On 4 November 2022, the Full Bench of the Fair Work Commission (Commission) published its decision that it was satisfied that a 15% interim increase in minimum wages for direct aged care workers covered by the Aged Care Award 2010, Nurses Award 2020 and Social, Community, Home Care and Disability Services Industry Award 2010 (Awards) is ‘plainly justified by work value reasons.’

This decision dealt with three applications made under section 158 of the Fair Work Act 2009 (Cth) (Fair Work Act) to vary the Awards to increase the minimum wages of aged care sector workers by 25%.

Under the Fair Work Act the Commission may make a variation to achieve modern award objectives if it is satisfied that the variation is justified by work value reasons. Work value reasons are reasons justifying the amount that employees should be paid for doing a certain kind of work.

To determine whether an increase is justified, the Commission considered in detail the nature of the work in the aged care sector, the skills and responsibility involved and the conditions under which the work is done. Based on expert evidence, the Commission preliminarily accepted a number of propositions about the influence of gender biased assumptions on the valuation of work in the aged care sector. The Commission also concluded that the work undertaken by RNs, ENs and Certificate III PCWs in residential aged care had changed significantly in the past two decades, which justified an increase in minimum wages for these classifications.

You can read the full decision here.

Read more:

Aged Care sector pay increase – what providers need to know

Fair Work Decision (.pdf)