Senator HOGG (8:25 PM) —I have no doubt about the sincerity of Senator MacGibbon but, unfortunately, what he put forward can best be described as quaint naivety.

Senator Jacinta Collins —Hogwash.

Senator HOGG —Thank you for the interjection, Senator Collins. I can declare that I come from the retail industry. I worked in the retail industry. I worked on both sides. I worked as an employee and I worked on the industrial side, as both an industrial advocate and the secretary of an organisation which had a great deal to do with retailers and their employees over a long period of time. Let me just say that Senator MacGibbon's concept of a career being established—whilst it is very nice and very quaint—is not the reality. As for your concern about an increase in unemployment—whilst, again, that is very nice—most of these people you are talking about are high school students who are working in the industry, as opposed to those people who are genuinely long-term unemployed. One must necessarily make the distinction between the classes of people whom you are talking about in this debate.

The fact remains that the Workplace Relations Legislation Amendment (Youth Employment) Bill 1998 is about providing cheap labour for the marketplace in the retail industry. The issue of junior rates just defies logic. Junior rates had meaning when they were first introduced in the earlier part of this century, as others have already pointed out. Then the majority age was 21, most people finished school at year 8 or lower, most of them were 13 years of age or younger and, of course, in joining the work force, they had knowledge and skill formation and education as part of their employment process.

Today, however, that has dramatically changed. The majority age is 18, most finish school at year 12 at about 18 years of age and, when they go into the service industry and the retail industry, in particular—which seems to be the main area of focus in this debate—there is minimal knowledge and skill formation or education as part of the employment process. So we are talking chalk and cheese, from the scenario under which junior rates were first established to what we have today. The scenes are completely different.

Senator McGauran mentioned that there had been no technological change in industries such as the retail industry. That is complete nonsense. The Australian retail industry has been the fastest industry of any nation in the world to take up new technology. That is through scanning and EFTPOS. Everyone, whether walking into a supermarket, a department store or the local corner store, is confronted with EFTPOS, scanning and the like today. So to say there has not been major technological change within the retail industry—I can peg when it first started to come in; it was back in 1980—is a complete lack of understanding of what that industry is about.

In the retail industry, the majority of employees—who are juniors—invariably get no more than two to four hours training in their induction. Part of their induction process may even involve something as complex as being shown where the lunch room and the toilets are. However, after that induction program, which on average may last two to four hours but could even last up to a day, one finds that these people are expected to perform at the same standard as a person who has been there for five weeks, five months or five years. That is regardless of that person's age, sex, race, religion or anything else. So the fact that they have been through an induction program and are then out on the floor does not in any way lessen the requirements of their employer—these people have to perform to the same standard.

You will find that the junior is required to do the same as the senior. You will find that that junior is subject to the same threat of dismissal. The fact that they have been through a two- to four-hour induction program and are out working on the floor is of no relevance whatsoever. The juniors are subject to the same abuse from management for alleged non-performance; they are subject to the same threats of dismissal for any measure of non-conformity in their personal outlook; they are subject to the same abuse from a cranky customer as any senior may well be; they are subject to the same dress standards as any senior that might be employed there; and they are subject to the same output standards. Even though employers may refuse to acknowledge publicly that they have such output standards, they do exist. Whether it be scanning rates or carton counts, these people are required to do exactly the same work for less money. The juniors get the same treatment as seniors in all but one respect, and that is in respect of their wage—they are paid less.

If one looks at a typical example of a retail award, one finds that the 21-year-old receives the adult rate, 100 per cent; the 20-year-old receives 90 per cent of the rate; the 19-year-old receives 80 per cent; and the 18-year-old receives 67½ per cent. In today's dollar terms for juniors working full time—and I am quoting now from an actual award that applies throughout Australia with a major retailer—that 21-year-old person receives $463.10; the 20-year-old, $416.80; the 19-year-old, $370.50; and the 18-year-old, $312.60. So the 20-year-old who is doing exactly the same work and facing exactly the same work requirements as the senior gets paid $46.30 less, the 19-year-old gets paid $92.60 less and the 18-year-old gets $150.50 less.

In terms of full-time employment, this is really about paying people lower rates of pay. The same applies if those people are casual. Junior employment, particularly in the retail industry, has plummeted over the last 25 years. Casual employment dominates the industry. So the argument that junior rates are going to provide some stimulus for full-time employment in industries such as the retail industry is just not true. It has not done so for the last 25 years and to believe that it will do so now is just nonsense. We have here a proposal that effectively will seek to entrench rates of pay which will keep people being paid far and away below what they should legitimately be entitled to be paid. But there is more. These juniors get no discount for their rent, food, electricity, clothes, public transport and a whole wide range of other issues. So the discrimination is compounded, the discrimination is blatant and the inequities are clear.

In the past some people had difficulties coming to grips with the concept of equal pay for women. At the time we had forecasts of dire consequences as a result of women achieving equal pay. It was a barrier; it was a hurdle that many people had to overcome. However, all the dire consequences that were forecast have not come to be. Women have continued to be employed and, of course, in greater numbers.

Dire consequences are now being forecast for youth employment with a great amount of hype, a great amount of emotional argument, as if something is being done for young people. But my experience in the retail industry has been that, regardless of the fact that youth wages have been there, the fact remains that retailers set about sacking people when they reach the ripe old age of 17 and 18. It did not just happen for a short period of time during my association with the industry; it happened for the whole time of my association with the industry—and my ongoing association with the industry—that people were sacked simply and solely because they had reached the age of 18. It had nothing to do with their being full-time employees. It was purely and simply because they were casuals, they were disposable and they could be replaced by a new semi-skilled or unskilled work force in next to no time.

What needs to happen is that junior rates need to be put to one side such as to force employers to employ people for the right reasons—that is, to give people a genuine career and not just to be used as dollar cannon fodder. Young people deserve and are entitled to better. This legislation will perpetuate injustice and will see the young people in our society continuing to face a disadvantage which they should not have to face. In the last 25 years, as I have said, full-time employment, particularly in the retail industry in which I have some experience, has fallen quite dramatically. Junior wages did not provide then, nor will they provide now, the basis for full-time, real, meaningful jobs. If that is what this is about—that is, junior wages—then the history of junior wages in the last 25 years certainly does not sustain the contention that it will provide real, meaningful jobs.

The fact is that the structure of the industry has changed. Full-time employment is what is needed. It will provide those people who are unemployed with dignity. However, those people will not achieve it through casual employment. As we have already heard in this debate, large numbers of young people are unemployed. However, those people are not the people being employed in industries such as the retail and service industries because of youth wages. Junior wages are not preventing these people from getting jobs but the structural problems in the industries put in place by employers are. That is a different issue which is certainly not being addressed by this legislation.

The employment practices in many industries, particularly the retail and the service industries, leave many people unemployed or underemployed. As a matter of fact, the retailers have affectionately called the retail industry—this is their terminology—a vestibule industry, because people are in there one day and before you can bat an eyelid they are out of it. So to use the argument that junior rates are necessary to sustain people in careers and to allow people to learn the job is nonsense. These people are turned over faster than you can bat an eyelid.

As Senator Cooney rightfully pointed out, the minister claimed in the second reading speech:

We show that junior wages help young people by giving them a foot in the door into employment.

The only thing I can say about that statement is that it is a revolving door. You are no sooner in the place than you are out. Anyone who does not believe that should go and have a close look at the industry. All the plaintive pleas from the retailers amount to nought.

There is no career based structure and no career based industry. This was one thing that the industry was moving towards some three to five years ago. It was looking at accomplishing genuine careers based on competency based rates of pay so that people could get genuine, meaningful and lasting employment within the industry. But what we have heard from many of the people on the other side in this debate is very much uninformed, unintelligent comment, particularly about the retail industry, of which few of them, if any, have any real knowledge whatsoever.

What is needed is an abolition of the junior rates, but it was never advocated that junior rates would disappear overnight. It was always advocated that there would be a phasing out process and that that would be accompanied by an increase in the career based opportunities and the skills of those people in the industry. To entrench what the government is seeking here tonight is purely, as I said, to put up junior people as dollar cannon fodder for the retail and the service industry labour market. It serves no good and no purpose for the young people of this nation. I am sure and confident that this bill will meet its proper fate this evening.