10th Nov 2022, 12:54 PM – Representatives Fair Work Legislation Amendment (Secure Jobs, Better Pay) Bill 2022 - Consideration in Detail - Exclude farming

The majority voted in favour of disagreeing with an amendment introduced by Kennedy MP Bob Katter (Katter's Australian Party), which means it failed.

What does the amendment do?

Mr Katter explained that:

I'm moving for the exclusion of farming here. I'm supporting the Fair Work Legislation Amendment (Secure Jobs, Better Pay) Bill 2022, but, in the area of farming, it's just not like it is everywhere else. To give you some idea, the banana industry employs about 6,000 people. I'm in the pub drinking and I say, 'What do you do, Mick?' He said, 'I work in bananas. ' I said, 'Well, you're not working today.' He said, 'I don't work on Tuesdays.' I said, 'Do you work later in the week?' He said: 'Sometimes I work on Thursdays. If you turn up at 6.30 in the morning at the corner of Eden Street, a bus picks you up and takes you out there. If you're not there, well, you're not there.' This is not the ordinary sort of arrangements—and I think everyone here are from cities—that you consider in a city. I just think it's so enormously different.

Amendment text

(1) Schedule 1, item 660, page 229 (after line 18), after Division 1, insert:

Division 1A — Application generally

55A Amending Act does not apply to farming employment

The amendments of this Act made by Schedule 1 to the amending Act do not apply in relation to farming employment. Farming employment will be under general uniform base wage and conditions.

55B Amending Act does not apply to certain businesses

The amendments of this Act made by Schedule 1 to the amending Act do not apply to businesses that employ under 50 full time equivalent employees in regional, rural and remote Australia.