Lisa Chesters (Bendigo, Australian Labor Party) Share this | Link to this | Hansard source

Mantle Group Hospitality employs up to 700 workers across 15 pubs, clubs, cafes and restaurants. Mantle Group though, as many of us learnt over the summer, has been avoiding paying its casual workers weekend and public holiday rates because of a zombie Work Choices agreement originally signed in 1999. This deal was terminated by the Fair Work Commission in late 2022, but during the dispute this employer moved all of its staff onto another workplace deal. Ten days after winning full penalty rates for the first time in 22 years the workforce were handed termination notices and rehired under a new entity and a new enterprise agreement stuck in 2019, with who knows how many employees, meaning they do not get paid penalty rates on Australia Day.

Just how many employers are there out there like Mantle Group, small or large? Just how many Work Choices zombie agreements are still in existence and being used today? Hundreds and hundreds. That is why this government has acted. This government is abolishing Work Choices zombie agreements and putting dodgy employers on notice. People who work on a weekend or a public holiday deserve penalty rates. They shouldn't have to fight so hard to get a basic entitlement. Twenty-two years of not getting them is wrong. That is why we have acted, so no other worker has to go through this.