Workplace agreements and Indigenous-friendly workplaces

The rate of employment of Indigenous Australians is much lower than that for other Australians. One of the reasons for this is that Indigenous employees have a higher rate of job turnover than other employees. Flexible work arrangements such as cultural or ceremonial leave and Indigenous-specific provisions can assist Indigenous employees remain employed when they face competing demands from the workplace as well as their family, community and cultural obligations. The availability of such work arrangements may also make it more attractive for some groups of Indigenous people to take up paid employment. This paper uses data on federal workplace agreements to analyse the extent to which agreements contain provisions that are likely to create more Indigenous-friendly workplaces and how this has changed since the mid-1990s. There has been a marked increase since 1997 in provisions in agreements for the recruitment, promotion and other conditions of employment for Indigenous Australians (including cultural or ceremonial leave). This in itself is a positive development, but these Indigenous-friendly provisions are still concentrated in particular workplaces, presumably where there is a sound business case for the organisation introducing these provisions. If the gap in employment outcomes between Indigenous and other Australians is to be further closed, Indigenous-friendly workplaces will need to become commonplace. The policy challenge is to encourage all businesses, especially small-to-medium size businesses, to embrace more inclusive workplace conditions.