Geelong Trades Hall Council

Geelong Trades Hall Council Tim Gooden Secretary 127 Myers Street Geelong 3220 Phone: 5221 1712 Fax: 5223 1115 Mob: 0438088112 e-mail [email protected]

Geelong Trades Hall is a not for profit organisation and is the peak council for trades unions in Geelong for over 100 years. As part of our service to unions and their members we also take enquires from non-members about workplace issues. We also act as a referral service depending on the issue and the initial advice provided.

Geelong Trades Hall receives about 3-4 complaints per week from no union members about breaches of their employment conditions. These complaints can range from underpayment of wages through to loss of entitlement such as sick leave and long service leave etc.

One common complaint from workers engaged by labour hire firms is that after raising an employment issue or a safety issue with their employer or their host company, they are not provided with any more work. When they contact the employer for a reason, they are simply told that there isn’t any work for them. Often the workers know that they have been replaced by another employee. But when they try to lodge a complaint with Fair Work Ombudsman their compliant is not accepted because their employment has not been terminated. They are just not given any more work. This also makes it difficult to apply for unemployment benefits without the normal separation certificate one receives when employment ceases.

Below I have summarised a list of cases relating to poor employment practices we have dealt with over the last twelve months. Some cases could not be pursued because Trades Hall has no authority to seek information or to collect evidence.

Typical Case Summaries

Kmart Kmart contracted Just One Call to clean the store in Belmont. The Contractor employed local asylum seekers and paid cash in hand. The scam relies on paying one person, who has a work permit, who was then required to pay 3 other workers cash from his account. Thus creating a paper trail that only leads to one worker and appears to be above award payments. When Trades Hall attempted to contact the employer about the breaches he filed for insolvency and has not been seen since. This case is still ongoing.

C&D Demolition A demolition recycling yard set up in Corio 2 years ago and recruited workers through MatchWorks with government subsidies. When the subsidies ran out the employer would recruit more workers to replace them. The workers were threatened not to speak to the Australian Workers Union or they would be sacked. About 20 workers were underpaid wages and no superannuation. Claims for both have since been lodged with Fair Work and the Australian Tax Office. 1 | P a g e COGG The City of Geelong Council engaged a large cleaning contractor called Quayclean to clean the 3 public swimming pools in Geelong. In turn, Quayclean subcontracted the cleaners through a labour hire company that recruited workers on bridging visas knowing, they had no work permits. The workers had to work the first two weeks for free and were only paid $10 per hour cash in hand. They could not read English and were forced to sign documents stating they had received training. This case was satisfactory resolved with the assistance of the City Council and Quayclean.

Batesford Hotel Some secondary school students doing their VET program come to Trades Hall to learn about their rights at work. As part of the discussion about law many of them give me examples of where they work and their employment arrangements. One such case was a students working for the Batesford Hotel and being paid $10 per hour cash in hand. Which further means they receive no superannuation and probably no worker compensation cover?

Pako St. Dentist Two young women complained that their employer had sacked them after claiming he lost investments and could not pay them 4 weeks back wages. Fortunately, one woman was in the Health Workers Union and the local industrial officer got the moneys owed to both of them.

West Coast Trailers A welder was employed for 9 years at West Coast Trailers and out of the blue the employer gave him a letter of termination saying he had no more work. Turns out he had plenty of work and hired another person. The employer was attempting to avoid his Long Services leave obligations.

Golden Farm I will leave the details of this case to the National Union of Workers. In short, it involves a labour hire company organising tourist visas to work at Golden Farms on lesser pay rates. The workers are not tourist and would be lucky to see north Geelong let alone Ayers Rock. The union has taken the labour company to court.

Private nursing homes One case in point was a small nursing home employed a trainee personal carer and paid her $30 per night to sleep over and care for 30 patients. The trainee was also sexually abused by the employer. In this case an out of court settlement resolved the issue. The nursing home is still operating.

Corio Truck Stop This business deliberately employs single mothers or unemployed women and then pays cash in hand and provide false groups certificate that is always below the tax threshold. They then use this situation to threaten workers not to complain or they will “dob them into Centrelink”.

Nail and Foot Shop There is a strong suspicion the young women employed in some nail and foot beauty shops are in fact indentured slave labour. There is no evidence for this other than hearsay and that staff are bused in and out of work to a single address. All attempts to interview the workers or shop management have been unsuccessful. Conclusion

Most small businesses in Geelong today would be in breach of employment law to some extent. In most cases it is due to convenient ignorance and a penny pinching attitude. However, there are some employers that deliberately attempt to increase their profits by avoiding paying employees in accordance with the law. There is a secondary objective by some employers who enter into illegal employment arrangements, which is to is to create a sub servant workforce that do not raise safety issues or demand their employment rights. This arrangement is particularly common in the labour hire sector.

Regardless of the laws, both federal and state, there is almost no regulatory inspection of workplace compliance in Geelong. The office of Fair Work closed in Geelong several years ago and replaced with a hotline phone number that does not provide an advocacy service. Young workers are not educated at school about employment law or their rights in the workplace. This is leading to more and more exploitation of workers in Geelong.

Geelong Trades Hall recommends to this enquiry that;

1. Labour Hire companies should be registered and audited to comply with standards and law simular to the Registered Training Organisation regime.

2. The Victorian school curriculum should include a special employment law education unit particularly for VET in school programs.

3. Due to Victoria handing over it Industrial Relations powers to the federal government, there is now a requirement for Victoria to lobby the federal government to increase funding for compliance in Victoria. All other states maintain their own I.R. compliance. Victoria has been missing out since the Kennett Government sold out workers in Victoria.

Tim Gooden Secretary 0438088112

26 November 2015

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