The Fair Work Commission’s (FWC) annual minimum wage order sets a baseline for the poorest fifth of workers in Australia, who are not on enterprise bargains and whose wages are set by awards.

The FWC raised the minimum wage by 3.5% last year, but this still meant that real award wages remained lower than they were in 2020.

The Australian Council of Trade Unions (ACTU) is asking for a 5% rise in the minimum wage this year. While this has been met with the predictable howls of protest from the bosses, a 5% rise will still not make up for the fall in real award wages.

The ACTU’s claim would raise the minimum wage to $26.19 per hour, lifting the annual full-time rate to $51,761. This would still less than half of the annual wage of the highest-paid two-fifths of workers.

The current national minimum wage is not enough to get by on, the ACTU’s submission noted, and now “falls $262 a week short of what a full-time worker living alone needs to make a healthy living”.

The ACTU’s minimum wage submission admits: “Workers on award wages are also still behind from the last spike in inflation after Covid and despite progress over the last few years, they have yet to catch up.

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