The Working Women’s Centre SA Inc have created these downloadable factsheets for the purpose of education, which are intended to be used as a general resource. Please note that the factsheets contain general information and may not be relevant to your particular matter, and should not be taken as legal advice.

If you require further and personalised information or advice relating to a workplace issue, please get in contact.

Wage Theft in South Australia, presented by the Working Women’s Centre SA .

Wage Theft in South Australia is an epidemic. The McKell Institute estimates that wage theft is costing South Australian workers $500 million a year. The Working Women’s Centre SA recovered over $500,000 for workers in just one financial year. While this is a great achievement, it is only a fraction of what is owed to hard working South Australians.

We know, more than most, that wage theft is hitting women and migrant workers the hardest. Wage theft extends to the non-payment of base wages, penalty rates, superannuation, loadings, and the non-payment of entitlements that workers should be receiving by law. In some sectors of the economy, wage theft has transitioned from a fringe activity to a business model.

This is an issue for workers and the government. In fact, the South Australian Parliamentary Wage Theft Interim Report confirms what we already knew: wage theft is rife in South Australia and it affects the most vulnerable workers in our community.

We gave evidence to the Wage Theft Inquiry about one of our clients who was only paid $14 an hour. How can you live on $14 an hour? You can’t. It isn’t a living wage.

In response to the Interim Report, we are holding a community discussion about the prevalence of wage theft to kick start South Australia’s response to this issue.

There are big questions at hand:
• Should we follow Victoria’s lead and criminalise wage theft?
• Is our industrial system is too complex?
• How does wage theft impact on working women? And is this impact due to a common business model?
• What are trade unions doing about this issue? And how do we campaign for a living wage?

We are thrilled to host Irene Pnevmatikos MLC, Edward Cavanough from the McKell Institute and Angas Story from SA Unions to tackle those issues and more.

There have been many claims that Working from Home (WFH) will spearhead a feminist revolution, likening the change in our work environment to the structural changes we saw for working women during and after WW1.

These sorts of claims elicit many questions;
🔸Is this a positive change?
🔸Does WFH finally give women the flexibility we have been fighting for?
🔸How do we navigate WFH when our own home is not safe? 🔸What about work, health and safety? What about the costs of running a home office?
🔸Will WFH be optional in the future? Should it be? Will more time in the home, increase our care work?
🔸What types of workers get to WFH? Do you have to let your employer into your home? Will work hours increase? What on earth are we doing about childcare?

There are no simple answers, and as always it depends; not every person has the opportunity to WFH or experiences WFH equally. Can we re-imagine work, so that is works for us?

To keep this conversation going and maybe answer some of these questions, the Working Women’s Centre SA Inc is proud to host:

Working from Home: Risks and Rewards: An online panel conversation about gender and labour, while working from & in the home.

👉 PANELLISTS:
🔹 Alison Pennington – Senior Economist for the Centre for Future Work

🔹The Hon Michelle Lensink MLC – Minster for Human services in South Australia

🔹Professor Suzanne Franzway – Emeritus Professor of Sociology and Gender Studies University of South Australia

🔹Maria Hagias – Chief Executive Officer of Women’s Safety Services SA

MC – Abbey Kendall – Director of The Working Women’s Centre SA Inc.

Your Rights at Work is a recording of an online webinar designed to help International Students working in Australia.

We have also uploaded a PDF copy of the powerpoint presentation that covers the basics of your workplace rights, as presented by Kylie Porter Industrial Officer at the Working Women’s Centre SA & Rachel Seaforth the Coordinator of the Young Workers Legal Service.

This includes information on:

 – How much you should be paid – the minimum wage.

– Your workplace entitlements as a casual worker.

– How to find what your ‘award rate’ is (how much you should be paid) based on what industry you are in.

– How to calculate how much you have been underpaid

– How to write a ‘a letter of demand’ – a formal letter to your employer informing them that you have been underpaid & asking them to pay what is owed to you.

– What to do after you have sent your letter of demand.

IMPORTANT INFORMATION:
This powerpoint presentation and training session was created on 30 June 2020. Please take this into account where you are relying on this information on another date. We will try to update this page with relevant changes and reforms but we may not be able to do this on every occasion.