Australian retailers oppose increase to minimum wage(69905)

Australian retailers lobby against minimum wage increase

Retailers should be spared having to pay any increase in the minimum wage even if the industrial umpire rules in favour of Australia's lowest paid, an employer group says.

The ACTU wants the nation's 1.4 million award wage earners, including shop assistants and cleaners, to be given a $27 a week pay increase.

But the National Retail Association - the lobby group for Myer, Kmart and Pizza Hut - wants some employers to be spared having to pay any minimum wage rise.

The implementation of national modern awards in July coincides with the scheduled start of a possible increase in the $544 weekly minimum wage.

The association's executive director Gary Black said retailers who faced award modernisation costs and a higher minimum wages bill should be exempted from paying both increases.

"It's just unrealistic to think employers can pay two rounds of wage increases at the same time," he said on Friday.

"A major wage increase now is simply not sustainable, and will cause major economic damage to low-paid workers - the very people the minimum wage is designed to protect."

Employers whose award modernisation costs are below the minimum wage increase should only be required to "top up" their employee pay levels to that of the minimum wage increase, Mr Black added.

Another major employer group representing McDonald's, David Jones and Woolworths, the Australian National Retailers Association, is calling for a much smaller minimum weekly pay increase of $10.

It also wants any possible increase in the minimum wage to be delayed until October - three months after a new award usually comes into effect.

In its submission to Fair Work Australia, it argues the withdrawal of federal government stimulus measures and rising interest rates had caused a slowdown in retail spending.

The implementation of national awards, requiring employers in some states to pay Sunday penalty rates to permanent employees for the first time, would cost the sector $19 million, it argues.

Submissions to Fair Work Australia's minimum wage panel close on Friday.

The Australian Chamber of Commerce and Industry and the Australian Industry Group are expected to put in submissions.

From July 1, 4000 state awards will be replaced with 120 national standards as part of the award modernisation process.

Australia's lowest paid workers missed out on a minimum pay increase last year, marking the first freeze in 15 years.