Thursday, 28 August 2025

Bills

Wage Theft Amendment Bill 2025

Second reading

Debate resumed on motion of Lizzie Blandthorn:

That the bill be now read a second time.

Richard WELCH (North-Eastern Metropolitan) (10:00): I rise to speak on the Wage Theft Amendment Bill 2025. Wage theft, the deliberate and dishonest underpayment of wages and entitlements, is a crime. Every honest day’s work deserves an honest day’s pay, and on that principle, there is no daylight between the government and the opposition. The bill before us does several things. Amongst them, it repeals Victoria’s wage theft offences now that the Commonwealth has legislated national laws criminalising deliberate underpayment. It renames the Wage Inspectorate Victoria as Workforce Inspectorate Victoria. It confers new functions on that inspectorate, including a complaints referral role. It changes the title of the act and makes necessary consequential amendments. Beyond that housekeeping, there are two real components: first, the repealing of the wage theft offences now covered federally, and second, the partial implementation of the review into Victorian government bodies’ engagement with construction companies and construction unions – that is, under the auspices of what we know now as the Wilson review.

On the first component, the principle is clear: wage theft is wrong, obviously wrong, always. Employees and contractors must be paid what they are entitled in full, on time, by law. When wage theft entered the public debate in Victoria, it was because of egregious scandals, franchises underpaying migrant workers, hospitality chains exposed for systematic rorts, young workers too afraid to complain because they feared losing shifts. These cases rightly disgusted most Victorians. We have absolutely no sympathy for employers who intentionally underpay. They are not cutting costs, they are not being efficient in business and they are not making payroll errors. They are thieves and they should face the full force of the law. And there is another kind of wage theft, one that is particularly relevant in the context of the Wilson review, and that is, in a sense, conditions theft – the same principle, except that theft is of the working environment and expectations in any workspace.

But protecting workers requires more than good intentions. It requires a system that actually works consistently, fairly and credibly. This is where the government has failed. It created a duplicate regime in an area already covered by Commonwealth law. The Victorian Chamber of Commerce and Industry warned at the time that duplication would confuse business and damage confidence. The Australian Industry Group said the same, that it was an unnecessary and unwanted change, and even legal experts pointed to the constitutional risk of parallel state and federal laws. Yet the government pushed ahead, and the result was predictable confusion: employers unsure which inspectorate had jurisdiction, employees uncertain who would enforce their claims. Further down the line, when the Commonwealth reasserted its remit in this area via the closing loopholes reforms passed in 2023 and 2024, the Victorian laws became redundant, as they were always going to be.

This bill repeals duplication that should never have existed in the first place. So it is not a reform; it is a reverse. It took four months after the Commonwealth scheme began on 1 January for this government to even bring the bill to Parliament, and now we are obviously eight months on from that. So if wage theft is an urgent problem, why did the bill sit on the notice paper for months? We can probably guess why, because we know that the government is more interested in appearances and announcements than actual outcomes. Look at the bail reforms.

We also have a startling double standard from the government as an employer. Even as the government denounced wage theft in the private sector, their own departments were guilty of it. Just this year it was revealed that junior doctors in Victorian public hospitals had been underpaid by $175 million over nearly a decade. This is the highest individual example of wage theft in the state, higher than any private sector employer. There are national examples that are larger, but for Victoria alone, the highest individual one was Victoria’s own government.

15,000 staff were affected across 36 health services, and these young workers worked brutal shifts – nights, weekends and emergencies – only to be systematically denied their lawful overtime. If a private company had been caught underpaying staff by $175 million, this government would have called it a scandal, rightly; demanded their heads roll, rightly; and perhaps even pursued criminal charges, probably. But when it was their own health system, they downplayed it as a complex payroll issue. Not one minister resigned; no one official was charged. That hypocrisy is staggering. Laws should apply equally to all. If the state cannot pay its own people correctly, how can it lecture everyone else? It erodes trust. Victorians look on and see double standards and get a sense that these days in Victoria the law seems to be very selectively applied. Businesses see a government keen to punish them but gifting impunity for its own failings, and workers see government worksites as somehow above the law and granted effective immunity compared to the rest of us. Let us reiterate: the single largest wage theft ever in Victoria was performed by the Victorian government.

The biggest areas of workers rights needing urgent protection are on government worksites. For all the righteous rhetoric, wouldn’t it be good to see the government turn that rhetoric on themselves for 5 minutes for once? There is an obvious place to start, because everyone in the industry has known about the CFMEU’s behaviour on worksites for a long, long time. There is a very particular history here. Coalition governments, state and federal, tried to rein it in. The Turnbull government in Canberra established the Australian Building and Construction Commission, a watchdog that actually had teeth. Here in Victoria, the Liberal government introduced the construction code of conduct and a dedicated compliance unit to enforce lawful standards. But what happened? The Albanese government dismantled the federal ABCC, and the state Labor government scrapped the state’s construction code and watchdog.

Labor time and time again turned a blind eye to the excesses of the unions and of the CFMEU in particular. Some people say it may be just incompetence, but when you have layered incompetence of this extent you might think it is intent. It was only when journalists from the Age and 60 Minutes forensically exposed the rot on our worksites that the current Premier begrudgingly launched the Wilson review. To be very, very clear, the review was not a royal commission – it had no public hearings, no power to compel evidence and no protection for whistleblowers, and it could not probe how deep the problems really went. It was essentially a policy paper, not a cleanse inquiry to get to the bottom. It was not the disinfectant needed, and it was only done out of embarrassment, not out of conviction.

Now we have its outcome. The Wilson review delivered eight recommendations to clean up the construction sector. How many does this bill implement? One and a half, maybe two. The review highlighted that labour hire was a very problematic loophole – a back door for outlaw motorcycle gang members and disreputable figures to get onto sites under a different job guise. In fact the Wilson report noted media allegations of ex-CFMEU officials removed for corruption simply returning to sites as labour hire workers. Yet this bill says not a word about labour hire. The government’s plan is to wait two years and then evaluate it further if reforms are needed. In the minister’s own second-reading speech they effectively committed to reviewing the situation in 2027, conveniently after the 2026 state election. How comforting that is for everyone on those work sites, I am sure.

For years major taxpayer-funded projects in Victoria have been plagued by rorts, grey corruption and outright criminality. We have seen ghost shifts for billed hours for work never done. We have seen bikie gang members installed as safety officers. We have seen women bullied, threatened and even physically assaulted on worksites. These are not minor infractions of workplace rules, they are crimes, and yet the union responsible has been allowed to become a law unto itself. We all know the record of major projects under this government – the Metro Tunnel, the West Gate Tunnel, the North East Link, the Suburban Rail Loop – one after another, staggering cost blowouts. By conservative estimates, Victoria’s infrastructure –

Sonja Terpstra: On a point of order, President, I know the lead speaker on a bill usually gets a lot of latitude. However, I have been listening for the last few minutes to what Mr Welch is saying, and I think most of his contribution in the last few minutes has been on anything other than anything remotely related to this bill. I would ask that he be brought back to the content of the bill and be relevant to the bill.

The PRESIDENT: Ms Terpstra, you are right about the first speaker having latitude, but I would just remind everyone if they can stay in the context of the bill, that would be appreciated.

Richard WELCH: It is clear, because obviously this bill is designed to implement certain selected portions of the Wilson review. The parts that it is choosing not to implement are very relevant. Those matters pertain to public worksites, and those public site worksites are part of the Big Build. There are obvious ramifications on those worksites of not reforming them. I would maintain that it is highly relevant to talk about the North East Link and the cost overruns of $40 billion – it is not just a number.

CFMEU misconduct is not a side issue, it is central. It is a union whose culture has been infiltrated by bikie gangs and organised crime figures, and violence was normalised. Reporting to police was rare. Labour hire was used as a back door for disreputable actors, and this was on projects funded by taxpayers, which is why industry stakeholders are alarmed. They know the construction sector’s scale, they know costs in construction flow through to every other sector, and they know that without tackling misconduct head on cost escalation and rorts will continue, which is where we are today. The CFMEU is still relatively unchecked.

The Wilson review was supposed to be the government’s response to this crisis, but how did it respond? You would think the recommendations would be followed, acted upon and implemented. Recommendation 1 is to establish a complaints referral body. While this bill does that with the workplace inspectorate, which is good, to be clear it is just a clearing house. It does not have powers of investigation, it does not have powers of enforcement. It cannot investigate, it cannot compel, but it can refer on, so it is basically a reception desk. Recommendation 7 – to empower the inspectorate to receive reports from any person, including contractors – is partly covered by the bill. The bill does partly do that as well, which is fine.

What about the rest? Recommendation 2, to create an alliance of state and federal regulators to police and coordinate enforcement across agencies – that is not done. Recommendation 3, to broaden the fit and proper person test for labour hire to exclude applicants with serious convictions or close associations who fail the test – that is not done. Recommendation 4, to clarify that certain construction activities are within the scope of the Labour Hire Licensing Act 2018 – that is not done. Recommendation 5, to strengthen the labour hire authority powers to demand information – not done. Recommendation 6, allowing publication of contextual information about cancelled or suspended labour hire licences – not done. Recommendation 8, to review the reforms after two years – the government says it will do this but only after the 2026 election.

Six and a half of eight recommendations are left untouched, and industry clearly consider this inadequate.

The Civil Contractors Federation said the review did not go far enough. Master Builders Victoria said the same, calling for fairer risk allocation in government contracts. The Ai Group went further, calling it a whitewash. These are the builders and contractors delivering our projects. They do not have a particular political axe to grind, but they do have a certain vested interest that our worksites work efficiently. They are ringing alarm bells, so we should take them seriously. This bill basically ignores all of those matters. Instead the government says, ‘Let’s wait two years’ – two years of drift, two years of cost blowouts, two years of misconduct unchecked, two years conveniently beyond the next election.

I think most people in the industry and the Victorian community are saying enough is enough. The government cannot claim to protect women while union enforcers still intimidate and harass them on taxpayer-funded sites. The government cannot claim to respect taxpayers while ghost shifts and sham contracts bleed billions from our infrastructure budget. For that matter, the government cannot claim to defend workers when junior doctors were unpaid $175 million in overtime while ministers looked the other way.

This is not reform; this is performative change to distract from having to deal with the rot beneath. We know why: because the government loves the rot, it profits from the rot and it is basically indistinguishable from the rot. It grants impunity to itself and a corrupt union and pats itself on the back for pushing enforcement penalties on others. It should be that the law applies to every actor in this state – employer, union, minister and state alike. It should be clear to every Victorian worker and taxpayer that integrity is not negotiable. But the government is not capable of this, because it is up to its neck in it and hamstrung by its own vested interests. It requires the government to reform itself, and that is something it clearly cannot do and far less wants to do. This is why, quite logically, a royal commission is needed. Only a royal commission has the powers to compel evidence, protect whistleblowers and expose the dark connections between union misconduct and organised crime. The sector is crying out for reform and the government is part of the problem, and it needs to be subject to it itself.

Where do we go from here? The coalition will not oppose this bill. Repealing duplicative offences was inevitable once the Commonwealth acted. Establishing a complaints referral mechanism is a good but modest step. This bill is not enough. It does not tackle labour hire loopholes. It does not create the enforcement alliance the Wilson review recommended. It does not confront the toxic culture of the CFMEU. That is why we have called for a royal commission into misconduct on government projects. Nothing less will break the cycle of silence and intimidation. Only a royal commission has the power of compulsion, the public hearings and the whistleblower protections to expose the truth. We have also pledged to reinstate the Victorian code of practice for the construction industry, so that integrity governs taxpayer-funded projects, and to establish construction enforcement Victoria, a dedicated watchdog to ensure compliance, accountability and value for money. These are not abstractions, they are actual, genuine reforms. They are not just an announcement, they are reforms. They are not a retreat, they are actually an advance. So they contrast very sharply with the government’s half-measures.

Everyone in this chamber knows there is a problem in the industry – I think no-one would deny there is a problem in the industry. And the Wilson review confirmed it – no matter how hamstrung it was, it confirmed it. So if even a hamstrung review like the Wilson review could confirm it, imagine what we would find if we dug a bit deeper. Industry said it did not go far enough, yet this bill implements 1½ of eight recommendations, and that tells a pretty telling story. The truth is obvious: the government is pushing reform beyond the next election. Why? Just like everything else, why delay? There is clear evidence of action required, there are clear reforms on the table and there are clear recommendations from a report they themselves commissioned, ready to go. And yet they do not act, because I think the intent is not reform; the intent is delay. The intent is to shuffle along a little bit, just give enough of a little salami slice to make it appear like you are doing something when you are failing to address the root cause.

That is why we need a royal commission, because this government cannot reform itself. It is congenitally incapable of reforming itself. I do not care where you are in society, an organisation that cannot reform itself will have to break. The government are pushing reform beyond the next election, so they are not on the side of workers, they are not on the side of the taxpayers, they are not on the side of business and they are not on the side of Victoria.

The Liberals and Nationals will not oppose the bill, but we will keep pressing until wage theft in all its forms – all its forms – is stamped out, whether by unscrupulous employers, by bureaucratic overreach or by union lawlessness. We will keep pressing until the construction industry is cleaned up, costs are contained and workers are treated fairly, because that is what workers deserve, it is what honest businesses deserve and it is what Victorian taxpayers have a right to expect.

Aiv PUGLIELLI (North-Eastern Metropolitan) (10:21): I rise to speak on the Wage Theft Amendment Bill 2025. This bill is repealing our state wage theft laws, amongst other things, given that we now have federal wage theft laws. And given that we now have those federal laws, the Greens support this bill.

I will state I am glad that this whole country is now covered by wage theft legislation, but I am worried that too many workers continue to be mistreated and continue to be underpaid. I have heard from dozens of workers this year alone who have told me about the awful, often illegal, things that they have endured in their workplace – things that are, I would say, most certainly constituting wage theft, things that in many cases they have already reported to the appropriate authorities. It is people being paid a fixed wage but working ridiculously long hours, people who are made to clock out every 4 hours and 59 minutes, wait 2 minutes and then clock in again. That way they are not getting to take a break but also not getting overtime. It is criminal. It is clearly illegal, but it still happens right now. People continue to be paid ‘off the books’. Workers are expected to undertake online training at home without pay, then threatened that their pay will be delayed or their shifts cut if they do not complete the training within a strict deadline. There are places where there is an expectation that staff will volunteer their time to do extra work – work unpaid. The problems are still rife, and the solution is not entirely straightforward. These laws are important, and it absolutely should be a crime to incorrectly pay a worker. Too many workplaces are simply exploiting their staff, exploiting vulnerable people often, to get away with wage theft.

This is particularly a problem for young workers. It is particularly a problem for recent migrants to this country, and it is particularly a problem for other people who find themselves working in casual industries, working on a low wage. The Fair Day’s Work project recently surveyed over 2800 young workers. This report showed that a significant number of young people are facing wage theft. They are being underpaid. They are being exploited in a number of ways, including bosses reducing workers’ time sheet hours or bosses failing to pay compulsory super. From the workers that I have heard from alone, over two-thirds – two-thirds – reported having to do unpaid work. We definitely, clearly, have a long way to go to fully stamp out wage theft. There is more work to be done to engage with young people, to engage with other casual workers, so that they properly understand their rights and genuinely feel supported to stand up for themselves at their workplaces. People who work in casual positions can lose their shifts in the blink of an eye. Expecting these same people in precarious work conditions to stand up to their bosses is a big risk to them, which is why we definitely need the Fair Work Commission to continue to find new ways to hold workplaces to account. They need to be genuinely resourced to do so, and we need to support unions to continue their important work in advocating for workers rights. Wage theft is a crime. It is time it was fully stamped out in all workplaces. I commend this bill to the house.

Sonja TERPSTRA (North-Eastern Metropolitan) (10:24): I rise to make a contribution on the Wage Theft Amendment Bill 2025. I am really pleased to be doing that, because I am going to talk a bit more factually about what it is actually about and not about what other people want to make it about. I also want to thank Mr Puglielli for his very considered contribution on this bill. I agree with much of what he said about what is really important and what is at the nub of this – it is about wage theft.

I can say as a trade union official who spent 30 years working in the trade union movement and represented many proud trade unionists, members of unions, hardworking union members who turned up to work each and every day, including on our government projects. I have listened to Mr Welch constantly talk down our hardworking tradies who turn up on our Big Build projects. A lot of those tradies are small business owners. They are business owners locally who turn up and who have bid for works as part of that. That is one of the things that our government did. On our Big Build projects we wanted to make sure that local business owners and operators who are tradies can actually make some money by contributing to these large government projects. Every time that Mr Welch over there talks down tradies on those government projects, he is talking down his own constituents in his own region. I hope that Hansard will reflect the record on what he has actually said. I am sure there will be many people in this chamber who will make sure that those remarks are read widely by many people in the North-Eastern Metropolitan Region, because I condemn those remarks. What a disgusting attack on hardworking tradespeople –

Richard Welch: On a point of order, President, I made absolutely no references to my constituents in my speech. It was clear I made absolutely no reference to my constituents, and my remarks were confined to the unions and in particular the CFMEU.

The PRESIDENT: That is more a point of debate.

Sonja TERPSTRA: On the point of order, President, that is not a point of order. I ask that I be allowed to continue in silence.

The PRESIDENT: I will monitor the debate. I will say that the previous point of order around the first speaker having latitude is 100 per cent correct. There are a number of rulings on that. But what it does do, though, is it affords following speakers the ability to rebut what the first speaker said and it opens up the debate. I just make people aware of that.

Sonja TERPSTRA: Again, I want to give a shout-out to all those very hardworking tradies and proud trade union members in the North-Eastern Metropolitan Region who work on these projects, who are hardworking people, and also the many trade unionists who are decent and hardworking trade unionists. As I have been saying, I worked for 30 years in the union movement before coming to this place, and I will stand shoulder to shoulder with each and every trade unionist, despite what you say opposite, because you just want to talk down Victorians. It is actually disgusting, because what we are talking about here is wage theft. You want to talk about wage theft in the context of this bill? This bill is actually about repealing our laws because – as Mr Puglielli rightfully said – we now have a federal regime that is going to take this over. But the Victorian government had to act first, because we needed to take strong action.

I might just say last week I met with the assistant secretary of the National Tertiary Education Union Victorian branch, a proud trade union that represents academics. There are also endemic and systematic wage theft problems across the university sector. It is not just about whether it is happening on Big Build projects, but I could also talk about the large number of retail traders and chains – big chains – Woolworths and the like, the rich friends of the rich mates over there on the Liberal benches who have been systematically ripping workers off in terms of wage theft. We see what has been reported time and again in the newspapers in the mainstream media about which organisations have been systemically ripping off workers. I can reflect on some of the workers that I had to represent. At one point as a proud trade unionist representing workers I can remember having almost a hundred claims of wage theft that I had to process as an industrial officer. That is a gigantic, mammoth task, and that would only be a hair, a pimple on a log, of the entirety of the wage theft problems that exist.

I also reflect back to when I was a much younger trade union official. I can remember the days when, if someone came to you, a worker, and said, ‘Look, my pay’s been messed up’ or ‘I’ve been underpaid,’ the payroll department would immediately move to fix that. Now it is like, ‘Oh, no, we don’t think we’ve underpaid you’ or ‘Oh, no, we can’t rectify that because we’re in between pay cycles’ – whatever garbage excuse there is. But in the meantime workers do not have their correct pay in their pay packets.

It raises very interesting questions around when someone deliberately underpays workers on an instrument. Are they then in breach of an industrial agreement or instrument, and should there be fines applicable? There absolutely should be. There is stronger action that can be taken for workers to be able to recover their wages, but there should be strong fines and an inspectorate with real teeth. What the rich corporate mates who talk to the Liberal Party all the time about wanting less regulation and less red tape are really saying is that they want to have impunity when ripping off workers. That is what this is really about: they do not like regulation over there. As I said, I am proud to be part of a government that has introduced groundbreaking wage theft laws. We decided to act because we knew the problem was huge, and we are proud to have acted. We are also proud to have been able to motivate our federal colleagues to now take action to make sure that we have a strong Commonwealth regime.

ABS data, for example, suggests around 400,000 Australians are paid below the applicable minimum wage. That is not by accident. That is wage theft – it is not by accident. All Mr Welch did in his contribution was carry on about Big Build projects and alleged corruption. What a shameful contribution. What an absolute disgrace. Why not talk about the 400,000 Australians that are paid below the applicable minimum wage, one in five of whom are under 25 – young people who get ripped off all the time. No, they want to talk about how bad unions are. They want to talk about how bad this government is. What a disgrace. You can just tell what an absolutely thin veil they have, with scant regard for workers and complete disregard for anybody who gets ripped off. It is garbage. I am glad the opposition is supporting this bill. Honestly, what choice would they have? By saying, ‘No, we don’t support it,’ they would be saying, ‘Yes, we want more wage theft.’ I think that is actually what they would really be saying, because they do not like regulation. They do not want bosses to be accountable for ripping workers off.

Our party and our government always stands with workers. We will always stand shoulder to shoulder with trade unionists and hardworking tradesmen and tradeswomen who work on our government projects. This is about amending and repealing some laws, as we have discussed earlier. Now we do not need these laws because the Commonwealth have the regime, and it is in their bailiwick in any event. I am also just going to say the Fair Work ombudsman reported that they recovered $473 million in unpaid wages and entitlements for nearly 160,000 employees in the 2023–24 financial year and recovered more than $1.5 billion for nearly 800,000 underpaid workers in the past three financial years. That is huge. That does not even go to people who do not get paid superannuation, because you cannot recover super through these laws; you have to go through the tax office.

There are a multitude of ways, which bosses know, to rip workers off. It is disgusting. You are the party of the bosses over there, so you should be looking at your shoes in disgrace, because all you wanted to talk about was how bad the unions are. I think unions do an amazing job representing their members and advocating and either going to the Fair Work Commission or taking action with the Fair Work ombudsman to make sure that their members get paid what they are entitled to. Let us face it, when a union negotiates an enterprise agreement with a boss, basically the boss agrees to pay a certain amount of wages in return for work that is being done in their business. Why an employer would think that they can then disregard that is beyond me. But again, you did not hear anything about that from Mr Welch over there. You heard him talk about corruption blowouts on Big Build projects rather than actually addressing the content of the bill. They are very light on detail over there and very high on attacking hardworking tradies who turn up every day to work on our Big Build projects – and local tradespeople, people in my and Mr Puglielli’s North-Eastern Metropolitan Region – and of course our hardworking retail workers who turn up every day. As I said, some of our large retail chains have been some of the biggest offenders, and also some of our banks – the Commonwealth Bank, for example. Some of these people have deliberately underpaid their workers, and it is an absolute disgrace.

I also reflect on Mr Welch hooking into the underpayment of doctors in our hospitals, and again it is a mischaracterisation of what happens, because they just want to cast aspersions on this government. I might say that our government respect our hardworking healthcare workers, who turn up to work each and every day, and that matter has been resolved. The hospital has worked with anybody who has been affected and will continue to do that. In any agency where we became aware of underpayment, the government and those agencies would act to ensure that those workers were appropriately remunerated and any problems were rectified. Again, Mr Welch over there casts aspersions on this government because it suits him, rather than talk about the hundreds of thousands of workers and young people who are underpaid each and every day. It is an absolute disgrace.

There is always more to do. We need to have an inspectorate with strong powers, and the inspectorate has been doing some amazing work. The inspectorate also does more than just look at wage theft. For example, the investigations that were launched by the inspectorate prosecuted, as I talked about, Commonwealth Bank. They prosecuted CommSec and Bankwest for breaching Victoria’s long service leave provisions, for example. In these matters CommSec pled guilty to failing to pay more than $38,334 in long service leave entitlements to eight former employees, ranging from $1113 to $10,321. That is not an insignificant amount of money. Then Bankwest pled guilty to failing to pay more than $22,847 in long service leave entitlements to nine former employees, ranging from $521 to $9957. CommSec and Bankwest are kind of large organisations, I would have thought. Those organisations were each fined – justifiably and deservedly so – $18,000 and ordered to pay combined costs of $12,000. Most importantly, the impacted employees were able to receive their entitlements as they were due to them, which was entirely appropriate. Also, the inspectorate led investigations into Optus, providing an additional $218,000 worth of long service leave to approximately 560 current Victorian employees who had not been allocated their full entitlements, with Optus also paying $13,000 in fines and $15,000 in costs. So you can see there is a range of large organisations who deliberately go out of their way to steal wages from workers. It is a disgrace.

This is really important work. In the front-facing aspect of the inspectorate, for example, they had 7300 calls to their helpline from people seeking information about rights and obligations under laws within the wage inspectorate’s remit and responded to over 1000 written inquiries. They do a power of work, really important work, and on top of that you have our hardworking unions who go out and represent workers and are doing that work as well as part of this. It is a huge problem. It is a massive problem. I know our government will continue to work to eradicate wage theft. The work will never be done. A bit like the harbour bridge, we are constantly finding different things and different ways – or like this building – in which employers actually do the wrong thing. Nevertheless, we will continue to stand shoulder to shoulder with our trade unions, who do an amazing job. I am a proud trade unionist; I will always be a proud trade unionist. I am a proud member of the AMWU and a proud member of the Australian Services Union – very proud and strong unions. I will continue to always be a member of trade unions because they do important work pushing back the largesse of greedy employers.

As I said, this bill really is just about repealing the wage theft laws, because we now have a Commonwealth scheme that will be doing the work that we spearheaded to ensure that people can get paid. There are still issues out there. I know a constituent of mine whose son was ripped off recently. It is really hard work going through the Magistrates’ Court. There can absolutely be some streamlining done there. A lot of people are self-represented, and I hope we can continue to perhaps refine processes in that regard. I will leave my comments there. I commend the bill to the house.

Renee HEATH (Eastern Victoria) (10:39): I rise to speak on the Wage Theft Amendment Bill 2025, which is referred to as the ‘abolition of offences’. This is quite an ironic title, because what this bill really does is abolish not just an ineffective law but the very pretence that the government is serious about tackling systemic wage theft, or corruption or criminal behaviour in our public construction sector for that matter. This legislation repeals the Wage Theft Act 2020, which has been declared constitutionally redundant since the introduction of the Commonwealth’s Fair Work Legislation Amendment (Closing Loopholes No. 2) Act 2024. The alignment makes legal sense, but what we are doing here is not just debating a repeal but exposing this government’s refusal to confront the very system it helped create.

This bill does nothing to address the deep-rooted misconduct in Victoria’s building sector, which has been the source of vast intergenerational wage theft for decades, money stolen straight from the pockets of hardworking Victorians. The 2015 Royal Commission into Trade Union Governance and Corruption exposed union bosses trading away work conditions for cash. In one case a deal was struck that saved a company millions; in return the AWU took $25,000 a year and put 100 fake members on a list. This government is well aware of this history. The government has offered a minor legislative adjustment to appease growing scrutiny while leaving deep structural corruption completely untouched. Billions continued to be funnelled into union-dominated projects, while inflating contracts, projected figures and enforcement-free zones.

From the outset the government’s 2020 wage theft laws were not about enforcement – they were about headlines, with only one prosecution commenced against a private business. That was a test case, and when it failed the government gave up and offered this amendment bill instead. The test case was the prosecution of the owner of the Macedon Lounge, who was hit with 94 charges over alleged underpayment of just $7200 to four employees across five months. In March 2023 the case collapsed. The defendant lodged a constitutional challenge, arguing that the state’s wage theft laws were invalid under section 109 of the Australian constitution. That was what ended the government’s big showcase.

Now the government comes to this chamber with a repeal bill and a symbolic complaints referral function dressed up as reform. Chris Crewther, a colleague in the other place, called it exactly what it is: another missed opportunity – another Labor half-measure on integrity in public construction and on tackling the culture of lawlessness, intimidation and waste. Innes Willox of the Australian Industry Group summed it up well. He said:

Establishing another ‘referral body’ to act as a clearing house just adds another layer of complexity, delaying any actual rectification. Another referral body is not going to make employers feel safer to make complaints about the union’s conduct or for complaints to result in positive outcomes.

Let me ask this: why was the Macedon Lounge dragged through the courts while no-one in the public health system was ever prosecuted for stealing from junior doctors? The contrast between this and the Macedon Lounge is massive on so many levels. Fifteen thousand exhausted junior doctors who worked across 36 Victorian health services and did not claim overtime won $175 million in back pay in a landmark case. The Age followed the back pay proceedings for several years as junior doctors sounded the alarms about unrostered excess overtime of up to 16 hours every day, causing ill health and burnout amongst staff and increasing the risk of errors. Why wasn’t the Minister for Health brought up on wage theft charges? No-one in the government has been held accountable for massive underpayments. The question still has no answers. The case that really opened the door was Dr Gaby Bolton, who went to court to recover overtime she was denied by Peninsula Health. The Victorian Wage Inspectorate was clearly busy elsewhere, looking for another small company to prosecute, because it was the Commonwealth, not the state, that acted on this.

It found Peninsula Health had breached Fair Work legislation by not paying Dr Bolton for the overtime that she had worked. This government has never prosecuted itself. It has never applied its own laws to its own agencies. Instead, it chooses to punish small businesses and parade them as an example, not its own broken systems. This bill says it is implementing the Wilson review. I quote Minister Dimopoulos from his second-reading speech:

The Formal Review into Victorian Government Bodies’ Engagement with Construction Companies and Construction Unions, led by Mr Greg Wilson … has exposed a rotten culture in the construction sector and the Victorian Government is taking strong action to stamp it out.

But I think, and many have said, that this Wilson review just did not go far enough – it did not have any teeth, it did not have power to compel witnesses. Innes Willox, head of the Australian Industry Group, again said:

Employers can only regard the report as whitewash of union misbehaviour amounting to a continued government protection racket for the CFMEU. The report is in places almost touchingly naive and perhaps a logical extension of the state government’s ridiculous claims in recent months of a lack of knowledge of the CFMEU’s unlawful activities.

The Business Council of Australia (BCA) added:

An inquiry has the ability to compel any document or witness, which is essential in understanding the extent of the alleged influence of criminal organisations and corruption within the union.

Federal Labor also moved in to put the union under administration, talking up its tough action. But alongside the Wilson review, this too was a political farce. As the BCA notes:

The Administrator’s role is to get the CFMEU operating again, not to get to the bottom of every issue, and it’s clear that if we’re serious about doing this we need to have a full, open and transparent national inquiry – because this is likely to be a problem across every state.

This is what on this side of the chamber we are calling for. But the government of course rejected that, because who knows what we would find. Instead what we get essentially is not a royal commission; we get a referral mailbox. That is the response to one of the country’s worst public integrity scandals in living memory. I like the way Peter Walsh in the other place put it, quite bluntly. He said:

… we have got this body to effectively do stuff-all other than pass stuff on and then maybe write a report in the future.

I think that is true. Only two of the review’s eight recommendations are touched on in this bill, and neither have teeth. Meanwhile, far from stamping it out, the CFMEU remains untouched. Here is an organisation that has been a big donor to the Labor Party and has broken federal laws more than 2600 times, costing the union more than $24 million in fines. Since 2003 the CFMEU has been the subject of findings of contraventions of federal workplace laws on more than 1500 occasions, plus 1100 contraventions by its own office holders, employees, delegates and members. That is around 213 court cases and total penalties ordered of about $24 million, yet their flags still fly over the massively overblown public construction sites. The best this government could do is give us at least a decent review that will actually get to the bottom of what is going on.

This government cannot feign ignorance about what is happening on its own construction sites – no-one who has looked into the issue for more than 5 minutes believes them. Last year the Age and the Sydney Morning Herald reported that women had been bashed, locked in rooms and harassed by violent offenders placed on taxpayer-funded worksites – men with bikie links, criminal records and protection from the CFMEU.

One woman was filmed being bashed by a bikie-linked workplace health and safety officer – just let that one sink in – during his lunchbreak from a government-funded project. Another was locked in a room by a man previously jailed for violence against women, who smoked ice as he detained her. The Sydney Morning Herald reported:

The women’s stories … reveal a pattern of the troubled union pushing men with violent histories onto worksites and then punishing women who complain …

Building companies agreed to employ them in pursuit of industrial peace. Isn’t that crazy? In order to have industrial peace you can have these thugs come onto worksites and bash women, and anyone that speaks up against this becomes a target. This is what the government defends when it looks the other way and offers reviews and interventions that go absolutely nowhere. This is what happens when complaints go into an expensive mailbox and remain stuck there. Yet Minister Dimopoulos can stand still and gushingly tell Parliament with a straight face during his second-reading speech that criminal and unlawful behaviour has no place in Victorian construction sites. He said:

The measures the Victorian Government is adopting aim to complement Commonwealth reforms and CFMEU changes, as well as actions already taken by the Government, which includes passing anti-bikie laws in 2024 that make it easier to prevent certain individuals from associating with each other.

Let me just quickly provide the minister with some common sense. Firstly, it may come as a surprise, but bikies do not actually list their membership. They do not. As a former bikie boss, Jay Malkoun made it clear in his recent interviews. He has said that many bikies have ordinary jobs and families, wearing their bikie colours only when they are on club rides. They will simply change their clothes, put on a hard hat, a vest or a business suit and continue to flout the laws that are rarely enforced. This is happening on all the government’s projects funded by our taxpayers, the actual people you were given a legislative and moral responsibility to protect.

In closing, we support the alignment with federal laws and we support the streamlining of jurisdictions. What we do not support and what we have pointed out is the hypocrisy. We can make this change, but unless there is a clear-eyed, real deep dive into what is actually going on, it does not matter if we align laws and it does not matter if we are doing these things to bring ourselves into line with Commonwealth standards. This government can look at its own projects, its own unions and its own contracts and apply the same rules it preaches to everyone else, because if it does not do that, nothing will change. These are more meaningless optics dressed up as reforms.

John BERGER (Southern Metropolitan) (10:53): I am here to speak in support of our Wage Theft Amendment Bill 2025, brought to the Parliament by the Minister for Economic Growth and Jobs in the other place. The Allan Labor government is committed to stamping out wage theft and dodgy employment practices in Victoria and has led the nation in combating wage theft. We were the first jurisdiction in the country to criminalise wage theft, in 2021, making dodgy operators liable for fines of up to $200,000 for individuals and nearly $1 million for companies and risking up to 10 years of imprisonment in serious cases. We intend to keep taking a hard line against such practices to ensure the safety of our workers in the future and protect employees from having their entitlements deliberately withheld, and this bill is designed to do exactly that.

I have listened to the last couple of contributions that we have had from those opposite and they have totally been an exercise in union-bashing. I cannot believe some of the things that they have come out with. I have been associated with a union for nearly 40 years – in fact my life membership comes up with the Transport Workers’ Union in 2026 – and I have come across all sorts of dodgy employers in terms of wage theft. It generally starts with superannuation, and the first thing that the employer will do is not pay it. Given that there are only a certain amount of times that they have got to pay superannuation in any one year, the opportunity to ensure that the employer is getting that money is fairly limited if they are not checking their accounts daily, weekly or monthly, as the case might be.

Those of us who have got superannuation accounts would be probably guilty of not checking those accounts, because we think it is one of those things that you set and forget and do not take the time to forensically look at it. Especially in transport, if we look at the gig economy I can give you countless examples of how the people working in that particular industry are ripped off on a daily basis. They are working off apps, getting jobs via particular companies, and if they get a job for any one particular day are they making sure they are getting paid the correct rate of pay? I am sure those opposite that are getting their pizzas delivered to their homes would not give two hoots about the wages of the person who has just driven through the rain to get their pizza to them or their bottles of wine that they get delivered to their house. They would not ask a question about what they are being paid, whether their entitlements are there or if in fact they are actually being paid at all for the job that they are doing. So I am not going to sit here and be lectured by those opposite about what it means to be a union member and ensure that all of your entitlements are going to be correctly paid.

Getting back to the bill, specifically the bill will make amendments to the Wage Theft Act 2020, substituting ‘Wage Theft’ within the title of the principal act to ‘Workforce Inspectorate Victoria’, as well as making the changes necessary to repeal Victoria’s wage theft offences and related investigation functions and powers to avoid potential confusion with the introduction of the Commonwealth legislation on wage theft, rename Wage Inspectorate Victoria to Workforce Inspectorate Victoria to better reflect its role and confer a general function on the workforce inspectorate which will enable it to provide information and advice in relation to workplace entitlements as they are prescribed.

The bill will amend other acts consequentially named in the bill as the Child Employment Act 2003, the Criminal Procedure Act 2009, the Long Service Benefits Portability Act 2018, the Long Service Leave Act 2018, the Owner Drivers and Forestry Contractors Act 2005, the Public Administration Act 2004 and the Integrity Oversight Victoria Act 2011.

The workforce inspectorate will have their regulatory functions and capabilities broadened in contrast to the current wage inspectorate. This will contribute to achieve our government’s aim in tackling wage theft within the state, ensure we are aligned with Commonwealth laws that have criminalised the intentional underpaying of wages and repeal any parts of the legislation that create unnecessary confusion for the community as well as workers and businesses.

In the bill the inspectorate’s new responsibilities are to be designated as follows: to receive complaints or matters and related information regarding public construction from any person; to refer the complaints or matters and disclose related information regarding public construction to other government agencies and bodies, including agencies and bodies of the Commonwealth and another state or territory; and to receive notifications and information from other government agencies and bodies regarding any complaints or matters the workforce inspectorate has referred to those government agencies and bodies. The workforce inspectorate authority will have the ability to provide advice, information and education on working entitlements and report to the minister, where appropriate, on any complaints, matters, notifications or information that Workforce Inspectorate Victoria receives or refers.

The bill aims to enforce compliance with the law and ensure legal minimums are respected. The workforce inspectorate functions are regulatory, not representative. This does not impede on the work of trade unions. Instead, it supports the voice of unions in their representation of workers rights and advancing conditions, enforcing the floor of workplace standards to allow them to focus on their vital work and provide for bargaining for better pay and conditions. While employment law is largely legislated by the federal government, such as the Fair Work Act 2009, with the recent amendments that have driven a change at a Victorian level, states still retain the power to implement workplace legislation in relation to areas such as health and safety, discrimination and workers compensation. This legislative amendment takes into account investigations done into dodgy practices.

The second objective of this bill relates to the Wilson review into Victorian government bodies’ engagement with construction companies and construction unions led by Mr Greg Wilson, who was a former Secretary of the Department of Justice and Regulation and Secretary of the Department of Sustainability and Environment and most recently the acting commissioner for the Victorian Public Sector Commission. The review was released by the Victorian government into public purview on 18 December 2024. All of the recommendations listed were accepted either in full or in principle. The bill addresses that first recommendation by establishing a complaints referral body, Workforce Inspectorate Victoria, which acts to receive and refer complaints referring to Victorian government construction sites.

The Allan Labor government also amended the Labour Hire Licensing Act 2018. That serves to add discretionary considerations to the fit and proper person test. As such, the Labour Hire Authority may find that an applicant is not a fit and proper person if the applicant reflects the following: has any conviction or finding of guilt for an indictable offence as specified in section 22(a) of that act in the previous 10 years; has held any role as an officer in other companies in the previous five years where that company has become insolvent or had a labour hire licence cancelled, suspended or revoked within six months of that person’s departure from the company; has a close associate who would not be found to be a fit and proper person; or is a member of a Part 5C organisation as defined in the Criminal Organisations Control Act 2012.

The government’s amendment of the Labour Hire Licensing Act gives the Labour Hire Authority the power to request in writing that a person provide information or documents that the authority reasonably believes are necessary for the monitoring of compliance with the Labour Hire Licensing Act. This request should provide its recipient with the power to provide the information and preserve the recipient’s right to refuse to provide the information. It can also require by written notice that a person provide specified information for the purpose of monitoring compliance with the Labour Hire Licensing Act within the time specified and in the manner specified. Failing to comply with a notice should therefore be an offence. The government’s amendments to the Labour Hire Licensing Act enable the register of licenced labour hire providers to include contextual information in relation to suspensions and cancellations of licences, with the publication to be limited to information that is not confidential under other state or federal laws and information that does not breach the privacy of people other than the licence-holder. These previous legislation changes demonstrate the Allan Labor government’s commitment to implementing the recommendations of the Wilson review.

The workforce inspectorate would serve to receive and refer complaints relating to Victorian government construction sites and would be responsible for protecting, investigating and enforcing workplace regulations, such as long service leave, child employment laws and owner-driver and forestry contractor laws. These will provide better regulation of the environment of our workers and ensure that fair practices are followed and maintained, working in tandem with other workplace regulatory bodies such as the Victorian Labor Hire Authority. The wage inspectorate successfully fought for over $1.2 million of unpaid long service leave for Woolworths workers in 2024, impacting over 1000 retail employees. Recently the sole director of Minto Nominees Pty Ltd was charged $10,000 for breaking the child employment laws after the wage inspectorate received a tip-off that they may be employing staff under 15 years of age. The wage inspectorate has allowed for workers to receive rightful compensation for work that they do, providing clear channels of support and shutting down loopholes that feed exploitation. I would like to thank commissioner Robert Hortle for his work since 2021.

The workforce inspectorate’s new oversight and strengthening of the Victorian Labour Hire Authority’s powers are designed to close loopholes in high-risk industries where unlawful practices have been documented. The Labour Hire Authority regulates who can provide labour, ensuring providers are legitimate and licensed, while the Workforce Inspectorate Victoria will regulate how workers are treated once employed. These reforms are led by the recommendations from the Wilson review. This bill aims to strengthen their coordination, mutually reinforcing the keeping out of dodgy labour providers and ensuring workers are paid fairly and are sufficiently protected. The bill represents a deliberate action by the Allan Labor government to support our hardworking trade unions. The Allan Labor government will engage in consultation with relevant bodies to implement these changes effectively.

Construction work contracts and policy for Victorian government sites under the new legislation will require clauses that cover criminal and other unlawful conduct, enforce that contractors report or deal with suspected criminal or unlawful activity at their worksites and promote the new complaints referral body. This aligns with recommendation 7 of the Wilson report, that construction policies and contracts for Victorian government-funded construction projects:

… include clauses that cover criminal or other unlawful conduct that require principal contractors … to:

• report any suspected criminal or other unlawful conduct to the new complaints referral body

• ensure that where possible, they and their contractors … address criminal and unlawful conduct

• promote, support and work with the new complaints referral body

• have systems and processes in place to fulfil these obligations with respect to the overall construction project, including its subcontractors.

Alongside this, the bill provides for a definition of ‘public construction’ to go along with these obligations, with the Wilson report estimating potential for complaints to reach around 200 per quarter, with verifiable actual numbers depending on the proportion of individuals directing complaints to the Fair Work Commission or other appropriate bodies in regard to awareness. Data used in the Wilson report was itself based upon information provided by the Fair Work Commission’s online portal, opening on 31 July 2024 and receiving 793 complaints and pieces of intelligence as at 31 October 2024. A measured judgement was made that complaints in Victoria would represent approximately 25 per cent, or a quarter, of those, equalling approximately 200.

Critically, the Allan Labor government has recently announced that this new inspectorate will use its new powers to receive concerns and complaints, with a particular focus on women’s safety. Our government is committed to achieving gender parity within the construction industry, and a major part of the work is to ensure that women are safe, respected and supported in their work. The Labor government has been doing the work to stamp out gender discrimination in the industry, with Building Gender Equality: Victoria’s Women in Construction Strategy 2019–2022 investigating barriers to women’s participation, including attraction, recruitment and retention in construction site-based roles. The CFMEU administrator, Mark Irving KC, and his team have been working hard to address allegations of gender discrimination and violence on public construction sites, and his work is to be commended. In construction women remain under-represented and too often face unsafe and hostile conditions.

This bill is a step towards change by providing safer pathways for women to raise concerns. As stated in the review itself, stamping out wage theft in the industry will require oversight and consideration of many influential factors, whether cultural, regulatory, legal, policy related or contractual, and will require the involvement of Commonwealth industrial relations law and the CFMEU administration. With the administration and cultural changes being spearheaded by Mark Irving in the CFMEU, these amendments must be able to be implemented quickly and effectively.

The Allan Labor government is responding to a complex and multifaceted legislative matter to improve oversight and management of the construction industry across the state. I would like to highlight further the work the Allan Labor government is doing to stamp out criminal and unlawful activity in the industry and improve the general culture of construction work, including the building of equity policies which work to train and employ more women in the sector, bridging gender disparity and encouraging diversity within the industry, because long-term structural cultural change is needed across a male-dominated construction sector. With that, I commend the bill to the house.

Georgie CROZIER (Southern Metropolitan) (11:08): I rise to speak to the Wage Theft Amendment Bill 2025, and I note that this bill has been brought into the house by the government. Previously there was the government’s Wage Theft Act 2020, which criminalised the deliberate and dishonest withholding of employee entitlements. At that point the government established the Wage Inspectorate Victoria to enforce the laws under that act. This bill is repealing some of this because the Albanese government introduced legislation into the federal Parliament, the Fair Work Legislation Amendment (Closing Loopholes) Act 2023. This tries to close some of those loopholes given that federal legislation.

Why are we debating this? We are debating it because of the corruption in the CFMEU. As members know, the government instigated the Wilson review, which was a complete farce. It did not go far enough in relation to what is going on – the extraordinary level of corruption and mismanagement in the CFMEU and the Big Build. As a result we have seen some appalling reports about what has gone on, with various allegations around inappropriate and criminal behaviour and intimidatory and coercive acts that have gone on. It is just a shocking situation where the taxpayer is footing the bill because of this ongoing corruption.

We have had allegations of bikie gangs linked with the Big Build and a high degree of criminal activity that has been involved, and that has all been reported. There has been some excellent reporting by journalists who have really uncovered the extent – well, not the extent because we do not know the true extent – or certainly very, very serious behaviours in the Big Build here in Victoria, and I do not think that is anything for the government to be proud of. We have got a Premier who has overseen that portfolio – when she was infrastructure minister and looking at this she turned a blind eye to it all, quite frankly, and did nothing, and then when it was exposed they decided that they had better do something on wage theft.

This is what this bill is doing. It is allowing for the workforce inspectorate to be renamed to better reflect the revised legislative issue, so the Wage Inspectorate Victoria will now be known as the Workforce Inspectorate Victoria. It really does not go to the crux of what we are talking about in terms of the level of corruption and those issues around wage theft and other components in Victoria. As I said, the Wilson review, which was quite farcical in terms of what it found, made eight recommendations. The bill implements recommendation 1 of the Wilson review and supports the implementation of recommendation 7. I understand that when the shadow minister asked the government ‘Why aren’t you implementing all of these recommendations?’ of course the standard line was, ‘Well, there’s further work underway.’ How long do they need?

Richard Welch interjected.

Georgie CROZIER: As Mr Welch said, there is always more work to do. It is a very convenient excuse. We have seen it with the childcare legislation that has been debated this week and in how the government’s bill that we urgently had to debate on Tuesday did not close the loopholes. Mr Erdogan, who was the minister sitting at the table, in the questions that I asked of him did not close those loopholes. Here we have another bill where, again, there is more work to be done, and I think that is an absolute slap in the face to every Victorian who is paying for the extraordinary waste and mismanagement as a result of a lot of this corrupt behaviour that has gone on. It is quite horrifying, given the extent of that criminal behaviour and what has gone on.

I want to go to a point about what the Liberals and Nationals say. We know, and so do all Victorians, that taxpayers have been ripped off blind because of the turning of the blind eye to this corrupt behaviour. That is why we say a royal commission needs to be established to really understand the extent of that corrupt behaviour, the criminal activity that has gone on and the implications to Victorians and the Victorian taxpayer. That is why we need a royal commission, and I stand by it. The government is too weak to actually call for a royal commission. If they truly had the interests of all Victorians at heart, they would also demand a royal commission to get to the bottom of this corruption in the Big Build. It stinks to high heaven. It is a very significant and serious issue and should not be brushed under the carpet. It should be taken very seriously, and this bill does nothing to the extent of what really needs to be spoken about.

While I am on wage theft, can I say that not only has wage theft gone on with the Big Build, wage theft under Labor has occurred in our hospitals, and for years. It has been entrenched. In fact the AMA have found that entrenched practice within our hospitals. For the last 10 years junior doctors have been underpaid, and a federal court found in favour of the junior doctors when this historical action took place. It was by $15,000 or thereabouts that those junior doctors were underpaid for the overtime that they had done. $175 million is being paid to junior doctors because of wage theft.

It was theft of wages from junior doctors under Labor. They have no excuse for this given that they knew about it for many years. The AMA Working Conditions of Junior Doctors in Victoria report is very damning. It talks about 93 per cent of Victorian junior doctors having experienced burnout in the last 12 months, 94 per cent of Victorian junior doctors fearing making a clinical error due to burnout and fatigue and that 98 per cent of junior doctors consider burnout fatigue a major reason for junior doctors leaving the profession in Victoria. That is the issue here: the overtime that doctors are working. The survey shows that 87 per cent of Victorian junior doctors have worked unpaid overtime in the last 12 months. Eighty-seven per cent worked unpaid overtime – that is what the class action was about. That is why Victorian taxpayers are paying out $175 million, and that is why our health system is really trying to support these young junior doctors in the work that they do, looking after very sick Victorian patients, yet they are being faced with this. This was a very damning finding.

This issue has been swept under the carpet a little bit. I do not think there are many Victorians who know that the wage theft that has occurred in relation to these junior doctors over the last 10 years has gone on. That $175 million payout is not an insignificant amount of money, and it is not an insignificant number of doctors – 15,000 over the last 10 years who were underpaid by the government. I do think that, while we are looking at the Wage Theft Amendment Bill, it is not just within the Big Build, with the Labor government overseeing historical blowouts, waste and mismanagement and billions of dollars of Victorian taxpayers money being blown, but the $175 million that has been paid to doctors by government because of the wage theft case that found in favour of doctors and against the Labor government.

More needs to be done on the CFMEU and the Big Build. I would again urge the government to support the Liberals and Nationals push for a royal commission. Victorians deserve nothing less than to get to the truth about the extent of the corruption, the extent of the crime and the very serious criminal links with all sorts of unsavoury types that are causing so much destruction and despair in this state. At the very least, the billions of dollars wasted of taxpayers money is an outright disgrace.

Jacinta ERMACORA (Western Victoria) (11:19): It is my absolute pleasure to stand and speak on the Wage Theft Amendment Bill 2025. Wage theft is a real thing. This bill will legislate to carry forward Victorian Labor’s proud legacy of protecting workers. It will modernise the way we regulate workplace rights here in Victoria.

Before I say some further things, the bill does three things. First, it repeals the Victorian criminal wage theft laws, recognising that Australia now has a stronger national framework to hold employers to account for deliberate and dishonest underpayments. The second thing it does is it renames and refocuses our state’s workplace regulator. Formerly known as Wage Inspectorate Victoria, it will now be known as the Workforce Inspectorate Victoria.

This is a more suitable title, as the inspectorate has never just been the regulator of wage theft and will ensure resources are better directed. Thirdly, it builds on the findings of the Wilson review, establishing a new function for the inspectorate to receive and refer complaints about public construction sites. This will include complaints of corruption, unlawful behaviour and, importantly, gender-based harassment and discrimination.

The story of wage theft in Victoria is one of Labor values and Labor action, and it brings me to reflect on the reason for being of the Labor Party. I can tell you that we have a very clear compass. We know what we stand for, and we are busy working towards implementing what we stand for. The shearers under the tree at Barcaldine in Queensland all those years ago were definitely talking about wages and conditions. That was their driving force for forming our party, and here we are today, all these years later, still working on these issues, still protecting workers rights and still looking to ensure that our judicial system and our criminal system do what they ought to do for working people. I must say that the lack of compass and lack of direction from those opposite really was reflected in what we saw last night in this chamber, and I think that we are absolutely the opposite to that in terms of having direction and knowing what values underpin our party and what we do.

In 2020 we were the first jurisdiction in this country, again, to introduce criminal offences for wage theft. It was recognition of something our communities knew all too well: that too many workers – often young people, often migrants, often women and often people in insecure work – were being ripped off. We have all heard the stories of wages stolen, entitlements denied and deliberate underpayments dressed up as mistakes. These were not mistakes; they were acts of theft. Our laws made it clear that if you steal from your workers, you are a criminal. We backed those laws with the creation of the Wage Inspectorate Victoria, which had the power to investigate, to prosecute and also to educate. This is a testament to the commitment of our government to working alongside the trade union movement and to the fact that the right to a fair day’s pay for a fair day’s work is not negotiable. That is the link all the way back, and that link is still alive and well in our party today. It is the bedrock of dignity in the workplace, and it is what our Labor Party has always stood for.

It is important to note that these laws are not being repealed because they are no longer needed in Victoria – that would be the ideal. They are being repealed because the Albanese Labor government shared our recognition of the need to legislate on this important issue, enabling a national approach to wage theft. Through its landmark Fair Work Legislation Amendment (Closing Loopholes) Act 2023, federal Labor has enshrined wage theft offences into the Fair Work Act 2009. That means that wage theft is no longer just a Victorian offence, it is a national one. Every Australian worker in every state and territory now has these protections. These offences came into effect at the beginning of this year, which now means we can put aside our laws in this space. We can direct the resources of the inspectorate towards outstanding and ongoing areas of industrial relations within the Victorian remit. There is strength in having Labor governments working together.

If we look at the history of our judicial system and the history of the idea of theft of property, our judicial system has been very tilted. The precedent system has been tilted towards people who own a bit more, perhaps middle and wealthy people who own property basically. Back in the day, horse theft was a big thing. What we have been doing and what federal Labor has now done is introduce a bit more equality into the notion of theft and legislated the equal behaviour of theft whether it is property or whether it is wages. If $1000 worth of property is stolen and $1000 worth of wages are stolen, both ought to be treated as the criminal offence that it is. I am very proud of our federal Labor government for doing what they have done in this space. It provides an enormous amount of protection for the entire nation now and really should never be repealed.

In 2020 Victoria had to lead alone in this space. Now that we have a coordinated, national approach with wage theft offences regulated at the Commonwealth level, the bill will amend the name of the inspectorate to better reflect the scope of their work. It will be renamed the Workforce Inspectorate Victoria. It has not just been about wage theft, though. Its responsibilities are wider, deeper and critical to the protection of Victorian workers. Take child employment – between March 2024 and March 2025 the inspectorate granted 480 licences, enabling more than 3000 children under 15 to work legally and safely. Children under the age of 15 need to be properly supervised and given required rest breaks. The inspectorate also launched 786 investigations into compliance, prosecuting businesses who failed to meet their obligations, particularly long service leave. In the last financial year the inspectorate finalised more than 100 investigations and recovered millions of dollars in entitlements for workers. When CommSec and Bankwest failed to pay their staff leave, the inspectorate held them to account. When Optus was found to have short-changed hundreds of staff, the inspectorate stepped in. These are just a few examples.

Beyond its enforcement work, the inspectorate is also trusted for advice and support. The helpline has answered 7000 calls and responded to over a thousand written inquiries. New education programs have been rolled out in multiple languages to make sure every worker in Victoria knows their rights.

One of the other significant reforms in this bill will confer a new complaints referral function on the workforce inspectorate. This will allow it to receive and refer complaints from any person relating to public construction. This comes directly from a recommendation of the Wilson review to examine how government agencies handle allegations of unlawful conduct on government construction projects. Specifically the bill will confer on the inspectorate the ability to receive complaints and information from any person regarding public construction. It will then refer these complaints to the relevant enforcement or investigative body or agency. The review also found that people often did not know which agency to go to. Should they call WorkSafe Victoria, IBAC, the Fair Work Ombudsman or Victoria Police? It recommended the creation of a single entry point, and the bill establishes Workforce Inspectorate Victoria in that role. It will receive complaints, triage them and refer them to the appropriate agency for investigation, also keeping records, tracking trends and reporting to the minister when systemic problems emerge.

This is important because what is not counted does not exist. What is not counted is not talked about. So keeping a record of the issues and reporting on them and, importantly, reflecting on that data is incredibly important.

I want to stress one aspect of this referral function that is absolutely vital: its focus on gender-based discrimination and violence. We know the construction industry is one of the most male-dominated sectors in our economy. We also know that women working on construction sites face unacceptable levels of harassment, exclusion and intimidation. The bill ensures the inspectorate is not blind to that reality. Where a complaint reveals not just unlawful behaviour but a pattern of gender-based discrimination, it will be referred appropriately and often to more than one agency. For example, a complaint may go to Victoria Police if it involves criminal conduct but also to the Equal Opportunity Commission if it involves sex discrimination. This approach recognises that workplace harassment is not banter and it is not just culture. It is unacceptable, and it must be addressed through a trauma-informed zero tolerance approach.

Our government has already invested nearly $8 million to diversify construction and build equality into this industry. You only need to have a look at TAFE to see the support for women trade apprentices. We have created Victoria’s first building equality policy, mandating targets for women on government projects – only Labor. I am proud we have launched the Building Equitable Futures Strategy, laying the foundation for a safer, fairer construction workforce. Whilst the bill implements the first Wilson review recommendation, the work does not end here. We are progressing further reforms to strengthen reporting obligations on contractors, to boost the powers of the Labour Hire Authority and to ban organised crime groups from Victorian government worksites. We will continue to evaluate these reforms over time and ensure they drive cultural change and redress corruption in this sector.

In conclusion, I would just like to say that this is our core business. This is something Labor is proud to do. This is complex as well, as you can see from the multiple issues at play. We are determined to continue to protect the rights of working families and women workers and to encourage women and diversity and inclusion across all workplaces in this state. Victoria has led the way with these reforms, reflecting the best of Labor values: fairness, accountability and justice for working people. I commend the bill to the house.

Tom McINTOSH (Eastern Victoria) (11:33): I, too, would like to add my voice to this bill. It is great to carry on from Ms Ermacora and her contribution and echo everything that was said. I think it is pretty simple. Sometimes you just want people to be able to understand simply what a party’s values are, what they believe in and what they will do for people. I wholeheartedly believe that Victorians and indeed in this instance Australians get better outcomes with Labor governments. It is about quality of life. If you want a good quality of life for yourself, for your family, for your broader community, don’t wages make a hell of a difference in that. If you think about the Labor Party, the things that have been achieved over so long out of the union movement, out of the labour movement, include eight-hour days, safety, ensuring that people get home in one piece, ensuring that if people are injured there are schemes there to assist them to be able to continue to support financially themselves and their families – something we know the Liberals are vitally opposed to – and superannuation. The fact that Victorians, indeed Australians, can retire in dignity is just such an incredible achievement of the Labor Party.

We know that the Liberal Party, whenever they have had the opportunity, have wanted to cut into people’s superannuation to (a) see it not exist, (b) see it reduced or (c) have people cut into it. I might come back to that during my contribution. Whether it is industrial manslaughter legislation or, as we are here to discuss today, wage theft legislation, it is always the Labor Party that will strive to ensure that Victorians have a better quality of life than the generation before them and that working Victorians who have families can ensure that their children are set up to have a better quality of life than they themselves have had, which I am sure is the hope and dream of the majority of parents in this state.

It is pretty simple: a fair day’s work for a fair day’s pay. If somebody turns up to work, works and does the hours, they should be paid accordingly. It does not matter whether someone is working in retail, in hospo, in a laundry, in a factory, as a hairdresser, in construction, in child care, as a receptionist, in agriculture or in manufacturing, whatever it might be, it is a contract we can all accept and agree to. If someone turns up and does their hours, their day’s work, they should be paid accordingly. Something that we on this side are very proud of is the work that was done to introduce the Wage Theft Act 2020 to ensure that Victorians of all employment types, of all professions can go to work and know that if their employer does not pay them for the hours done, there are means to deal with that and to have it amended. There are enough things going on in people’s lives without them having to worry about whether their employer is going to pay them.

We know that the Liberal Party do not only not care about whether people get paid, it is their economic policy. They do not have many policies, but one of the few policies the Liberal Party have is to drive down the wages and conditions of workers. We know that one of the few things that they have stood up and stood for over many decades is the lowering of pay and conditions for workers. It is why we are so proud on this side to be able to ensure that particularly some of our lowest paid workers, who are perhaps some of our most vulnerable, have a means to get the pay that they deserve when they are not paid by their employer.

The Wage Theft Bill 2020 was first introduced in 2020, and the Wage Theft Amendment Bill 2025 that we are here discussing today will repeal Victoria’s wage theft offences and associated regulations and functions. As I said, we are very proud to have been the first in the country to introduce criminal offences targeting the deliberate and dishonest underpayment of wages. For someone to turn up and do their hours and to not receive pay is pretty low. I think it is why this policy and the legislation introduced in 2020 have been so popular. Of course it has been picked up nationally. We know it was there for a reason. It was not just something dreamed up that was not applicable to what Victorians were experiencing.

The Fair Work ombudsman reported that they had recovered more than $473 million in unpaid wages and entitlements for nearly 160,000 employees in the 2023–24 financial year and recovered more than $1.5 billion for nearly 800,000 unpaid workers in the past three financial years. When we talk about a cost-of-living epidemic and cost-of-living pressures on working Victorians, I will tell you what helps that: getting paid. When you have turned up and done your hours, getting paid is pretty darn helpful.

There are a whole lot of other things a Labor government has done to support working people and to support families and communities around Victoria – and indeed around Australia, because we know that people have a better quality of life when Labor governments are in – whether they are the services in education or whether they are the services in health. We know that the Liberals, any chance they get, will close schools and will close hospitals. I hate to raise it again, but we know what they will do to public transport – cut services, close lines. Far be it from me to raise it in this place, but we know what the coalition did in the 1990s to our regional train lines. They just closed them and shut them down.

When you are looking at cost of living, when you are able to provide services that people dearly want and need to have a better quality of life and to reduce the cost and the expense of that life, as I said, getting your wages paid – what a great thing. For five years we have had that, and our laws in Victoria have been acknowledged by those nationally. When we introduced this in 2020, if my history is correct, we had a Liberal federal government. Of course they had no interest in this – no interest whatsoever. They did not have any policies to begin with other than driving down the pay and conditions of workers across Australia.

These laws are not being repealed because they are no longer needed in Victoria, they are being repealed because the Albanese Labor government shared our recognition of the need to legislate on this important issue, enabling us to have a national approach to wage theft. The Albanese Labor government’s closing loopholes legislation enshrined the criminal offence of intentionally underpaying wages and related employee entitlements in the Fair Work Act 2009. This means not just all Victorians but all Australians can rely upon these laws to protect their right to fair pay. These offences came into effect at the beginning of this year, which now means we can put aside our laws in this space and better target the resources of the inspectorate towards outstanding and ongoing areas of industrial relations within Victoria’s remit.

Following the line that imitation is the best form of flattery, I am just so proud that, first of all, there is a Labor government in Canberra that can ensure nationally that Australians’ wages are strong and something that is valued and supported by a government and that services in education, in health, in transport and in energy – right across the domain, all the things that really are the touchpoints in people’s lives and the things that improve the quality of people’s lives – have those investments to make a material day in, day out difference. I think this is why my colleagues have been so passionate to speak on this bill. I think Minister Symes will follow me when I have used my time to make my remarks. It is because this flows on directly not only to the individual, as I said, but to the families and the community. It actually gives us stronger economies.

When people have money to spend down at the shops – and we are talking about ensuring people are paid – they can go out and get to the hairdresser and they can get down and have dinner or lunch in the local shops and stimulate our economy. That is what we have seen with a state Labor government and now a federal Labor government as well. It is these material differences to people’s lives which are so incredibly important.

When it comes to renaming the Wage Inspectorate Victoria, with the inspectorate no longer regulating the offence of wage theft, our bill will amend the name of the inspectorate to better reflect the work they will continue to do. Instead of Wage Inspectorate Victoria, the inspectorate will now be called the Workforce Inspectorate Victoria and the governing legislation, the Wage Theft Act 2020, will be named the Workforce Inspectorate Act 2025. The inspectorate has never just been the regulator of wage theft. They have and will continue to play a critical role in regulating and enforcing key aspects of our industrial relations system. For example, the inspectorate is responsible for administering the Child Employment Act 2003 and the licensing system that applies to the employment of anyone under 15 years of age. Between March 2024 and March 2025 the inspectorate assessed and granted 480 child employment licences, enabling the employment of over 3200 children. There were 786 investigations launched into compliance monitoring across the state within a 12-month period. There is important work that will continue.

But again, I am just so proud that the labour movement, as I said at the start of my contribution, born out of ensuring better pay and conditions for workers, has continued decade on decade to deliver better outcomes for working Victorians, whether it has been making sure people get home safe or making sure if they are injured or there is a fatality, they are cared for, that their loved ones are cared for – we introduced other legislation into this place only last sitting week, I think it was, to ensure that the families of workers who do not come home from work are adequately, or further adequately, financially supported. The labour movement is always looking to strive to get the best quality of life for Victorians and ensuring that the safety net is there when things go wrong – the safety net to support those that are vulnerable, those that have been hurt, those that have found themselves in a situation that may otherwise leave them completely financially vulnerable and perhaps unable to keep a roof over their heads. That is why I am just so proud that this is one of many pieces of reform over decades to improve the pay and conditions of Victorians, of their families and of their communities, which sees a more prosperous society for all of us.

Jaclyn SYMES (Northern Victoria – Treasurer, Minister for Industrial Relations, Minister for Regional Development) (11:48): It is a pleasure to sum up on the Wage Theft Amendment Bill 2025. It is my first bill in the role of Minister for Industrial Relations. Thank you for the contributions both in the lower house and in our chamber today.

It is a relatively straightforward bill, but it is an important bill. It does three key things. First and foremost, it repeals Victoria’s wage theft offences, not because they are not necessary but because they have been taken up by the federal government, ensuring that protection of workers that benefit from such protective measures in legislation remains. We were the first state to introduce laws of this kind – criminal penalties for the deliberate and dishonest underpayment of wages. As I said, these laws influenced a federal commitment in the space, leading to the Commonwealth amending the Fair Work Act 2009 to introduce federal wage theft offences.

The commencement of the Commonwealth offences at the beginning of this year has put us in the obvious position that Victoria’s offences are not only inoperable but it is appropriate to update the statute books to ensure that they are repealed, clearing the way for and removing any confusion in relation to the operation of the Commonwealth laws. The Commonwealth are now equipped to take action on this important area of protecting workplace entitlements.

Secondly, the bill will amend the powers and the name of the Wage Inspectorate Victoria, which will now be known as Workforce Inspectorate Victoria. It is fortunate because we call them the WIV, and we do not have to change any of that terminology.

Tom McIntosh interjected.

Jaclyn SYMES: It is a very sensible amendment, isn’t it, Mr McIntosh? The unit will now be known as Workforce Inspectorate Victoria, as I said, and we will be repealing their powers of investigation into wage theft-related matters as appropriate. The repeal of wage theft offences means that the name Wage Inspectorate no longer aligns with the predominant area of their responsibilities, so, as I said, Workforce Inspectorate Victoria is much more appropriately fitting terminology for this important body. We will maintain ongoing responsibility for the regulation of child employment, long service leave and owner-drivers and forestry contractors and remain a sector regulator under the Child Wellbeing and Safety Act 2005, and we will still be able to give advice and information in relation to workplace entitlements. I thank them for the important work that they do in those areas.

Finally, the bill will acquit recommendation 1 of the Wilson review, which was to create a complaints referral function to receive and refer complaints relating to Victorian government construction sites. Members have reflected on this, and I join them in their concern about the deeply troubling allegations and conduct that came to light within our construction sector. It was conduct that our government condemns to the highest degree, and conduct that we have taken action on and will continue to do so. A key part of that action was commissioning the Wilson review to provide an independent assessment to identify weaknesses and opportunities for improvement and to address the conduct as best as possible, obviously also acknowledging that there is a role for Victoria Police in many of those matters.

A key part of the action was the Wilson review, which led to eight recommendations about how the powers of Victorian government bodies can be strengthened to better respond to allegations of criminal or other unlawful behaviour. Our response was to support these recommendations, either in full or indeed in principle, and in some way deliver the same outcome or go further than Mr Wilson’s recommendations. We are underway to deliver on each of them by the end of the year, beginning with recommendation 1, which is contained in this legislation. This new function will be conferred onto WIV, who will act as the doorway for complaints about issues arising on government construction sites. The WIV will then triage these complaints and, where appropriate, will refer them to the relevant enforcement agency such as IBAC, Victorian Equal Opportunity and Human Rights Commission or police.

The impact of the Wilson review recommendations in addressing corruption on government worksites also ties in with the existing reforms that the government has taken outside of the industrial relations sphere that contribute to addressing the concerns raised. I had responsibility for these in my former role when we brought legislation in to strengthen Victoria’s unlawful association scheme as part of the Criminal Organisations Control Amendment Act 2024, banning members of specified organised crime groups from entering Victorian government work sites. We have also taken proactive steps to address the systemic and cultural barriers to women’s workforce participation across the construction sector, something we know is critically important to ensuring women can feel safe and represented on these work sites.

I just want to take a little bit of an opportunity to respond to some of the criticisms that have been raised. I acknowledge that there have not been major criticisms, but I wanted to explain some of why we have landed where we have. Some have questioned why we did not set up a specific body with its own investigative and enforcement powers. There are two reasons that we opted not to do this. The first is that it is not consistent with what the independent investigator in Wilson recommended as part of his review.

He specifically recommended that the function serve as a clearing house and did not consider that this body should have the power to conciliate, mediate or investigate complaints. This is because the powers and mechanisms of existing bodies, such as IBAC, VicPol and indeed VEOHRC, are not what is an issue here. The responsibility for action belongs to the law enforcement or regulatory agency that has the relevant powers.

Second, we have a commitment as a government, as part of our Economic Growth Statement, to halve the number of regulators. Setting this function up in WIV as an established industrial relations regulator not only aligns with this statement but enables us to leverage its existence, experience and capability in dealing with workforce issues to deliver this important service.

I also want to address the point raised that we will not be involved in relaying the outcome of complaints to complainants. The legislation does enable the workforce inspectorate to follow up on complaints and matters it has referred to other agencies by facilitating a two-way flow of information and to request and receive notifications and information about matters which it has referred. That does not mean that we should be the only place where someone seeks to follow up on complaints that they have made but also certainly does not mean that we have no role.

There has also been some criticism of the bill not rolling out the entire scope of reforms under the Wilson review. I can confirm we are on track to have each of these recommendations acquitted before the end of the year. We have already established the alliance under recommendation 2; we will have legislation addressing recommendations 3, 4, 5 and 6 in the Parliament before the end of the year; the recommendation 7 policy and contractual changes are underway; and the final recommendation, to review the changes, will be conducted within two years of implementation.

[NAMES AWAITING VERIFICATION]

I thank those who have worked hard on getting this bill into this place: department staff from Industrial Relations Victoria, Lissa Zass, Lisa Williams, Sharon De Silva and Naomi Seinder. And what better birthday present to my senior adviser Samantha Taylor, who is the industrial relations adviser, than passing the bill in the Parliament. Happy birthday, Sam.

Motion agreed to.

Read second time.

Third reading

Jaclyn SYMES (Northern Victoria – Treasurer, Minister for Industrial Relations, Minister for Regional Development) (11:57): By leave, I move:

That the bill be now read a third time.

Motion agreed to.

Read third time.

The PRESIDENT: Pursuant to standing order 14.28, the bill will be returned to the Legislative Assembly with a message informing them that the Legislative Council have agreed to the bill without amendment.

Business interrupted pursuant to standing orders.