Fed: Employer groups and ACTU at odds over redundancy
By Barbara Adam, Industrial Correspondent
MELBOURNE, April 11 AAP - Employer groups and the ACTU are at loggerheads over proposedchanges to redundancy entitlements for workers who lose their jobs in company collapses.
The ACTU is seeking to double the current minimum redundancy payout to 16 weeks forlong-serving employees who lose their jobs.
Workers with more than six years' service would qualify for the 16 weeks, with thoseover the age of 45 entitled to 20 weeks' pay.
A sliding scale of entitlements would apply for sacked workers with less than six years'service, and casuals would be entitled to severance pay for the first time.
The arguments will be heard in the Australian Industrial Relations Commission (AIRC)in a redundancy test case next month.
In submissions already lodged in the AIRC, employer groups and the federal governmenthave opposed any increase in the minimum redundancy provisions.
Employer groups also want employees made redundant in company collapses to be treateddifferently to workers made redundant in other circumstances.
The Australian Industry Group (Ai Group) wants to cap the maximum amount of award-basedredundancy payments to eight weeks' pay in the event of an insolvency.
Under the federal governments General Employee Entitlement and Redundancy Scheme (GEERS),taxpayers foot the bill for eight weeks' pay for workers made redundant when a companycollapses.
GEERS was heavily drawn upon in the wake of the Ansett collapse, which left an estimated16,000 people out of work.
The ACTU, in a submission to the redundancy test case lodged today, said discriminatingbetween the redundancy entitlements of employees of solvent and insolvent companies wouldencourage reliance on the taxpayer-funded GEERS.
In its submission, the ACTU said such a distinction would also be an incentive forbusinesses to be placed into insolvency rather than continue operating as a going concern.
The ACTU said the employees of insolvent businesses should not be entitled to lessmoney than redundant employees of solvent businesses.
"Poor management, rather than the level of employee entitlements, is the primary causeof business failure," the union submission said.
Workplace Relations Minister Tony Abbott, meanwhile, called on the AIRC to reject theACTU's bid for greater redundancy entitlements.
"The government estimates that the ACTU's claim would cost small business an additional$6,100, on average, every time a permanent employee is retrenched," Mr Abbott said ina statement.
"If the claim is granted and flows to all jurisdictions as intended by the ACTU, itwill affect the vast majority of the 540,000 Australian small businesses with employees."
AAP bja/dk/ph/de
KEYWORD: REDUNDANCY
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