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This report documents the findings from interview-based research with low paid workers in Western Australia (WA). The project has also been designed with the goal of facilitating the development of a national report that summarises findings from similar projects (using similar methodology) in Queensland, New South Wales, Victoria, South Australia and the Australian Capital Territory (Elton, et al. 2007). Specifically, the study aims to assess the impacts of changes to work regulation on women employed in sectors that have traditionally relied on awards for defining their conditions of employment. The study aims to communicate the experience of change in a number of real life situations. In presenting the findings this report is organised as follows. Section two provides an overview of recent regulatory changes impacting on the WA labour market. Section three describes recent employment and wage trends as a way of providing some context to the study. Section four presents the findings from in-depth interviews with 22 women selected primarily from the following low paid sectors: child-care, aged-care, cleaning, hospitality and retail. Section five offers a summary and discussion and some policy recommendations. The research design and methodology is detailed in appendix documents.

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In the period since the establishment of the Scottish Parliament in 1999 there have been growing differences between higher education in Scotland and other parts of the UK, in terms of the policy framework, structures, initiatives, aspects of practice, and patterns of participation. However it is necessary to ask to what extent have these differences built on policies, structures and trends which were already there, to what extent did devolution give fresh impetus to differences, and create new opportunities for differences to emerge, and to what extent has this produced differences in practice and outputs? This paper will seek to explore these issues.

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The WorkChoices amendments to the Workplace Relations Act 1996 represent a significant shift in national employment regulation in Australia. The legislative amendments are extremely complex and comprise, together with the accompanying regulations, some 1400 pages of regulation (Legislative Council of NSW Standing Committee on Social Issues 2006: 11). While some of the legislative changes are clear, such as the restriction of unfair dismissal protection to those working for employers with more than 100 employees and the restriction of unions’ right of entry to workplaces, other changes are less so. Indeed the extent to which the application of specific changes within certain workplaces is legal or illegal under WorkChoices has been a matter of on-going political debate and some considerable confusion. Even where changes are unambiguous, the individual and organisational ramifications of the removal of long-standing protections, particularly in relation to job security, have not yet been explored and understood. The authors were commissioned to conduct a deep qualitative study of a set of experiences amongst workers in low pay sectors, particularly childcare, aged care, cleaning, retail, clerical and hospitality, across five states and the Australian Capital Territory. This report includes full details of the methods and approach of the study, along with recruitment materials and interview schedules (see appendices). This report outlines findings arising from 121 women low paid interviewees. Amongst other recommendations, we strongly recommend a larger national analysis by means of a comprehensive longitudinal survey of Australian workers and workplaces. This report thus provides the first comprehensive, qualitative study of the effects of recent industrial relations reforms on low paid women workers and should be of interest to all those working in this field.

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