Unions want fruit pickers to be guaranteed the minimum wage following revelations some farmworkers have been paid as little as $3 an hour.
The Australian Workers Union is applying to the Fair Work Commission to ensure horticulture workers are paid a minimum of $24.80 an hour.
Farms do not currently have to pay the minimum award rate, with many workers paid depending on the amount of fruit picked or vegetables harvested.
The AWU is comfortable with farmer-owners being able to keep those piecemeal arrangements in place, but wants the award rate set as a floor.
AWU national secretary Dan Walton said worker exploitation and abuse was rife on Australian farms.
“There is no reason we have to accept this shameful reality,” he said on Wednesday.
“Australia was founded on the principle that if you do a fair day’s work you should be guaranteed a fair day’s pay.”
Agriculture Minister David Littleproud said the devil would be in the detail of the union’s proposal, but argued it would be disingenuous to assume all farmers did not pay their workers enough.
“They are generalising the fact that there is a minority that have cut corners and have done the wrong thing,” Mr Littleproud told Sky News.
“They should be weeded out, they are a cancer in agriculture that need to be weeded out, but that’s not unlike any other industry.”
Mr Littleproud claimed it was human nature for bosses to try and cut corners.
“But to generalise the way the AWU is effectively saying that Australian farmers are exploiting their employees – each and every one of them – and that is not the case,” he said.
“The vast majority of Australian producers do the right thing and we shouldn’t generalise.”
