Removal of five-voyage minimum for temporary licences; automatic approval of temporary licence applications where there is no approved general licence route/cargo nomination; and removal of tolerance limits for temporary licence voyages for routes or cargo types where there are no general licence holder route/cargo nominations.

RTBU national secretary, Mark Diamond, called for the Deputy Prime Minister and Transport Minister, Michael McCormack, to quash the reforms and pull his department into line.

“These reforms will decimate jobs, many of which are concentrated in regional Australia in towns including Kalgoorlie, Port Augusta, Albury, Parkes, Narrabri and Moree," Mr Diamond said.

“Up to 10,000 direct and indirect jobs are at risk if foreign-flagged vessels with third world labour practices are allowed to undercut Australian conditions. This will be a sucker punch to Australian workers.

“The trade union movement has repeatedly exposed exploitation on flag of convenience vessels. It is astounding to think the Commonwealth Department of Transport would consider giving these shonks a stronger foothold in the Australian market.

“This proposal would drain money from the Australian economy at precisely the worst time. Foreign owned shipping operators do not pay Australian wages or Australian taxes, and do not operate to Australian safety standards.  Their profits are repatriated overseas.

“We would also likely see an increase to rail freight pricing due to the reduced rail volumes. Freight rail requires critical mass in order to recover its fixed operational costs," Mr Diamond said.

“The Deputy Prime Minister has made much of his government’s Inland Rail project, describing it as a 1,700km ‘corridor of commerce’ that will underpin regional economies.

“But now his own department could turn that project into a massive white elephant."

RTBU submission to the Federal Government.

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OPTIONAL preferential voting, the introduction of the Robson Rotation for House of Representatives ballot papers and an entirely new Electoral Act have all been recommended by the Parliament’s Electoral Matters Committee.

Tabling a report into the 2019 Federal Election, Committee Chair Senator James McGrath said Australia’s reputation as a successful democracy was upheld by the delivery of a transparent and robust election outcome.

“Australia is one of the oldest most successful democracies in the world,” Senator McGrath said.

“But that has not come through chance, or good luck - our democracy works because over a century, generations of people, paid and unpaid, have worked to make it so through blood, sweat and tears.

“Our democracy works because countless Australians have made the ultimate sacrifice to protect the freedoms inherent in democracy.

“Our elections are a fundamental cornerstone to our democracy and they should not only be fair, open and transparent, they should be seen to be so.

“As technology evolves and society changes, we must ensure our electoral processes are robust and voters are empowered.

“There is action that can be taken to increase fairness and protect our electoral system. The Committee’s recommendations will empower the voter, increase transparency, establish further safeguards, and create consistency.”

The Committee recommended:

• To maximise voter choice compulsory preferential voting should be replaced by optional preferential voting.
• To increase fairness and to reduce the luck of the ballot draw while minimising the so-called donkey vote, the Robson Rotation of candidates on the ballot paper should be introduced for the House of Representatives in tandem.
• Voter ID should be introduced for all voters with savings measures similar to provisional votes. Likewise, all electoral enrolments, whether new or changes should require proof of ID.
• The pre poll voting period should be reduced from three weeks to a maximum of two weeks. Voters who choose to vote early should be required to explain why they are unable to attend on the day rather than it being a matter of convenience.
• The Electoral Act should be completely rewritten to make it fit for purpose. A new offence of political violence, both physical and verbal should be introduced.
• The rules governing the use of Party names should be tightened to restrict the use of existing party names by new political entrants.

“Parliament should also commence a conversation about whether the Parliament should be increased in size,” Senator McGrath said.

“Part of the dialogue should consider whether the nexus between the Senate and the House of Representatives should be reformed.”

“In addition, consideration should be given to changing the term of the House of Representatives from three years to four years.”

Full report here.

ALMOST HALFof the super system may could be exempt from a crucial government performance test that would reveal to workers if their fund is a dud, new analysis from Industry Super Australia (ISA) has revealed.

An eyewatering estimated $881 billion in retirement savings belonging to 8.4 million member accounts or about 47 percent of the APRA regulated system could be exempt from the government’s new Your Future, Your Super performance benchmarks. And there is no timeframe for performance tests to be applied to three quarters of the nearly $1.13 trillion in assets not in MySuper. 

“If the government doesn’t apply new performance tests to all super funds and products, millions of Australian workers may never find out that their savings are being eaten away by a dud investment," ISA chief executive Bernie Dean said.

“Every worker, no matter if they choose a retail or industry fund product, deserves to know how their super fund stacks up so that they can make an informed decision about switching to a better fund.

“We applaud government moves to tackle underperformance – which can be a huge drain on worker savings – but to be meaningful the new tests should apply to whole system, and certainly to the for-profit products in the Choice sector, which a number of government reviews have found are rife with poor performing products.

“When it comes to protecting worker savings, we can’t have any carve outs or loopholes that would leave workers stuck in underperforming products," he said.

 “Leaving much of the Choice sector and administration fees out of the performance benchmarks means the government is giving many for profit funds a licence to continue to fee gouge on their members’ savings.”   

Failing the critical benchmark test means members are warned about a fund’s poor performance, a second consecutive strike bars the fund from accepting new members.

Among those currently out of the test are notorious dud investment products whose poor performance and fee gouging Banking Royal Commissioner Kenneth Hayne savaged in his final report.

The government will only initially test the performance of MySuper and “trustee-directed products” in the Choice sector, excluding hundreds of products and investment offerings, Mr Dean said.

Trustee-directed products is not a term currently defined in legislation, but it would capture only Choice products that invest in multiple asset classes and the trustee has 'control' of the investment strategy.

ISA analysis of the SuperRatings database could only identify $254 billion in trustee-directed products – just 22 percent of assets in the Choice sector. This is despite the Productivity Commission finding that the Choice sector was littered with fee gougers and poor performing super products.

Excluded are most platform investment options offered by third parties, single-asset investment classes and all pension products.

At a Senate inquiry, superannuation assistant minister Jane Hume confirmed the government had no timeframe to extend the performance benchmark beyond trustee-directed products.

The government’s proposal leaves almost 70 percent – 6.5 million accounts holding $425 billion in assets –of the big bank dominated retail super fund sector out of scope.

Investment offerings and products from retail super fund giants BT, MLC, ANZ, AMP, Colonial First State could all be excused. Cash only asset options which the Banking Royal Commission uncovered retail products that had negative investment returns, are also exempt.

About 634,000 industry fund accounts and $98 billion in assets are out of scope – only about 6 percent of industry fund members and 14 percent of assets under management.  

It is vital this benchmark is extended to the entire system before the government proceeds with its plan to staple members to their first super fund, or else members could be stuck in a dud fund for life.

Mr Dean said Industry Super Australia supports the government’s Your Future, Your Super package and its crucial performance benchmark tool, but is concerned unless important improvements are made, members could end up worse off. ISA supports sensible changes in members’ best interests including:

Ø  Net return as a performance benchmark rather than net investment return

Ø  Forced closures of chronically underperforming funds

Ø  Expanded coverage to ensure all funds and products – including the Choice sector – must also pass the benchmark tests, with no carve outs

Ø  Sequencing of reforms to ensure performance measures are implemented before stapling

Source: ISA analysis of APRA Annual Superannuation Bulletin, June 2019 and SuperRatings Fund Crediting Rate Survey, June 2019

Notes: Estimates as of June 2019, does not include defined benefit assets or accounts

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THE Australian Workers’ Union has moved to close the industrial loophole that allows farms to pay vulnerable workers a fraction of the award rate.

The union has applied to the Fair Work Commission to amend the Horticulture Award to guarantee that every worker on every farm is entitled to take home the minimum casual rate of pay – $24.80 per hour.

Currently, farms can dodge this minimum rate through ‘piecework’ arrangements, under which workers are paid depending on the quantity of fruit picked or vegetables harvested. Manipulation of this system has led to widespread incidences of workers getting paid as little as $3 per hour, as revealed most recently in the McKell Institute’s landmark Blue Harvest report.

Under the AWU’s proposed amendment, piecework arrangements would still be permitted, but every worker would be guaranteed the award rate as a floor.

“After a slew of investigations, inquiries and media exposes over a decade, we know for a fact that worker exploitation, worker abuse, and even modern slavery is rife on Australian farms,”  AWU National Secretary Daniel Walton said.

“There is no reason we have to accept this shameful reality. Australia was founded on the principle that if you do a fair day’s work you should be guaranteed a fair day’s pay. There is no reason we should consider farms to be an exception to this rule in 2020.

“As things stand fruit and veg employers don’t even record how many hours people are working. That’s madness. The hours should be logged and people should be paid accordingly.

“The farm employers lobby is fond of claiming that fruit pickers on piecework arrangements make more than the minimum wage. If that’s true then they should have zero problem with supporting our amendment," he said.

“The ethical farmers who employ people on decent rates will face no disadvantage from our amendment. It is only the wage thieves, the scammers, and the shonks who have anything to fear.

“Shearers, station hands, cane cutters, and others on piecework rates already have this protection. We need to extend it to fruit and veg pickers," Mr Walton said.

“The reason farmers are finding it hard to attract workers to fruit picking currently is because people don’t want to be ripped off and exploited. If we are successful in amending the Horticulture Award every person working on an Australian farm will be guaranteed a basic award rate. This will help drive down youth unemployment in our regions which we know is at catastrophic highs currently.

“We expect broad support for this amendment because it also makes economic sense to rural communities. Workers who earn more, spend more in local shops and supermarkets. They pay income tax and GST. They rent houses and build lives in regional areas.”

The call-for-reform is supported by bushfire survivor Natalie Trigwell, who has thrown her support behind the claim after she was paid just $15 a day for backbreaking work on a blueberry plantation.

“I was working six to eight hours a day in the heat and getting a ridiculously low wage that you couldn’t live on,” she said.

“There are decent farmers out there who are doing the right thing but we need to root out the bad guys and make sure every fruit and veg picker is paid a fair wage. Right now there’s no way I’d encourage anyone to take up this work, but if we ended the current piece rates award arrangements that would be a game changer.”

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ILLEGAL exploitation of migrants worsened during the COVID-19 pandemic, with the largest ever audit of foreign job ads revealing almost nine-in-10 (88%) offered wage rates below the award minimum.

Wage Theft: The shadow market is the third audit of foreign job ads by Unions NSW and reveals the prevalence of advertising wages below the legal minimum is up from 77 percent in 2017 and 70 percent in 2018.

The 2020 audit analysed 3000 job ads in Chinese, Korean, Vietnamese, Nepalese, Spanish and Portuguese. Of those, 2,189 (72%) indicated a rate of pay, of which 88 percent were below the national legal minimum award rates.

The report also found:

●      Construction was the worst industry for migrant wage theft with 97.3% of jobs advertised below the minimum wage. This was followed by cleaning at 91.8%, hair and beauty at 87.9%, fast food at 87.5%, retail at 87.1%, hospitality at 87%, clerical at 84.3% and transport at 66.7%

●      Advertisements in Vietnamese were most often below the minimum wage at 90.7%. This was followed by 88.3% of Korean ads, 87.9% of Chinese, 86.3% of Nepalese, 83.9% of Portuguese and 76.4% of Spanish ads.

“There are more than one million temporary migrants in Australia who can’t fully enforce their workplace rights due to their visa status,” said Mark Morey, secretary of Unions NSW. “So many migrants were already exploited, and without JobKeeper or JobSeeker it got much worse during the crisis.

“Without income support, tens of thousands of migrants were made more vulnerable. Clearly, some unscrupulous bosses seized on the opportunity of the COVID pandemic to rip off vulnerable migrants even further.

“This is a problem that can be fixed. Australia is among the world’s wealthiest nations yet we have allowed an apartheid to emerge in our workplaces. If you are a permanent resident you have workplace rights, but if you are temporary you are vulnerable to wage theft," Mr Morey said.

“The 20 hour a week restriction on work for international students must be abolished as a matter of urgency. It’s almost as if this rule has been deliberately crafted to push international students into exploitation in a cash economy.

“The Fair Work Ombudman is also a shambles. It doesn’t understand its brief and doesn’t have the resources to stamp out exploitation. Instead, resources should be directed to peak union and business groups to conduct legal wage compliance.

“It should also become a legal requirement to advertise the minimum rate of pay in every job advertisement. This would create a powerful baseline expectation for wages.”

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THE Australian Federation of Travel Agents (AFTA) said the Federal Government’s tailored $128 million support package for travel agents and tour operators, announcede this month, comes at a critical time, especially given the ongoing delays to full resumption of international travel.

Parallel to AFTA’s work on the grants support, given the severity of the COVID impact on Australia’s 4000 travel agents and the 40,000 employed in the sector, AFTA has continued to press the case for additional support including JobKeeper 3.0 for the travel industry. This work will form the basis of AFTA’s pre-Budget submission to be lodged January. 

“Australia’s travel agents and tour operators who have been so devastated by COVID are incredibly grateful for this support and for the government’s responsiveness from Prime Minister Scott Morrison and (previous) Tourism Minister Simon Birmingham down in making this grant possible," AFTA CEO Darren Rudd said.

“Given the numerous constructive, collaborative conversations had to date with government, AFTA hopes this measure is the first of a number of support mechanisms including the tailored evolution of JobKeeper for our sector. As the Prime Minister himself has acknowledged in Question Time recently, travel agents will need ongoing support for some time.

“AFTA looks forward to continuing to work closely with government and government agencies to ensure the implementation detail is right and that those travel agencies, tour operators and tour wholesalers who are unable to access funding through corporate debt raising receive the ongoing support they need to stay in business and continue to support their employees, clients and customers.”

Mr Rudd said eligible businesses can lodge applications now for the one-off grant support via the Services Australia Business Hub. To be eligible, businesses must:

1. be a travel agent or tour arrangement service provider; 
2. be actively incorporated or registered in Australia as at November 30, 2020 with AFTA or other peak bodies; 
3. have business turnover (gross income) of between $50,000 and $20 million for the 2019 calendar year; 
4. have been eligible for a JobKeeper fortnight in October (either September 28 2020 –October 11 2020 or October 12 – October 25). 

 Grants range from $1,500 to $1,000,000 per entity. Applications will be taken for three months. 

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THE Financial Rights Legal Centre has urged the Australian Government to immediately act to implement the recommendations of the Northern Australia insurance inquiry to ensure Australians have access to affordable insurance and a fair claims outcomes in the aftermath of natural disasters.

The Financial Rights Legal Centre is supporting the recommendations of the Australian Competition and Consumer Commission’s (ACCC) final report on the Northern Australia insurance inquiry including:

• Making it easier to search for, and compare, insurance products;
• The introduction of an effective standard cover regime with standard definitions;
• Requiring that insurers estimate an updated sum insured for their home insurance customers on renewal notices;
• Requiring insurers to warn customers when they appear to be underinsured;
• Banning conflicted commission payments to insurance brokers;
• Help for customers experiencing premium payment difficulties;
• The abolition of stamp duty on home and contents insurance products or the redirection of revenue towards measures to improve affordability for low income consumers or to fund mitigation works; and
• A call for governments to provide direct subsidies to people to relieve acute affordability and cost of living pressures facing people in high risk areas.

Financial Rights Legal Centre director of Casework Alexandra Kelly said Financial Rights assisted more than 120 Australians who were affected by the Black Summer bushfires in 2019-20.

“Many of these people have suffered severe financial hardship and unfair insurance outcomes after losing their homes and livelihoods,” Ms Kelly said.

“We continue to receive calls from people confronting bushfire insurance disputes. People like the residents of Conjola who are struggling to rebuild even a year on from NSW bushfires.”

Financial Rights has also assisted more than 375 Australians affected by other natural disasters like storms, hail events, flooding and drought in the past 12 months.

Ms Kelly said many people confronted similar problems including exposure to significant losses above and beyond their level of insurance.

“This leads to ongoing insurance claims disputes over whether an excess should be paid, the scope of works and cash settlement offers, underinsurance borne of an incorrect sum insured for their property and temporary accommodation,” Ms Kelly said.

The ACCC’s report follows several royal commissions and inquiries concerning natural disasters, the recommendations of which have not been implemented or only in part.

Ms Kelly said the Australian Government must act quickly to implement the ACCC’s recommendations.

“The Australian Government must intervene to ensure that insurance for Australians at risk of experiencing bushfires or other natural hazards is affordable,” Ms Kelly said.

“We support the ACCC’s conclusion that direct subsidies have the greatest potential to work in a targeted way to relieve some of the acute affordability and cost of living pressures facing consumers in higher risk areas.”

About Financial Rights

The Financial Rights Legal Centre is a community legal centre that specialises in helping consumers understand and enforce their financial rights with consumer financial products and services, especially low income and otherwise marginalised or vulnerable consumers.It provides free and independent financial counselling, legal advice and representation to individuals through the following channels: 

• Financial Rights Legal Centre - https://financialrights.org.au/;
• Insurance Law Service 1300 663 464 – a national service focusing on problems with insurance or debts to insurers;
• Mob Strong Debt Help 1800 808 488 – a national service for Aboriginal and Torres Strait Islander callers https://financialrights.org.au/mob-strong-debt-help/;
• Credit and Debt Legal advice line 1800 844 949 for those needing legal advice in NSW;
• National Debt Helpline 1800 007 007 – for people needing to talk to a financial counsellor (this line is answered by a number of different services around Australia, Financial Rights is one of those services).

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EFTPOS has announced an updated digital product and technology strategy for rollout over the next two years, which aims to change the daily lives of Australians for the better.

The strategy also provides greater clarity to members, Australian fintechs and retailers about opportunities for innovation and collaboration.

Eftpos CEO Stephen Benton said the strategy aimed to create greater value, ease and security for consumers and businesses by enabling compelling innovations for members, fintechs and retailers that enhance the digital commerce experience.

Mr Benton said much of the work was already well underway and the business was deeply engaged with members and industry participants to finalise detailed rollout schedules over the next two years.

The digital strategy has five key elements: Mobile wallets, e-commerce, digital identity, APIs and fintech access, and a national QR code payments rollout.

“The eftpos digital product strategy has been devised with an Australian focus, creating world-class innovations to compete against global players,” Mr Benton said. "The strategy we embarked on two years ago aimed to transition eftpos from a card present retail business to a major player in the centre of Australian e-commerce that leverages our world-class technology investments.

“It has been a journey not without challenges, but it has come together better than we could ever have hoped, with a keystone being the recent acquisition of Beem It," he said.

“In many ways, eftpos was Australia’s first fintech and our digital strategy builds on that history to deliver on eftpos’ purpose - to do good for Australia. We aim to do this by engaging with members, Fintechs and retailers to make everyday payments easy, secure, smart and cost efficient.” 

Mr Benton said the growth of debit card transactions in Australia made eftpos’s digital strategy even more important for competition and innovation.

He said debit cards were where competition was thriving in Australia today. Debit cards are by far the most popular payment choice for Australians as they move from cash and credit during this challenging time. Of the almost one billion electronic transactions per month in Australia, around 70 percent are now on debit and that number is growing every month. 

Many of the digital initiatives leverage eftpos’s centralised payments infrastructure, the eftpos Hub, that was built in late 2014 and itsToken Service Provider that went live in 2016.

Together, Mr Benton said, these assets provide locally-based, world-class, secure and accessible real time payments infrastructure. The resilient Hub infrastructure has been running at zero downtime since launch and enables local fintechs and financial institutions to access, innovate and compete on top of the eftpos payment rails.  

"The rapid pace of our transformation agenda means new initiatives are being introduced swiftly to encourage competition and innovation during the nation’s economic recovery, and at a low cost due to its accessible design and our use of global standards that facilitate choice."

About eftpos 

Eftpos is Australia’s debit card system, accounting more than 2 billion CHQ and SAV transactions in 2019 worth around $130 billion. www.eftposaustralia.com.au 

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