Last week the Liberal Party, and particularly its leader, opted out of debate. Following the inquiry into the racial discrimination act,...

Last week, when the Fair Work Commission handed down its decision to reduce Sunday penalty rates by up to 25%, the headline response from the ACTU (Ged Kearney) and the ALP (Mark Dreyfus) was that this would result in a loss of up to $6,000 per annum for affected workers. This claim should not go unchallenged. Intuitively one can tell immediately that it is an exaggeration. For a 25% reduction in Sunday pay to result in a $6,000 loss, the worker’s pay would need to have be