Govt MPs Are Spooked They’ll Lose Their Seats Over The Penalty Rate Slash

Last week’s penalty rate decision from the Fair Work Commission has whipped up a pretty damn strong response – definitely stronger than a lot of people, including the government, expected.

Now, the decision didn’t actually come from the Turnbull government, but it doesn’t mean they’re not sweating a little. According to a report in the Sydney Morning Herald today, voters are very keen for the government to step in and do something to protect weekend penalty rates, and Coalition MPs are worried it could tip the scales in some seats toward Labor, who have pledged to protect them.
The pain particularly felt in regional areas, where many rely on penalty rates and where the Coalition are bleeding votes towards One Nation. Pauline Hanson has been desperately trying to rebrand as a warrior of the working class (and not just a big ol’ racist) to closely match the rhythms of the Donald Trump revolution – so it doesn’t really help when video resurfaces of her only three years ago saying penalty rates ought to be scrapped altogether.
Polling from ReachTEL in five Coalition seats found that three of them were susceptible to falling to Labor on the basis of penalty rate cuts alone. Among the five electorates, a whopping 65.1 per cent agreed that the government should legislate to protect penalty rates as they currently are.
For the record, the Coalition said they have no plans to intervene with legislation, though Turnbull is toying with the idea of phasing in the reductions and praying to whatever dark god he worships now that regular wage increases will swallow up any discrepancies.
The unions are reportedly firing up a big WorkChoices-style campaign to fight the cuts. When someone says ‘WorkChoices-style’ they mean ‘a campaign that will boot a sitting Liberal government to the kerb’ so it’s worth paying attention to, ya know?
“The lowest-paid workers in our communities rely on these wages for food and rent, and these are the workers we depend on to keep our shops and businesses open,” said ACTU president Ged Kearney.
This is about to get a little wild, I’d say.
Photo: Getty Images / Ryan Pierse.

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