{"id":711200,"date":"2026-06-02T21:48:12","date_gmt":"2026-06-02T21:48:12","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/711200\/"},"modified":"2026-06-02T21:48:12","modified_gmt":"2026-06-02T21:48:12","slug":"australia-news-live-senior-ministers-back-aukus-amid-renewed-scrutiny-unions-welcome-minimum-wage-increase-as-business-groups-warn-of-high-costs","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/711200\/","title":{"rendered":"Australia news LIVE: Senior ministers back AUKUS amid renewed scrutiny; Unions welcome minimum wage increase as business groups warn of high costs"},"content":{"rendered":"<p>Secretary of the Australian Council of Trade Unions (ACTU) Sally McManus says the 4.75 per cent increase to award and minimum wages will not negatively impact businesses.<\/p>\n<p>\u201cI again say, every year we hear people say this is going to be terrible, and everyone\u2019s going to shut their doors, and they don\u2019t,\u201d she told the Today show this morning.<\/p>\n<p>\u201cWhen you give people at the bottom pay rises, it does circulate back in the economy \u2026 Their wages overall aren\u2019t very large, so when they get an increase, it doesn\u2019t have any knock-on effect to anyone else.\u201d<\/p>\n<p><img decoding=\"async\" alt=\"ACTU secretary Sally McManus. \" loading=\"lazy\" src=\"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-content\/uploads\/2026\/06\/1719869076cf90f1f8c7405d1af2430dc0f6fed4.jpeg\"  class=\"sc-d34e428-1 ldCIuB\"\/>ACTU secretary Sally McManus. Alex Ellinghausen<\/p>\n<p>The Fair Work Commission\u2019s latest increase will see Australia\u2019s minimum wage lift to $26.44 per hour from July 1.<\/p>\n<p>McManus also said unions welcomed the outcome which would ease pressure on the nation\u2019s lowest-paid workers, who were already struggling with the cost of living.<\/p>\n<p>\u201cWe are happy, 4.75 is more than inflation, and that\u2019s what you\u2019re always going for, because you want people to get ahead, not get behind \u2026 We still don\u2019t know what\u2019s going to happen with inflation, and the war, and everything,\u201d she said this morning.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"Secretary of the Australian Council of Trade Unions (ACTU) Sally McManus says the 4.75 per cent increase to&hellip;\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":711201,"comment_status":"","ping_status":"","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[4],"tags":[64,63,44],"class_list":["post-711200","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","category-australia","tag-au","tag-australia","tag-news"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/711200","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=711200"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/711200\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/711201"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=711200"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=711200"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=711200"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}