Secure Jobs, Better Pay 2022: changes to AU workplace laws you need to be aware of
The Australian Government has passed the Fair Work Legislation Amendment (Secure Jobs, Better Pay) Act 2022. This legislation amends the Fair Work Act to change a number of existing rules and introduces a range of new workplace laws across 2022 and 2023.
Importantly, for business, some initial changes came into effect in late 2022, with majority of the changes taking place in 2023 (across the year). A full breakdown can be seen below – download your copy of this timeline here.
Changes that have commenced (Dec 2022 and Jan 2023):
Job security
– new workplace rights on disclosing pay and workplace conditions
– prohibiting pay secrecy
– unlawful job ads – job ads can’t include pay rates that would be in breach of the Fair Work Act or a fair work instrument.
Gender equality measures
– new protected attributes in the Fair Work Act:
* breastfeeding
* gender identity
* intersex status
– new objects of the Fair Work Act, modern awards and minimum wages
– equal remuneration principles and orders
– functions we perform, including around guidelines and community outreach in multiple languages
Enterprise agreements and enterprise bargaining
– termination of enterprise agreements after their nominal expiry date
– sunsetting of ‘zombie’ agreements
– initiating bargaining
– dealing with errors in enterprise agreements.
Fair Work Fact Sheets
Fair Work have summarised each of these changes, and comprehensive fact sheets can be found here: https://www.dewr.gov.au/secure-jobs-better-pay
How do these changes affect your business?
These changes will likely result in some adjustments to internal business operations. If you are unsure how they might impact you and would like to discuss further, please reach out to Nikki Jenkinson, Director and Lead HR Consultant – 0472 545 584 or submit an enquiry via our Contact page.
