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26-675: It was implemented in the Workplace Relations Amendment (A Stronger Safety Net) Act 2007, which came into operation on 1 July 2007. The Act saw the renaming of the then Office of Workplace Services, which became the Workplace Ombudsman , and the creation of the Workplace Authority , combining the former Office of the Employment Advocate and parts of the then Department of Employment and Workplace Relations, now

52-691: A "take it or leave it" AWA as a condition of employment. They were registered by the Employment Advocate and did not require a dispute resolution procedure. These agreements operated only at the federal level. AWAs were individual written agreements concerning terms and conditions of employment between an employer and employee in Australia, under the Workplace Relations Act 1996 . An AWA could override employment conditions in state or territory laws except those relating to occupational health and safety, workers' compensation, or training arrangements. An AWA

78-492: A State Award (NAPSA), a Federal Award, or where the work done by the employee was in an industry or occupation which would have been covered by an Award or NAPSA prior to 27 March 2006. Where the business was not bound to a particular Award or NAPSA, the Workplace Authority could designate a Federal Award for the purposes of the fairness test. If an agreement did not pass the fairness test, the Workplace Authority notified

104-486: A sample of AWA agreements. In response to ongoing criticisms of WorkChoices and AWAs, then- Prime Minister John Howard announced the introduction of a new "fairness test" with an advertising campaign in May 2007 targeting women and youth which did not mention specifically either WorkChoices or AWAs. However, the changes were not retrospective, leaving tens of thousands of workers on contracts that have removed conditions without

130-452: Is inherently unequal bargaining power for the contract. For exceptional individuals in a workplace, or industries with a labour shortage, the union movement argues that common law contracts are sufficient. They also believe that while commercial law and common law provides for fairness and equality of bargaining power, AWAs were designed to entrench inequality between an employer and their workforce with regard to pay and conditions. The policy of

156-555: The ACTU was that AWAs should be abolished and that the bargaining system should contain collective bargaining rights. Most unions warned their members to be very cautious about signing AWAs, and if they did so, to appoint the union as their bargaining agent . For example, the Australian Services Union warned members: AWAs are about one thing: tipping the balance of power more firmly towards your employer and away from you. In

182-679: The Department of Education, Employment and Workplace Relations . The fairness test operated retrospectively from 7 May 2007. The test was introduced by the then Howard government as a “fine-tuning” of WorkChoices , but received criticism from both employer associations (due to the complexity and additional burden to businesses) and trade unions including the Transport Workers Union (for not providing adequate protections to employees). The fairness test applied to all Collective Agreements and Australian Workplace Agreements (AWAs) lodged with

208-684: The Employment Advocate, which had existed since 1997. It was replaced by the Fair Work Ombudsman and Fair Work Australia (since renamed the Fair Work Commission ). The primary role of the Office of the Employment Advocate was to accept the lodgement of Australian workplace agreements . In March 2006 the Office's role expanded to include the lodgement of collective agreements . The Workplace Relations Amendment (A Stronger Safety Net) Act 2007 received royal assent on 28 June 2007, establishing

234-569: The Fairness Test. Additionally, the Authority provided free support and advice to employers, particularly those in the small business sector, and employees, in the areas of agreement-making and lodgement of agreements, as well as advising on prohibited content and whether agreements met the minimum requirements as set in the Australian Fair Pay and Conditions Standard . The Workplace Authority

260-1004: The Government's five minimum conditions were satisfied.[6] New AWAs were banned under the Fair Work Act 2009 . As of May 2004, AWAs had achieved coverage of about 2.4% of the workforce. Mining companies pushed the agreements with some success, offering substantial increases in pay to workers who chose to sign an AWA. According to OEA statistics, as of 31 December 2004, 1,410,900 persons were covered under Union Certified Agreements , 168,500 under non-union Certified Agreements, and 421,800, or over 21%, were covered by AWAs. By 31 December 2005 this had risen to 1,618,200 under Union Certified Agreements, 185,300 under non-union Certified Agreements, and 538,200 Australian Workplace Agreements. Australian Bureau of Statistics figures published in March 2005 showed hourly wages of workers on AWAs were two percent lower than

286-801: The Western Australian Parliament in May 2005, the Labor Minister for Consumer and Employment Protection stated his belief that AWAs were being used to reduce wages and conditions of employment in Western Australia. The Howard Government and most business groups maintained that AWAs were mutually beneficial for employers and employees, often promoting the view that 'flexibility' is paramount: AWAs give employers and employees flexibility in setting wages and conditions, and enable them to agree on arrangements that suit their workplaces and individual preferences. AWAs offer an employer and employees

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312-597: The Workplace Authority and introducing the Fairness Test, as part of the WorkChoices amendments to Australian labour law . The Authority's director, Barbara Bennett, was responsible for assessing whether agreements lodged on or after 7 May 2007 passed the Fairness Test. However she also agreed to be the front of the Howard Government's WorkChoices advertising campaign in 2007 and received heavy criticism for her role. The Authority also received strong criticism concerning

338-796: The Workplace Authority between 7 May 2007 and 10 April 2008 (signed on or before 27 March 2008), where employees earned under $ 75,000 base annual salary (for AWAs only) and worked in industries or occupations usually covered by awards and where the CA or AWA removed or modified protected Award conditions. Protected award conditions included penalty rates and loadings (including overtime penalties, weekend and public holiday rates, shift loadings and annual leave loading), monetary allowances, public holidays, rest breaks and incentive based payments and bonuses. Where protected award conditions had been varied or removed, agreements had to provide ‘adequate compensation’ to employees. The Workplace Authority had to take into consideration

364-621: The agreement for the life of the agreement. The introduction of AWAs was a very controversial industrial relations issue in Australia. During a Senate Estimates hearing on 29 May 2006, Peter McIlwain, Head of the Office of the Employment Advocate detailed that from a sample of 4 per cent, or 250, of the total 6,263 AWAs lodged during April 2006 after WorkChoices was introduced, that: 100% removed at least one protected Award condition; 64% removed annual leave loadings; 63% stripped out penalty rates; 52% cut out shift loadings; 40% dropped gazetted public holidays; and 16% slashed all award conditions and only

390-502: The common law in the 1980s in Western Australia with productivity improvements of between 20 and 35 per cent, according to Rio Tinto managing director Charlie Lenegan. The union movement saw AWAs as an attempt to undermine the collective bargaining power of trade unions in the negotiation of pay and conditions of their members. Unions argued that the ordinary working person has little to no bargaining power by themselves to effectively negotiate an agreement with an employer, hence there

416-508: The employer and allowed them the opportunity to vary the agreement in order to pass. If the agreement was not varied or the variation did not pass the fairness test, the agreement did not apply at all, and the employee derived their minimum terms and conditions at work from the industrial instrument (agreement, Award or NAPSA) otherwise capable of applying to the employee Where an employee was previously not covered by any industrial instrument (an ‘Award-free’ employee) but had an Award designated for

442-454: The enormous backlog of unassessed Workplace Agreements lodged after Bennett's appointment. The Fairness Test was applied to Australian workplace agreements and collective agreements to ensure they provided fair compensation for the removal or modification of protected award conditions, such as penalty rates and overtime loadings. The Authority could, upon request, carry out a pre-lodgement review of an agreement to assess whether it would pass

468-408: The fairness test for agreements made on or after 28 March 2008 (for AWAs signed on or before 27 March 2008, the 14-day lodgement period remained), and instead introduced the new "no disadvantage" test. Workplace Authority The Workplace Authority was an Australian Government statutory agency that existed from 1 July 2007 to 1 July 2009. It replaced and expanded the role of the Office of

494-424: The hourly wages of workers on registered collective agreements, mostly negotiated by unions. For women, AWAs paid 11% less per hour than collective agreements. The most common methods of setting pay for all employees were registered collective agreement (38.3%), unregistered individual arrangement (31.2%) and award only (20.0%). Unregistered collective agreement (2.6%) and registered individual agreement (2.4%) were

520-504: The least common methods of setting pay. The remaining 5.4% of employees were working proprietors of incorporated businesses. In the federal public service the Department of Employment and Workplace Relations reported that as of 31 December 2004, out of 124,500 public and parliamentary service permanent staff, there were 11,085 AWAs (covering 1928 Senior Executive Service (SES), where AWAs are compulsory, and 9,157 other employees). The rest of

546-401: The opportunity to make an agreement that best suits the specific needs of individual employees. An existing employee cannot be forced to sign an AWA. In April 2007 The Sydney Morning Herald reported that it had received unpublished Government spreadsheets that showed 27.8% of the agreements had stripped away conditions that were intended to be protected by law. The spreadsheets were based on

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572-417: The particular circumstances of the employee/s, such as their pattern of work. Adequate compensation could include monetary benefits (such as a higher base rate of pay), or non-monetary benefits (such as child care or a parking space) of ‘significant value’ to the employee. The fairness test applied where a business was, prior to 27 March 2006, bound to a State Award, which became a Notional Agreement Preserving

598-574: The permanent staff were covered, as at 30 March 2005, by 101 certified agreements, of which 70 were union enterprise agreements and 31 non-union enterprise agreements. According to a report in The Australian newspaper in March 2007, about five per cent of the total workforce were at that time employed on AWAs, with about 32 per cent of miners employed on AWAs, but this figure was much higher in Western Australia where up to 52 per cent were on AWAs. Rio Tinto pioneered individual employment contacts under

624-475: The purpose of the fairness test, the protected Award conditions continued to apply to the employee. The fairness test did not check agreements for prohibited content or compliance with the Australian Fair Pay and Conditions Standard . The Workplace Relations Amendment (Transition to Forward with Fairness) Act 2008 (see Workchoices ) (the Forward with Fairness Act ) came into operation on 28 March 2008. It removed

650-586: Was located in Canberra, Sydney, Melbourne, Brisbane and Perth. It also operated a Workplace Infoline for workplace relations queries. This Australian government-related article is a stub . You can help Misplaced Pages by expanding it . Australian Workplace Agreement An Australian workplace agreement (AWA) was a type of formalised individual agreement negotiated between an employer and employee in Australia that existed from 1996 to 2009. Employers could offer

676-415: Was required to meet only the most minimal Australian Fair Pay and Conditions Standard. Agreements were not required to include effective dispute resolution procedures, and could not include prohibited content. Agreements were for a maximum of five years; approved, promoted and registered by the Workplace Authority ; operated to the exclusion of any award ; and prohibited industrial action regarding details in

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