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TRANSCRIPT OF PROCEEDINGS
Fair Work Act 2009 2009-1
Fair Work Australia
Inaugural Sitting of Fair Work Australia
SYDNEY
9.11AM, Wednesday 1 July 2009
JUSTICE GIUDICE, PRESIDENT
VICE PRESIDENT LAWLER
VICE PRESIDENT WATSON
JUSTICE BOULTON, SENIOR DEPUTY PRESIDENT
SENIOR DEPUTY PRESIDENT WATSON
SENIOR DEPUTY PRESIDENT HARRISON
SENIOR DEPUTY PRESIDENT ACTON
SENIOR DEPUTY PRESIDENT DRAKE
SENIOR DEPUTY PRESIDENT LACY
SENIOR DEPUTY PRESIDENT CARTWRIGHT
SENIOR DEPUTY PRESIDENT KAUFMAN
SENIOR DEPUTY PRESIDENT HAMBERGER
SENIOR DEPUTY PRESIDENT RICHARDS
DEPUTY PRESIDENT IVES
DEPUTY PRESIDENT HAMILTON
COMMISSIONER SMITH
COMMISSIONER LEWIN
COMMISSIONER HARRISON
COMMISSIONER GAY
COMMISSIONER FOGGO
COMMISSIONER BLAIR
COMMISSIONER LARKIN
COMMISSIONER WHELAN
COMMISSIONER DEEGAN
COMMISSIONER RAFFAELLI
COMMISSIONER SPENCER
COMMISSIONER THATCHER
COMMISSIONER WILLIAMS
PN1
JUSTICE GIUDICE: On behalf of the members of Fair Work Australia I warmly welcome you all to this inaugural sitting. We welcome not only those of you here in the main hearing room in Sydney but also everyone joining us via the internet including the staff of Fair Work Australia at the various locations throughout the country. In formally opening the proceedings I acknowledge the traditional owners of these lands, the Eora people. I'm pleased to say that almost all of the members of the Tribunal are able to sit with us this morning, and we've also invited Senior Deputy President Lacy of the Australian Industrial Relations Commission to join us on the Bench. The Deputy Prime Minister.
PN2
DEPUTY PRIME MINISTER J GILLARD: Your Honour, this is in a somewhat disturbing fashion taking me back to my legal days when I used to appear against you rather than before you.
PN3
JUSTICE GIUDICE: ..... I’m sure.
PN4
DEPUTY PRIME MINISTER GILLARD: I don't think we'd want to do the scoreboard, at least not publicly. Your Honour, can I say more formally this is of course an historic day and we're celebrating the beginning of a new chapter in this nation's industrial relations history with the commencement of the Fair Work Act and the creation of Fair Work Australia.This body will play a role that lies close to the heart of the Australian democracy, that is, the role of its independent industrial umpire, and in fulfilling that role Fair Work Australia stands on the shoulders of the Australian Industrial Relations Commission and before it the Commonwealth Court of Conciliation and Arbitration, a great tradition and a great history.
PN5
Like those bodies Fair Work Australia will be a defender of our society's value of a fair go. Fair Work Australia, like its predecessors, will apply the new laws fairly and impartially and exercise its statutory functions according to that wonderful formulation, the equity, good conscience and the merits of the matter. With the continuing fall in the rate of industrial action that has occurred over the past decades, Justice Higgins description of the ‘barbarous processes of strike and lockout’ perhaps seems an irrelevance now in 2009. But it remains important now, just as it was in 1904, to ensure that the independent industrial umpire is empowered to act where necessary, so that in our society, the strong will not be able to treat the weak unfairly.
PN6
As I outlined in my second reading speech to the Fair Work Bill, Australia's version of fairness began with industrial relations: with the concept of the living wage, determined first in the Harvester judgment; with the idea that people's democratic rights don't cease when they step onto the factory, shop or office floor; with the recognition of the need for time, for family, relaxation and community; and with an end to divisive industrial conflict. With the commencement today of the Fair Work Act 2009, we've put in place a system that will be fair, simple and effective. I am optimistic that we have a system that will form a solid foundation to achieve Australia's first national workplace relations system for the private sector.
PN7
What we celebrate today began more than a century ago when the Labor movement enshrined the Australian right to a ‘fair go’ in one of the first conciliation and arbitration systems in the world. The Fair Work Act builds upon these core Australia values to build a new enterprise bargaining system to meet the needs of this nation in the future, and the bedrock of that system is the provision of a comprehensive safety net of employment conditions through the National Employment Standards and modern awards.
PN8
The initial creation of the new modern awards by the Australian Industrial Relations Commission from the many thousands of pages of state and federal instruments is a significant and challenging task and a task that is of national importance. It is a task that has been, and is continuing to be, performed by the Commission with its customary level of expertise and dedication, and I want to take this opportunity to once again thank all members of the Commission and the parties involved for their hard work on delivering this important national reform.
PN9
Under the new system the safety net will not be unyielding to the needs of a changing and growing society. The body that we celebrate today, Fair Work Australia, will play a crucial role in consulting with employers, employees and the community at large to review modern awards every four years to ensure they continue to meet community expectations.
It's customary at occasions such as this to celebrate the achievements of the great arbitrators of the past, with the top of the list being Justice Higgins in the Harvester judgment.
PN10
But there are many great achievements of Australia's industrial arbitration system and those achievements of course are shared equally with the unions who argued for these changes and the progressive employers who saw their merits.
PN11
Achievements that have made our society what it is today and which we too often take for granted include: the 44 hour week in 1927, followed by the 40 hour week in 1947 followed by the Reasonable Hours test case in 2002; equal pay for indigenous employees in 1966; equal pay for women, as a result of a series of cases starting from 1969; maternity leave in 1979; in 1990 paternity leave, and in 1995 carer's leave; then in 1984 the security and decency afforded to employees through the Termination, Change and Redundancy test case; in 1994 superannuation, a decent retirement system for all Australians; and in 1994 a supported wage system to give access to the dignity and independence of work for our most disadvantaged.
PN12
These are significant achievements and under the Fair Work Act we will build on these achievements with moderns awards that will provide a decent safety net that cannot be stripped away. But under the Fair Work Act arbitration will not be the principal means of creating new and innovative employment conditions for the future. As has occurred over the past 16 years, it is bargaining at the level of the enterprise that will continue to be the primary means to secure innovative and creative workplace conditions and to test and modify them over the years. The Fair Work Act has enterprise bargaining at its heart and bargaining will be the primary means of driving continued workplace improvements and reform.
PN13
We will be ensuring through bargaining that we will see new efficient ways of working that increase labour productivity and business competitiveness; new ways of attracting and retaining skilled staff; of helping employees to balance work and family responsibilities; of rewarding good performance and building loyalty and commitment; new ways of training the workforce; of reducing waste and improving service to clients; new ways of consulting and working cooperatively. As we near our second decade of enterprise bargaining, there are different needs among users of the workplace relations system.
PN14
There will always be a group of employees and employers who will rely on fair and simple safety net through the award system. For these groups the focus will be on providing a simple, easy to understand and apply safety net. The new low paid bargaining stream provides the opportunity for Fair Work Australia to assist employers and their employees to bargain for the first time. The stream encourages Fair Work Australia to be a hands-on facilitator, to help the parties help themselves to negotiate the benefit that can flow to employers and employees through collective agreements.
PN15
Fair Work Australia has a new role in making sure that the good faith bargaining obligations are implemented in practice. All bargaining representatives must participate genuinely and reasonably deal with each other by meeting and listening and responding to the ideas and proposals of others. There are of course many Australian employers and unions who are now experts at bargaining and many have sophisticated and mature relationships characterised by mutual trust and recognition of the shared interests and shared futures of the employer and employees. For these groups their only interaction with Fair Work Australia may well be when they lodge their agreement once every three or four years.
PN16
But for those who need its help, Fair Work Australia has the opportunity to find new ways of working with employers, employees and their representatives to foster cooperative, constructive and productive workplace cultures.
The predecessors to Fair Work Australia have embodied and promoted the values of fairness, independence and objective expertise, values that continue to deserve the highest respect and consideration.
PN17
In the best tradition of its predecessors Fair Work Australia will continue to exhibit these values and will adapt to meet the needs of an ever-changing economy and society. It will embrace new technology and new ways of working. It will work cooperatively with the Office of the Fair Work Ombudsman and, as we move to the national system, with state tribunals and services to provide seamless service delivery to the Australian public on all aspects of workplace relations.
PN18
I take this opportunity to welcome the appointment of Mr Nicholas Wilson as the Fair Work Ombudsman. Under the new Act, the Office of the Fair Work Ombudsman has a new focus on the promotion of harmonious, productive and cooperative workplace relations and providing advice and education in addition to the important compliance role. These activities are essential to achieve the kinds of modern workplaces we want to take our nation forward.
PN19
I also welcome the appointment of Mr Tim Lee as General Manager of Fair Work Australia. In this role Mr Lee will work closely with you, your Honour, the members here today and the Office of the Fair Work Ombudsman to provide excellent service to all users of the system.
PN20
Can I conclude by congratulating your Honour on your appointment as the inaugural President of Fair Work Australia. You bring a wealth of experience and wisdom to this role. I also congratulate each of the members of Fair Work Australia who have been newly sworn here today. Your Honour, I am delighted to have the opportunity to address you today at the first sitting of Fair Work Australia. Having achieved the passage of the Fair Work Act 2009 through Australian Parliament, I can now say on this historic day, that the Rudd Labor Government has delivered in full on the commitments we gave to the Australian people at the last election to bring fairness to our workplaces.
PN21
Your Honour, I have every confidence that Fair Work Australia will serve our nation fairly and effectively in the years to come. Thank you.
PN22
JUSTICE GIUDICE: Mr Evans.
PN23
MR G EVANS: Thank you, your Honour. I have great pleasure in participating in the inaugural sitting of Fair Work Australia on behalf of the 360,000 employers in Australia represented by the Australian Chamber of Commerce and Industry and its 37 state, territory and industry based member organisations. It is also a particular honour to share the bar table on such a significant occasion with the Deputy Prime Minister and Minister for Employment and Workplace Relations, the President of the ACTU, Sharan Burrow, and my colleague from AIG, Stephen Smith.
PN24
Moreover, I would also like to thank the Deputy Prime Minister for the opportunities that have been provided by the Government both through the committee on industrial legislation and through other means, to enable our views to be heard in the processes surrounding the development of the Fair Work legislation.
PN25
In 1904 the Federal Parliament passed the Conciliation and Arbitration Act, establishing this country's first federal industrial tribunal and in the following year, 1905, that tribunal known as the Commonwealth Court of Conciliation and Arbitration, convened its first hearing not far from here, in fact just up the hill at the Darlinghurst Courthouse.
PN26
Since that time the tribunal and its successors, the Conciliation and Arbitration Commissions, and more recently the Australian Industrial Relations Commission, have been one of the cornerstones of working life in Australia as they have gone about their role of resolving disputes, setting and adjusting wage rates at the national level and shaping and determining the employment arrangements that exist in hundreds of thousands of different workplaces across the country. Throughout that period debate and discussion about the role of the tribunal and indeed the broader framework of employment regulation seem to also have been inevitably at the centre of political and intellectual debate in Australia. Indeed it is hard to think of another country in which these issues assume such prominence and loom as large on the political landscape.
PN27
The passage of the Fair Work Act and associated legislation, and from today, the establishment of this tribunal, Fair Work Australia, are of course the latest manifestations of those ongoing processes of change and reform. Can I say in response that at a somewhat simplistic level one of the immediate things we now have to come to grips with is the change of the name to Fair Work Australia. Certainly for the past 20 years we have of course been living with the Industrial Relations Commission and this is in fact only the fourth occasion in 106 years that the name of the federal tribunal has been changed.
PN28
Fair Work Australia is of course a different entity from its predecessor in a number of distinct ways. It incorporates an extended range of responsibilities. It again assumes the important national responsibility of setting and adjusting wage rates each year. From today it also regains the responsibility of assessing and approving workplace agreements. There are also some significant new elements that sit within the Fair Work legislation, particularly in regard to the framework that exists around bargaining and agreement making. These will be important issues for this tribunal to deal with, interpret and determine. ‘Majority support determinations,’ ‘good faith bargaining,’ the ability to put in place multi-employer agreements and the new ‘low paid sector’ mechanism are each new initiatives that Fair Work Australia will be required to deal with and determine and in doing so provide guidance to other parties about their intended application.
PN29
The massive task of overhauling this country's award system will also continue to be a critical part of the work to be undertaken by the members of Fair Work Australia. The Federal Government has been strong in its desire to see this important and long awaited task of award modernisation tackled in a significant and genuine way. The Industrial Relations Commission has of course already done much work towards this end. We now look forward to the members of Fair Work Australia continuing to work to complete this task.
PN30
ACCI does believe that it has a real potential to deliver a framework of awards that are indeed simpler and easier to understand and work with for the end users of the system, Australian employers and employees and their representatives and that those outcomes can be achieved in a way that does not disadvantage employees or add additional cost for employers. The challenge of change is nothing new for this tribunal or its predecessor. We do have a new legislative framework to work within. We also live in difficult and challenging economic times where many businesses are struggling to maintain financial viability and in fact are doing their absolute best to maintain employment levels. Fair Work Australia will now have an important role in working to guide a path forward through these economic challenges that do now confront many Australian employers and employees. The Australian Chamber of Commerce and Industry looks forward to working with Fair Work Australia and the members of the minimum wage panel in particular in these important roles.
PN31
There are inevitably different views amongst us all about how we might get to where we would like to be. However, at the same time I suggest that many of the objects that underpin the direct work of Fair Work Australia contained in section 3 of the Fair Work Act do provide a set of objectives that we can all support and endorse. I refer in particular to the words in section 3A:
PN32
The objective of ‘providing workplace relations laws that are fair to working Australians, are flexible for business, promote productivity and economic growth for Australia's future economic prosperity and take into account Australia's international labour obligations.’
PN33
If the Commission pleases, the Australian Chamber of Commerce and Industry and its member organisations welcome the ongoing appointment of the President and members of Fair Work Australia. We now look forward to working with you in the future as Fair Work Australia begins to deal with the important responsibilities given to it under the Fair Work Act. Thank you.
PN34
JUSTICE GIUDICE: Ms Burrow.
PN35
MS S BURROW: Thank you, your Honour. Let me acknowledge the traditional owners of the land and thank the elders for their custodianship. This is an historic day and for working Australians a day of celebration. I am proud to be here with my colleague, Jeff Lawrence, the secretary of the ACTU and other union women and men representing those workers.
PN36
Let me congratulate the Deputy Prime Minister, Julia Gillard, and the Prime Minister for their commitment and, indeed, the journey that got us to this day. Work Choices is dead. The Fair Work Act lives and Australia will be socially and economically strengthened as a result. Rights at work are back in place and we entrust them to you.
PN37
This is a great institution, an institution in transition, but with long and proud historical foundation and it will continue to sit at the heart of that Australia. As an institution, the AIRC has, and Fair Work Australia will be, respected, indeed trusted, as a result of its institutional strength and independence, an independence that is the touchstone often in highly charged emotional, industrial and political environments.
PN38
Of course, particular decisions have attracted criticism, rumour would suggest even from the ACTU, but respect for the institution has remained. Now Fair Work Australia will be even more embedded in the working lives as its structure, scope and geographical location expands for those working Australians.
PN39
For most of the institution's history, there has been limited parliamentary override of decisions. More recently, legislature placed limits on how power could be exercised which did not serve any party well in our view and, of course, the new constitutional footing allows even greater parliamentary intervention in setting safety nets in a way not previously thought available.
PN40
This will only work where the independence of the institution of Fair Work Australia is the touchstone and of critical importance to that, of course, is confidence in a strong evidence-based approach to an essential setting of the safety net, the timely settlement of disputes with a focus on practical lasting settlements that recognise that employers and employees have an ongoing relationship. When dealing with unfairness at work, particularly unfair dismissals amongst other issues, the focus on justice being seen to be done as well as being done is critical. The expanded capacity for research and public consultation for inquiry has the potential to see even greater authority and expertise regarding the labour market vested in this institution, from minimum wages to workforce trends to changing community standards and social and economic benchmarks and with the best of the Workplace Authority, resources to provide speedy advice with ease of access, standards, of course, backed by the functions of the Ombudsman, then a powerful mix is brewing here.
PN41
It is, indeed, an institution of enormous economic significance in a new modern environment. Despite the anxiety of the reality that has taken us along the journey to new ‘modern awards’, the transition aside, we will see with collective bargaining which is the centrepiece of the new system a falling reliance on the safety net. That is coupled with the fact that wages policy, established centrally, will no longer be a practical economic lever.
PN42
Therefore, Fair Work Australia's ability to conduct research and to hold inquiries on your own initiative will be significant. We hope that Fair Work Australia will develop a capacity similar to HREOC or the Productivity Commission when it comes to the labour market and be an important place for the development of evidence based non-partisan, labour market policy.
PN43
Indeed, it is in a unique position to take heed of and implement its own recommendations. In regard to bargaining, then as the Deputy Prime Minister said, there are many mature bargaining parties out there and they will not be knocking on your door so often, but significant groups of workplaces need to make new arrangements, particularly groups of employers and employees joining in collective bargaining for the first time or re-joining after a period of less collaborative arrangements.
PN44
Your educative role regarding ‘good faith obligations’ where we will see Fair Work Australia encourage parties to focus on the end-game or outcomes and not the process can generate a renewed focus on safe, secure and satisfying work in sustainable enterprises where employers and employees get a fair share of improvements in productive capacity of the business and, of course, there are new roles and they're substantive.
PN45
Without question, the development of case law with regard to some of the more revolutionary aspects of Fair Work Australia will be of great interest to us: assisting bargaining for low paid workers, seeing them lifted from the safety net and emerge as participants in the heart of the system will be of social and economic significance; new roles in orders for equal pay for equal or comparable work which we would argue is no longer found in an anti-discrimination framework, but long overdue evidence-based value placed on the work and associated skills; and the justice role in identifying discriminatory terms in agreements, assisting parties to avoid them, facilitating dispute settling procedures to prevent parties offending the Fair Work Act prohibitions on discrimination and, of course, the exploitation of sham contracting arrangements and much more, I am sure.
PN46
We also recognise that you have a new group of employees or clients looking to you for assistance. All employees and employers with an interest have standing in respect to the safety net, a standing that was previously reserved for registered organisations and parties to disputes. People previously covered by state systems or those who are award free, many of whom have not enjoyed protection through the collective instruments of awards and agreements or through unions, will look to Fair Work Australia for assistance.
PN47
Your door may be open to a wider range of complainants. This may be Fair Work Australia's role in dispute settling or assisting the Fair Work courts in respect of breaches to the law, whether it be the National Employment Standards, breach of awards, breach of freedom of association, discrimination provisions of the Act or other and, of course, those workers involved in the spread of collective bargaining to sectors previously not involved.
PN48
This will pose new challenges for Fair Work Australia and for unions and employer organisations who are used to having a certain status before the Tribunal. We understand that efforts have already occurred to ensure Fair Work Australia is accessible and open to its dealings with all persons and for our part we look forward to co-operating with Fair Work Australia to ensure an inclusive modern labour administration that continues to ensure both ‘Decent Work’, work where rights are respected in workplaces that are safe and productive.
PN49
We know that the history of the AIRC has shaped much of our way of life, not just living standards, but pattern of family and community time built around, and increasingly within the context of work. Can I acknowledge all past and present Commissioners and staff who have had a significant influence on the lives of working Australians. Australians trust you.
PN50
We know that from our research. We know that because they campaigned to get back an independent umpire and, indeed, they voted for fair workplace laws inclusive of that independent umpire. The seamless transition to Fair Work Australia is an historic marker in what will be an ongoing and strengthened role for a great institution in our society.
PN51
You are part of that. I know you're proud to be part of that. We're proud to be associated with that and we look forward to a much strengthened Australia with a set of workplace rights now buried back deep in its heart. Thank you.
PN52
JUSTICE GIUDICE: Mr Smith.
PN53
MR S SMITH: If it pleases Fair Work Australia, it is a great pleasure to be invited to address you at this inaugural sitting of Fair Work Australia. Ai Group's chief executive is in London and Heather Ridout sends her apologies for not being here today and her very best wishes. It's a historical day which marks the beginning of a new era. From today we have a new institution and a new Act, both of which will bring about many changes. In the new system, Fair Work Australia will have a very significant and powerful role and no doubt your decisions over the months and years ahead will shape the new workplace relations system.
PN54
We are confident that the wisdom, practicality and fairness that have been the hallmarks of the Australian Industrial Relations Commission will continue to be the hallmarks of Fair Work Australia. These are the attributes which have led to the AIRC being held in such high regard in the Australian community. We are very confident that this standing will continue under Fair Work Australia. Over the past 100 plus years the Australian community has enjoyed an Australian industrial relations system which is quite unique and it has served this country very well. The central tenet of that system has been the notion of a ‘fair go all around.’
PN55
While that central tenet has endured, the system has continued to change and evolve. The pace of change has been particularly rapid over the past 15 years with different political parties pursuing their industrial relations ideas and policies. In 2000, few if any industrial relations practitioners would have believed that we would achieve a unitary industrial relations system in the next decade. But here we are with a unitary system already in place for corporations and most States having already agreed in principle to refer powers to achieve a unitary system for the private sector.
PN56
It is very pleasing that when economic or other circumstances have necessitated change that there has been the capacity to change our workplace relations system to accommodate the needs and wishes of the community. This capacity to change while preserving the important elements of past approaches should not be understated. Many other countries do not enjoy this similar benefit, and the USA is a case in point. The National Labour Relations Act was signed by President Roosevelt on 5 July 1935, six years after the start of the Great Depression. The Act established the National Labour Relations Board and it created a duty to bargain in good faith with unions which had majority support in the relevant workplace.
PN57
Now, those broad concepts of course are quite central to the Fair Work system, but it would not be wise, we submit, for Fair Work Australia to look to US labour laws for significant guidance on the way that our modern workplace relations system should be interpreted. Over the past 70 years the US National Labour Relations Act has only been significantly amended once, in 1947, despite several attempts to amend the legislation and as a consequence many of the good faith bargaining principles which have developed over the years in the US were developed a very long time ago.
PN58
A number of commentators over recent weeks have speculated that principles that apply under the US bargaining system or, for that matter, the Canadian, British, New Zealand or European bargaining systems will most likely apply under the Fair Work bargaining system and it is likely of course that these arguments will be brought before Fair Work Australia. While such debates are important and appropriate we see far more relevance in Australian decisions than decisions of tribunals and courts of other nations, and your decisions are going to be absolutely critical in this area.
PN59
These of course are matters for another day but we hope that in listening to commentaries and arguments brought before you that Fair Work Australia will not lose sight of the fact that Australia's industrial relations system has always been unique and this uniqueness has served this nation very well over the years. We're a nation with a relatively small population and we need a productive and flexible workforce to maintain global competitiveness and to continuously improve living standards. Members of Fair Work Australia from day one are extremely busy with the award modernisation process and over the months ahead the work load will no doubt increase substantially as a result of the expanded unfair dismissal jurisdiction, the new bargaining laws and the enterprise award modernisation process which is under way also from today.
PN60
For our part we will continue to devote substantial time and energy to assist your institution to achieve its objectives while of course vigorously representing the interests of industry. The award modernisation process highlights this role. AiGroup has devoted vast resources to the process and hardly a week goes by without another major submission being filed. It's placing huge demands on our staff and resources but we're very conscious that the process has placed huge demands on the AIRC and it will continue to place huge demands on the institution over the months ahead.
PN61
It is a great credit to your Honour, President Giudice, and to everyone else involved for what has been achieved. You were given what looked like to us to be an impossible task, but the four stage process is on track for completion by the end of this year and the resulting safety net will be enduring. The AiGroup and its members have been major customers of the AIRC for a very long time. We were registered federally in April of 1926 but registered in the New South Wales system in 1902 and we hold Registration Certificate Number 1 in that system. Today is an historic day for our organisation as well as for Fair Work Australia. Today is the day that your institution has approved the merger between Ai Group and the Engineering Employers Association of South Australia which takes effect from today, so we are now in operation with officers and staff in South Australia.
PN62
AiGroup and its members will no doubt continue to be major customers of Fair Work Australia over the months and years ahead and, in conclusion, we have great faith in your capacity and determination to protect the public interest and to deliver a ‘fair go all around’ to all parties. AiGroup's National Executive, our Branch Councils and staff wish all members of Fair Work Australia the very best in achieving the goals and objectives of the new institution. Thank you.
PN63
JUSTICE GIUDICE: Deputy Prime Minister, Mr Evans, Ms Burrow and Mr Smith, thank you all very much for your kind remarks and support and good wishes. I think we're all realistic enough to know that the new tribunal is possibly at this moment at the peak of its popularity, but we nevertheless welcome very much what's been said. We're grateful to all those who have taken the time to be present this morning and to those who are watching the proceedings throughout Australia and elsewhere.
PN64
The creation of a new national workplace relations tribunal is a significant event in Australia's history, and we have heard already some of the reasons why that is so. I would like to just make two points only.
PN65
Firstly, the tribunal's work is important. The minimum wage fixing functions for example will directly affect millions of Australians, both employers and employees. In carrying out dispute resolution functions of many kinds, whether assisting the parties to reach agreement or arbitrating, the tribunal will influence working relationships and standards of behaviour in the workplace in a material way.
PN66
Disputes coming before Fair Work Australia will often be collective disputes but more and more, as we've seen in recent years, the increase in statutory individual rights means that the national tribunal must be responsive to individual disputes, particularly disputes relating to dismissal from employment.
PN67
Our work involves decisions about, on the one hand, the employment, wages and conditions of employees and, on the other, the business costs of employers. It is therefore work which in a real sense matters and that makes it both challenging and rewarding.
PN68
Secondly, while this is not the first occasion on which the national industrial tribunal has been reconstituted, the establishment of Fair Work Australia is an historic departure from previous systems. For the first time there is a truly national system in the private sector. The statutory framework and the processes have been simplified. The governing legislation has been completely rewritten to reflect the new Constitutional basis for the system. The need to identify an interstate industrial dispute, the parties to it and the matters in dispute before exercising jurisdiction involve the complexity, and sometimes artificiality, of the most extreme kind. No one regrets the passing of those technicalities, although no doubt other jurisdictional issues will arise.
PN69
There have been important changes to the structure and administrative framework of the tribunal itself which will increase its effectiveness and there has been a significant rationalisation, as we've heard, of the workplace relations bodies and institutions which, combined with the introduction of other measures, such as Fair Work Online, will make the system as a whole easier to get access to and to use.
PN70
If I could now just make a few observations about the way in which the new tribunal will approach its work.
PN71
The members and staff of Fair Work Australia are conscious of the need to observe proper standards of impartiality, quality and timeliness in all that we do. No doubt we will have our critics, that has always been the case, it is in the nature of the jurisdiction. But I am confident that we shall match the high reputation which I believe the Australian Industrial Relations Commission currently enjoys and surpass it.
PN72
Workplace relations in general and the exercise of powers by the national tribunal in particular, are always attended by a degree of controversy. Participants in the workplace relations system very often have strong views, and we rarely find ourselves without the benefit of advice by way of submission, or even less formal means from the informed and the not so well informed alike. It's an area in which everyone can be an expert. Despite popular misconceptions to the contrary the tribunal does not make the laws, but works to implement the intention of the Parliament as expressed in legislation. Each member of Fair Work Australia participating in this sitting earlier this morning promised by oath or affirmation to carry out their duties faithfully and impartially. I mention that because it is a tangible indication that people coming before the tribunal can be confident that it will carry out its functions fairly, independently and within the framework the legislature has provided.
PN73
While the Australian Industrial Relations Commission will continue for some time and complete some important tasks, in particular the modernisation of the award system, it is appropriate this morning to acknowledge the dedicated work of the members of the Commission and the staff of the Australian Industrial Registry, and on a personal note to thank them all most sincerely for the support and encouragement they have given me over the last 12 years.
PN74
The establishment of Fair Work Australia has been a big project involving a great number of people in many areas. Without singling out individuals I would like to express my appreciation to the members of the Fair Work Australia Establishment Taskforce, the Industrial Registrar and the many Registry staff who have worked so hard to implement the new arrangements, and I also thank the staff in Melbourne and Sydney who have been involved in preparations for this inaugural sitting.
PN75
Deputy Prime Minister, Mr Evans, Ms Burrow and Mr Smith, thank you all again for your contributions to this sitting and thank you all for your attendance. We shall now adjourn.
<ADJOURNED INDEFINITELY [9.54AM]