The Struggle to Regulate Precarious Work Arrangements to Minimize Their Adverse Effects on Health and Safety in Australia

As in other countries, the growth of precarious work arrangements in Australia from the late 1970s has had significant adverse effects on occupational health and safety (OHS). While there is now a large body of global research on this issue and its connection to the rise of neoliberalism, there has been less investigation of efforts to address these problems. This article reviews regulatory interventions in Australia over the past two decades. It particularly focuses on industrial relations regulation, which can play a critical role in addressing at least some of the underlying reasons why precarious work undermines OHS. The most significant of these changes were passed by the Australian Parliament in February 2024, including a highly controversial but world-leading creation of minimum standards for platform workers.

Private Governance, State Regulation and Employment Standards: How Political Factors Shape their Nexus in Australian Horticulture

The global weakness of collective bargaining and state regulation has spawned growing interest in employment protection though private governance. However, scepticism about the efficacy of unsupervised codes of conduct has triggered debate about external discipline through state regulation. This article seeks to contribute to debates about the processes that shape the nexus between private governance and state regulation.

It is based on an empirical study of Australian harvest workers who formally benefit from state regulation of pay and occupational health and safety (OHS). However, industry changes have undercut standards. Product market pressures from supermarkets squeeze growers’ capacity to pay. Also, the labour market is increasingly supplied by vulnerable Asian temporary migrants (including undocumented workers), often supplied to growers by unscrupulous temporary work agencies. While pay and OHS practices vary, many harvest workers are exploited. Nor is private governance (which extends to horticulture through the codes of conduct of supermarkets and peak temporary work agency bodies) effective. All codes draw their standards from minimum legal employment conditions, and all possess loopholes allowing breaches to escape attention and rectification.

In 2015, media and political attention fell on the working conditions of temporary migrants in horticulture. Government inquiries found evidence of exploitation, but were divided over solutions. Progressive politicians (influenced by unions) favoured stronger state enforcement powers and temporary work agency licensing. Conservative politicians (influenced by business lobbies) claimed these steps would fail, and favoured the status quo. Political reform therefore stalled.

This study illustrates the importance of political processes in shaping the nexus between state regulation and private governance. In this case, a political stalemate leaves both regulation and governance deficient. Lacking protection from either source, harvest workers remain exposed to exploitative employment conditions.

How Precarious Employment Affects Health and Safety at Work: The Case of Temporary Agency Workers

Precarious employment has been associated with adverse occupational health and safety (OHS) outcomes across a range of studies. Temporary agency workers are particularly vulnerable, with studies showing they experience a higher incidence of workplace injury, and a greater likelihood of more severe injuries than all other employment types. Explanations for agency workers’ higher risk of injury have, to date, been impeded by data limitations associated with researching temporary employment. This article seeks to begin filling this gap through analyzing the experience of agency workers based upon two data sources. The first is a unique qualitative and quantitative data set developed from investigated temporary agency and directly hired workers’ compensation files; the second is focus groups of agency workers conducted in the State of Victoria, Australia. Quinlan and Bohle’s (2004) Pressures, Disorganization and Regulatory Failure (PDR) model, developed to explain the greater OHS vulnerability of precarious workers, provides the framework for analyzing the data.

After explaining the key concepts in the PDR Model, the article analyses the data to test for evidence of economic pressures, disorganization at the workplace, and regulatory failure impacting upon temporary agency workers’ health and safety. The analysis supports the relevance of the PDR model, and provides an understanding of additional and unique risk factors which contribute to agency workers’ higher risk of injury. Temporary agency workers experience economic pressures in common with other types of precarious workers. However, these appear more acute amongst agency workers. They also confront disorganization risks, extending to mismatched placements; lack of familiarity with host workplaces; and more complex fractured communication. These contribute to workplace risks and create barriers to improving their experience. Many of these outcomes are a result of, or contribute to regulatory failure.

The analysis finds strong support for the explanatory value of the PDR model as a tool for understanding how precariousness contributes to temporary agency workers’ adverse health and safety outcomes. It also suggests the complexities of the triangular employment relationship create additional economic insecurities and disorganization problems beyond those experienced by other types of workers, which the regulatory environment has yet to address.