New industrial relations laws have passed NSW parliament today, which the government says will create the structure needed to deliver meaningful improvements to wages and conditions for hundreds and thousands of workers in the state.
Treasurer Daniel Mookhey said, ‘We promised meaningful industrial relations reform and today this has been delivered. It has been a long, difficult twelve and a half years for public sector and essential workers in NSW – but that is now at an end.
‘The wages cap is gone and workers will be able to negotiate for a fair and decent wage increase,’ he said.
‘The blunt, unsophisticated instrument of the former government’s approach has been replaced by a resumption of genuine, meaningful public sector bargaining.’
A new approach
The Minns Government says the passage of these new laws, in the final sitting week of parliament for the year, marks the beginning of a more considered and independent way of settling industrial relations disputes, and negotiating wages and conditions, with agencies and unions now able to sit down together and find mutually agreed improvements to pay and conditions in NSW.
The new IR laws remove the power to cap wages, removing the government’s ability to meddle in the work of the Industrial Relations Commission, which sets awards and settles disputes.
The NSW Industrial Court, which was weakened and dismantled under the former government, will be re-established, including the appointment of expert judges, who will preside over workplace health and safety matters and underpayments.
A victory for workers
Minister for Industrial Relations, Sophie Cotsis, said ‘I congratulate health workers, nurses, paramedics, police, child protection workers, teachers, cleaners, firefighters, transport workers and many more essential workers who spent years campaigning to scrap the wages cap. This is their victory.
‘NSW will have a modern industrial relations system that enables fair wages to be negotiated and disputes to be resolved,’ she said.
‘The former government’s wages cap and wage suppression created a recruitment and retention crisis in public services, and this is the beginning of reversing that damage.’
She says the Minns Labor Government was elected with a clear mandate to scrap the wages cap and sit down for genuine negotiation with frontline workers, improving working conditions and attracting new people to those vital roles, with that process now well underway.
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