Fair Work Act

Fair Work Act

Student’s Name

Course Number and Name

Instructor’s Name

Due Date

Fair Work Act

Introduction

The Fair Work Act 2009 is among the legislation pieces governing the employment relationship in the private workplaces in Australia. The Act is the foundation of every minimum standard and regulation for employments falling within the workplace system CITATION Jud11 l 1033 (Sloan, 2011). The employment’s terms and conditions and the employers’ and employees’ rights and responsibilities related to employees outlined in the Act intends to provide a balanced structure for productive relations within the workplace. This helps to promote social inclusion and national economic prosperity for employees under Australia’s workplace system. The Fair Work Act 2009 aims to provide employment’s terms and conditions, set out rights and responsibilities for organizations, employers, and employees with regards to that employment, provides compliance with the Act, and provides for the Act’s administration by establishing the Fair Work Ombudsman and the Fair Work Commission (The Attorney General’s Department of Australia, 2021). In addition to these guidelines and provisions, employees in Australia are provided with guaranteed safety net of relevant, fair, and enforceable minimum terms and conditions through the Modern Awards, National Employment Standards (NES), and National Minimum Wage orders. This paper will address the background of the Fair Work Act, the current situation in Australia regarding the Act, the workplace relation laws in Australia, and the arguments drawn based on the findings.

Background of the Fair Work Act

For many years prior to the Fair Work Act introduction, the election campaigns in Australia were considerably focusing on issues regarding industrial relations. Through this, various Australian Union organizations and Labor government despite being popular, were frequently pointing out the Work Choices system’s flaws (Buchanan & Oliver, 2016). Union organizations argued that the Work Choices system created an environment in which employers’ power over their employees was uneven. This and for other reasons, the Fair Work Act was introduced and was enforced on the 1st of January 2020. This Act was implemented to build a national system of workplace relations to wages and employment conditions. The Fair Work Commission overlooks this legislation and the role of the commission is maintaining a safety net of conditions and minimum wages, fairness at the workplace, and flexible working arrangements (James & Ombudsman, 2015). In addition, it ensures that both employers and employees comply with the Fair Work Act.

The approach for creating the Fair Work Act stemmed from the presumptions that there was an unclear bargaining power between employers and employees. It was also believed that the trade union representation promotion was meant to redress this imbalance. Therefore, the third party’s role was to approve agreements, set conditions ad minimum wages, and to solve industrial disputes (Gahan, Pekarek, & Nicholson, 2018). In general, the Fair Work Act retreated to the arrangements during the introduction of the Workplace Relations Act of 1996 by the Howard government. James & Ombudsman (2015) argues that so far, the FWA’s impact is muted and a number of agreements that were made under Work Choices have not yet expired. Furthermore, the conditions of labor market have been relatively benevolent since the Fair Work Act started to operate. The real test comes in the process of negotiating new agreements under the rules contained in the Fair Work Act. Should the track be faltered down by the labor market, a further FWA test would be the extent to which an employer can adjust his cost of employment workforces, or hours of work to fit subdue demands (Gahan, Pekarek, & Nicholson, 2018). This Act applied to every business which is a “national system employer.” The Fair Work Act contains specific rules which helps in the facilitation of both economic prosperity and social inclusion for all workers in Australia. The Act has proved to be a useful tool for employers in Australia since it provides a structure upon which employers can build their company culture and foster a productive and happy workforce.

Current Situation

The exploration of the Fair Work Act reveals that these new conditions have failed to strike a balance between the concerned parties. It is difficult to sustain this balance because the legislation’s major provisions result in unpredicted consequences and issues where the Act is presented as the problem and destroyed the system that was in existence (EmployerSure, 2021). A survey that the Australian Industrial Group conducted revealed that there are about thirteen claims are identified against bargaining decisions and against the individual agreements’ elimination. These claims were focused on the lack of workplace relation system development since there are no more improvements to be introduced because the one-to-one agreements had been ignored (Ebisui, Cooney, & Fenwick, 2016). With respect to the global standard of employment, Australia’s current situation has made it impossible to be part of the global marketing arena and to sustain a stiff competition. In this regard, the primary concern of employers is with the development of industrial tools and legislation that would allow them to focus on improvement and productivity. Also, they focus on the legislation that eliminate the barriers halting the employees’ level of performance and production (Ebisui, Cooney, & Fenwick, 2016). It is important to outline the current provision serving as a major obstacle to the promotion of productivity and increased level of performance among employees. This is of special concern to the possibilities of outsourcing and the limited use of contractors. Furthermore, individual arrangement of flexibility hampers productive cooperation between employers and employees.

Several negative effects of the Fair Work Act have been identified as far as Australia’s economic dimension is concerned. From the beginning, the proposals by the employers demonstrate a complete lack of concern and consideration for junior staff (Gahan, Pekarek, & Nicholson, 2018). Moreover, it showcases the ineffectiveness of the styles of management of the organizations involved. The fact that the profitability of a company is prioritized over the employees’ welfare not only demonizes but also breaks the recommendations of the Act. Another indicator of the Act’s shortcomings is the self-serving and uncaring image of the companies’ managements. The fact that the majority of their proposals deprive, undermine, and intimidate the employees’ behaviors with the intentions to purposely manipulate them to their benefit disputes the impression they are supposed to give (Gahan, Pekarek, & Nicholson, 2018). Despite the above shortcomings, the Fair Work Act has continually enhanced employee and workplace effectiveness. Also, it is regarded as an important tool and instrument to maintain and retain valued employees, improved health and worker productivity, and absorb the contribution of the employees to the organization’s work.

Australia’s Workplace Relations Laws

As it is established in Australia’s workplace legislation and Fair Work Act, the core elements of the workplace relations structure include a safety net employment’s minimum terms and conditions (Isaac, 2018); systems of corporate-level collective bargaining reinforced by the rules and obligations of bargaining that govern industrial actions; provisions for individual arrangement of flexibility in the quest of allowing individual employees and an employer to create flexible arrangements of work which would meet their individual need provided that employees are better off; employee protection against unlawful or unfair employment termination; protection of both employee and employer freedom to choose if they would want third party representation in the workplace matters; and the provision of rules that govern the rights and responsibilities of the employee and employer representatives (Isaac, 2018).

The Commonwealth Parliament is responsible for enacting workplace relations laws of Australia. The Fair Work Ombudsman and the Fair Work Commission are responsible for the oversight of the Fair Work Act’s practical application in the workplace. The Fair Work Commission is Australia’s independent workplace relations tribunal with the authority to conduct various functions related to maters in the workplace (Schnabel, 2020). They include minimum condition’s safety net, industrial action, enterprise bargaining, dispute resolution, and employment termination. Furthermore, the commission conducts a number of functions that related to registered organizations (employer organizations and unions) like their amalgamation, registration, rules and WHS applications and entry permits. The Fair Work Ombudsman helps employers, employees, contractors, and the community to get to know their rights and responsibilities in the workplace and it also enforces compliance with Australian workplace laws (Schnabel, 2020). The Registered Organization Commission educates and monitors companies regarding their responsibilities like finances, record keeping, and even elections. This commission was established four years ago to enhance financial accountability and transparency within registered organizations.

The Fair Work Act’s beauty is that it was tailored with an employer in mind. The Act incorporates particular instructions that are tailored to be practical and applicable to companies and businesses of all sizes and shapes (Schnabel, 2020). Whether a company manages its team onsite or it supervises a remote workforce, it is practically guided in virtually all aspects of workforce management. On top of the base-level provisions that National Employment Standards affords, the Modern Awards offer more guidelines for employee agreement outlining the entitlements of employees (Amendment, 2015). They are essential because they offer variances for various occupations and industries which makes it easier to build on the standards integral in the Fair Work Act into workplace operations.

Discussion/Findings

According to Australia’s Industrial Group, the changes incorporated to the Fair Work Act was analyzed thoroughly with respect to the previous shortcomings in the Work Choices. The government needs to pay a close attention to the needs needed to eradicate any barriers to the increase of productivity in the workplace. The workplace flexibility introduction should be based on the introduction of changes to the law. According to Peetz (2016), there is reason to believe that the Fair Work Act has failed to encourage increase of productivity in the workplace and hampers organizations’ ability to streamline and to maintain a flexible workforce. Indeed, there are multiple challenges when it comes to the process of manufacturing and with this, it ca be argued that the Fair Work Act is among the fundamental barriers to increased productivity development (Peetz, 2016). It is up to the government to recognize that growth of salaries does not contribute to an increase of performance. This is because it prevents the country from establishing a fair competition.

Contrary to popular belief, the new system has not been able to contribute to Australia’s economy overall welfare because it is difficult to ensure that the interest of all stakeholders are met. Regarding the bargaining provisions that the Fair Work Act presents, it is possible for bargaining to commence even with a lack of formal notification and consequently, employers and employees can begin with the negotiations (Ombudsman, 2017). The issue here is that when employers refuse to negotiate, employees can be supported by unions on the enterprise agreement basis. As a result, if Fair Work Australia determines that most of the employees in Australia support enterprise agreement, the employers will be required to collectively bargain with the employees. The support that the employees provide forces the employers to conceded to the norms that have been established. Gahan, Pekarek, & Nicholson (2018) identifies that the provisions of the Fair Work Act has not provided changes the growth of productivity. What is more threatening is that the laws established does not impose any responsibilities and obligations on unions to encourage productivity as a part of collective agreements. In particular, employers are obliged to bargain with the unions when in fact, many unions do not believe in the significance of encouraging the production success of an organization. These unions are entitled to freely exercise their bargaining power but it did not bring positive changes to the productivity and performance rates.

Conclusion

By identifying, resolving, and preventing labor issues, the Fair Work Act strives to continuously enhance employee and workplace effectiveness. Also, it is a vital instrument and tool to maintain and improve the employees’ productivity rate in the workplace. By introducing the Fair Work Act, the government aimed to improve the employees’ working conditions and to provide a space to bargain and resolve disputes (Gahan, Pekarek, & Nicholson, 2018). But, bargaining alongside the minimum wages level implementation has failed to make a major contribution to the growth and development of production rates. Particularly, most organizations in Australia under the Australian Industry umbrella provided appalling facts and statistics which proves that improvements have not been recorded. Particularly, the bargaining power overuse, individual agreement removal, and the modern award establishment are the main barriers to the enhancement of productivity and the improvement of employee performance (Gahan, Pekarek, & Nicholson, 2018). The emphasis that has been placed on collective agreement deprives employers their right to impose responsibilities on employees. To eradicate these issues, the changes must be concerned with reevaluation of modern awards, minimum wage, and unfair dismissal procedures. From such considerations, it is important that the Fair Work Act is significantly corrected and expanded to fill the current performance gaps.

References

Amendment, A. P. (2015). Bill 2012. Senate bill)—(Senator Hanson-Young). https://cdn.aigroup.com.au/Submissions/Workplace_Relations/2012/Employer_sanctions_MigrationActChanges_aug2012_final.pdf

Buchanan, J., & Oliver, D. (2016). ‘Fair Work ‘and the Modernization of Australian Labor Standards: A Case of Institutional Plasticity Entrenching Deepening Wage Inequality. British Journal of Industrial Relations, 54(4), 790-814. https://doi.org/10.1111/bjir.12215

Ebisui, M., Cooney, S., & Fenwick, C. (2016). Resolving Individual Labor Disputes. Geneva: International Labor Organization. https://www.ilo.org/wcmsp5/groups/public/—dgreports/—dcomm/—publ/documents/publication/wcms_488469.pdfEmployerSure. (2021). Employment law in Australia. Retrieved from employsure.com.au: https://employsure.com.au/guides/employment-contracts-and-legislation/employment-law-in-australia/

Gahan, P., Pekarek, A., & Nicholson, D. (2018). Unions and collective bargaining in Australia in 2017. Journal of Industrial Relations, 60(3), 337-357. http://dx.doi.org/10.1177/0022185618759135

James, N., & Ombudsman, F. W. (2015). Commonwealth of Australia. https://www.colemangreig.com.au/userfiles/file/Fair%20Work%20Information%20Statement%202015-16%20(02177991xA3D94).pdfIsaac, J. (2018). Why are Australian wages lagging and what can be done about it?. Australian Economic Review, 51(2), 175-190. https://doi.org/10.1111/1467-8462.12270Ombudsman, F. W. (2017). Fair Work Ombudsman. https://thepeopleindairy.org.au/wp-content/uploads/2019/02/FWO-fact-sheet-About-the-FairWork-Ombudsman.pdf

Peetz, D. (2016). Industrial action, the right to strike, ballots and the Fair Work Act in international context. Australian Journal of Labour Law, 29(2), 133-153. https://research-repository.griffith.edu.au/bitstream/handle/10072/380625/PeetzPUB6698.pdf?sequence=1

Schnabel, C. (2020). Union membership and collective bargaining: Trends and determinants (pp. 1-37). Springer International Publishing. https://ftp.iza.org/dp13465.pdfSloan, J. (2011). Evaluating the Fair Work Act. Retrieved from cis.org.au: https://www.cis.org.au/app/uploads/2015/04/images/stories/policy-magazine/2010-summer/26-4-10-judith-sloan.pdf

The Attorney General’s Department of Australia. (2021). Current workplace relations issues. Retrieved from ag.gov.au: https://www.ag.gov.au/industrial-relations/workplace-relations-australia