The Australian Retailers Association (ARA) hopes to “clarify, simplify and modernise” the General Retail Industry Award (GRIA) with a number of proposals.
Under the ARA’s proposals, which will be heard by the Fair Work Commission (FWC) next month, workers who would like to work a four-day week have the option to more flexibly work 38 hours across four days, while allowing split shifts. The ARA says this would provide working parents with greater flexibility for activities such as school pickup and drop off.
“Workers that want to finish early can choose to take their break at the end of their shift,” adds the organisation.
ARA Chief Industry Affairs Officer Fleur Brown says this choice and flexibility aligns with the shift towards more flexible ways of working which is in the best interests of workers and their employers.
“Our proposal addresses areas where the GRIA is out of step with the needs of a modern retail workforce and where there are obvious, counter-productive barriers to mutually agreed flexible work arrangements,” she says.
“It’s widely accepted that the GRIA is unnecessarily complex. There’s almost 1000 individual pay rates. The complexity and onerous detail puts an enormous burden on small to medium businesses in particular who simply want to focus on fairly rewarding their team, doing the right thing by their customers and being part of the retail sector which is a crucial element of the Australian economy.
“We respect the FWC process, and we look forward to next month’s hearing.”
Ms Brown, however, acknowledges a “misinformation campaign that has been waged by unions in recent weeks around penalty rates”, noting that it’s important to “correct the record”.
“There is no proposal to remove penalty rates, overtime or paid breaks from the award. What the ARA has proposed is that managers can opt into a pay increase if they select the voluntary salary absorption option. This will only apply to employees that agree to it,” she says.
“Similarly, our proposal has never suggested removing breaks from the award. We are simply proposing that any employees who prefer to take an early mark can opt into that.”