Woolies' disgrace: Staff short-changed
Woolworths has been thrown under the microscope by the Fair Work Ombudsman (FWO), after an investigation found cleaning contractors were paid as little as $7 an hour.
The inquiry, which commenced in 2014, found cleaning contractors at 90 per cent of Woolies outlets in Tasmania were not complying with workplace laws, and the major supermarket has been accused of failing to monitor this behaviour.
“Our inquiry found deficiencies in Woolworths’ governance arrangements with regard to its procurement and oversight of cleaning contracts, resulting in serious exploitation occurring at multiple levels of its cleaning supply chain,” Fair Work Ombudsman Natalie James said in a statement on Wednesday.
“We uncovered breaches across 90 per cent of Woolworths’ Tasmanian sites, including cases of contractors paying cleaners as little as $7 per hour for training and $14 per hour for work — well below their legal entitlements.”
News.com.au reports none of the cleaning contractors are still with the supermarket and Woolies has introduced mandatory audits of third-party cleaning contractors in the past three years, but the FWO still criticised the supermarket for its record-keeping.
“Overall, record-keeping by contractors engaged at Woolworths’ sites was abysmal,” Ms James said.
“At 84 per cent of sites, workplace records were inaccurate or not kept at all. The impact of record keeping failings is exacerbated by the use of cash payments which, while lawful, make it difficult to determine with any certainty the extent of underpayment of wages by the contractors.
“Such blatant and widespread breaches of workplace laws are clearly unacceptable, and echo the findings of our previous inquiries into supply chains employing low-skilled and vulnerable workers.”
The inquiry also reportedly suggests that while cleaning performance of the contractors was regularly checked and scored by the supermarket, the approach led to a “culture of noncompliance” prevalent in its supply chain.
“Woolworths should have been putting the same effort into monitoring its contractors’ compliance with workplace laws as it did into scrutinising the cleanliness of their stores,” Ms James said.
“It is not enough for businesses to simply have governance systems in place if they do not follow up to check that contractors within their networks are complying with those systems.
“Businesses need to step up and be active in their responsibility to ensure that workers in their supply chains are being paid appropriately and treated fairly.”
Ms James acknowledged the work Woolies has done in recent years to bring it back into compliance, but argues that there is still a lot that the supermarket can do.
“While we acknowledge that Woolworths has since taken steps to improve compliance within its labour supply chain, it is clear from our findings that at the time of the Inquiry a culture of noncompliance was prevalent amongst contractors on its sites,” Ms James said.
Woolies were quick to reply with their own statement, with a spokesman saying they would, “continue to work closely with the Fair Work Ombudsman as we incorporate enhanced management of our cleaning contractors throughout Australia”.
“We’re also committed to paying cleaners if they’re found to be underpaid for cleaning services provided to Woolworths, and where the relevant subcontractor employing entity fails to rectify the underpayments,” he said.
“Cleaners are an integral part of our store teams, providing an essential service across Woolworths’ sites, not just in Tasmania, but nationwide. We’d like to thank them for their continued hard work and support of our store teams”.
What are your thoughts? Do you think Woolies has a case to answer for?