NEW workers for the fabric and homeware giant Spotlight are being offered a two-cent pay rise in exchange for entitlements.
Nicola Roxon, MP for Gellibrand, feared workers at the Braybrook Spotlight store would be hit by this “assault on wages”.
“The impact of Howard’s IR laws are starting to hit our electorate,” she said.
“New Spotlight employees across Australia are being offered an Australian Workplace Agreement (AWA) that excludes penalty rates and overtime, eliminates paid rest breaks, offers no breaks between shifts, and eliminates annual leave loading and public holiday pay rates.
“And, for the loss of these conditions and entitlements, all Spotlight is offering their new employees is an extra two cents an hour.
“Under the Spotlight AWA, a fulltime adult employee, on a roster including late night shopping and weekend work, will receive $90 a week less than a fellow employee on the existing award.”
The Australian Council of Trade Unions’ (ACTU) website Your Rights At Work states that Spotlight employs 6000 workers across Australia and “rakes in over $600 million a year”.
“With increasing petrol prices, rising costs and interest rates moving up the last thing Australian working families can afford is a $90-a-week pay cut.
“Workers in the retail industry are not on high wages by any stretch of the imagination.
“Most of the Spotlight workers are struggling to keep their heads above water on $14.28 an hour.”
Spotlight did not respond to Star’s questions before the newspaper went to press.
