Industry-Innovation-and-Competitiveness-Agenda

a right to access workplaces including those that do not have any members. The 2012
Fair Work Act Review found this has led to frequent use of entry rights by some unions.
The Review notes that during the construction phase of BHP Billiton’s Worsley Alumina
plant, visits by union officials increased from zero in 2007 to 792 visits in 2010 (McCallum
et al, 2012). The Bill provides that a union is entitled to enter a workplace for discussion
purposes only if it is covered by an enterprise agreement, or it has been invited. Further,
the Bill ensures the Fair Work Commission can properly deal with excessive right of entry
visits – for example, by suspending, revoking or imposing conditions on an entry permit.
• Improving workplace flexibility by enhancing the scope for employees to make individual
flexibility arrangements that meet their genuine needs — Under the Fair Work Act
employees and employers should be able to achieve flexibility in the workplace through
individual flexibility arrangements (IFAs). However, the Fair Work Act currently allows
enterprise agreements to restrict the use of IFAs. This means that employees covered
by an enterprise agreement may be denied the opportunity for more suitable workplace
arrangements even if their employer agrees. The Bill provides workers with fair flexibility
by ensuring IFAs can be made in relation to a minimum of five key conditions.
• Closing the ‘strike first, talk later’ loophole in the good faith bargaining rules — The Fair
Work laws enable industrial action in support of claims for a new enterprise agreement
before bargaining has commenced. The Bill ensures industrial action cannot be the first
step in the bargaining process.
The Government will further amend the Fair Work legislation to ensure that protected industrial
action can only happen after there have been genuine and meaningful talks between workers
and business during enterprise bargaining and only in support of claims that are not manifestly
excessive and would not have a manifestly adverse impact on workplace productivity. We will
also require employees and employers to consider productivity improvements when bargaining
for an enterprise agreement.
Boosting the workforce participation of parents
The Government aims to boost women’s workforce participation to help increase Australia’s
labour force and GDP, and this will be supported by the proposed Paid Parental Leave (PPL)
scheme and informed by the Productivity Commission review of Childcare and Early Childhood
Education.
Industry Innovation and Competitiveness Agenda
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The gap between women’s and men’s labour force participation rate is 16.7 percentage points
for those aged 25 to 34 years and 11.9 percentage points for those aged 15 years and older
(OECD, 2014b). Closing the gap in the participation rate between women and men is estimated
to boost Australia’s GDP by 13 per cent (Toohey, 2013). The availability of paid parental leave
and affordable childcare are strongly supported by international organisations to assist women’s
workforce participation (OECD et al, 2014; Elborgh-Woytek et al, 2013).
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The Reform Agenda: Ambition 2
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