Long, Jeremy --- "Queensland's Wage Exploitation" [1985] AboriginalLawB 70; (1985) 1(16) Aboriginal Law Bulletin 14

• Qld's Wage Exploitation

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QLD's Wage Exploitation

by Jeremy Long

Last November the Queensland Nurses Union approached the State Health Department about wages and employment conditions for Torres Strait Islander nursing aides (technically assistants-in-nursing), at Bamaga Hospital, at the northern tip of Cape York Peninsula. The Union presented evidence that these assistants, like most other employees on reserves, were being paid what is known as the' minimum wage' and not at the rates prescribed in the Nurses Award.

The Union, at the same time, informed the Human Rights Commission and we took the matter up with the Queensland authorities as a complaint of racial discrimination.

The Queensland Health Department provided an interim response in March 1985 that the matter was being discussed with the Department of Community Services. In May the Department wrote again indicating that the Queensland Government had recently decided that Aboriginal Islander staff employed in hospitals controlled by local hospital boards in the reserve communities should be paid at the proper award rates.

We understand that these people have enjoyed the full benefits of the wages and conditions laid down in the award since early May. (Teaching assistants employed by the State Education Department are also, it seems, paid at the appropriate award rates). The Nurses Union has indicated that it is also considering action on the matter of back pay that may be owed to the hospital workers.

This was the first complaint submitted by a Union on behalf of Aboriginal and Islander workers employed on reserves. We are still pursuing two other employment complaints from reserve workers - one relating to holiday pay for pre-school assistants and the other to general terms and conditions, including pay, for Aboriginal police.

Unhappily, it seems that the Government's decision does nothing for the many other nursing assistants who work i n places where the State Department of Community Services, rather than a hospitals board, is their employer. These places apparently include several Cape York Peninsula communities and the Torres Strait Islands.

The judgement of the Industrial Court of Queensland on the Arnold Murgha case in May 1979 was that workers on reserves had the same entitlement as other Queensland workerssThe Commonwealth Parliament's Aboriginal and Torres Strait Islanders (Queensland Discriminatory Laws) Act of 1975 had also provided that Aboriginals and Islanders should be paid the same wages as other workers.

The Queensland Minister for Aborigi nal and Island Affairswrote last August that he had decided that all Aboriginal and Torres Strait Island workers should move on to award wages. At the same time. he indicated that, if fundingwas not provided for 1984/85 because of budgetary constraints, councils might seek Federal Government funding for part of the workforce so that award wages could be paid to the rest.

The few Aboriginal councils which have so far been granted limited local government responsibilities last year received only enough money to continue paying the workers who became their employees at the 'minimum wage' rates land were not given money to cover workers' compensation and overheads). Workers still employed directly by the Queensland Department of Community Services have similarly continued to be paid at these sub-award rates.

The Queensland Minister indicated last August that the State Government was implementing a program which 'one way or another' would 'result in all community area employees being on award wages within an 18 months time frame.' It is hard to see why some employees should have to wait until 1986 to receive the wages they have long been legally entitled to.

Meanwhile, several Aboriginal councils have told the Minister that they are not prepared to accept additional responsibilities unless they are assured that they will be given the funds they need to pay all the workers concerned at the legal rates and to meet all associated costs.

The Queensland Government seems to have no difficulty in finding the necessary funds to bring the wages of at least some Aboriginal and Islander nursing assistants and teaching assistants into line with the law but regrettably it apparently remains unwilling to allocate the money needed to ensure that other workers on reserves receive their legal entitlements.

(HUMAN RIGHTS - Newsletter, of the Australian Human Rights Commission-No. 14, August 1985)