Former ACT Chief Minister Kate Carnell has signalled she will take a hard line against weekend penalty rates when she takes over the leadership of a national business lobby group.
Subscribe now for unlimited access.
$0/
(min cost $0)
or signup to continue reading
''We've got to take the shackles off business,'' she says.
''Where people are working a standard week, why would you get paid more for a Sunday hour rather than a Friday hour?''
Ms Carnell is leaving beyondblue to head the Australian Chamber of Commerce and Industry, which represents 300,000 businesses.
As a former small-business operator, she has experienced the cost of penalty rates.
And now her son, who grew up in Canberra, has just opened a restaurant in Brisbane.
''He tells me he could employ five more people if it wasn't for penalty rates,'' she says.
''I have no problem with people being paid penalty rates when they work over 38 hours a week or a standard working week.
''Paying higher salaries on Saturdays and Sundays when lots of people want to work on Saturdays and Sundays seems to be really counterproductive for productivity in Australia.
''We want more people in the workforce. We want more women, particularly … in the workforce.
''Many of them don't have a choice but to work weekends when possibly their partners are at home.''
Ms Carnell's appointment comes amid pressure from the government backbench for Tony Abbott to address ''job killing'' weekend and holiday penalty rates.
However, the Abbott government's leadership team is determined to keep its pre-election promise not to touch penalty rates in its first term.
During her time as chief minister, Ms Carnell watched endless Council of Australian Governments debates over cutting red tape.
''What tends to happen is NSW will perceive that, yes, we should change [regulations], so long as it's to ours, and Victoria will say, yes, we should align, so long as it's in line with our regulations,'' she says.
Ms Carnell was chief minister when John Howard slashed the federal bureaucracy and she returns to Canberra as Mr Abbott prepares to deliver a tough budget that's expected to cut further into the federal public service.
''We will be looking very closely at the budget and the National Commission of Audit to see where their appetite for real change is, and we will be looking for significant appetite,'' she says.
''He has got to make some really tough decisions in getting the budget back on track. A lot of people won't like it, but that's the job.
''I think it would be very disappointing if the government stepped away from those tough decisions … everyone is going to have to share the pain.''