TENS of thousands of NSW workers face pay cuts of up to $370 a week under sweeping Rudd Government workplace reforms.

In a major election-year challenge to Labor, truck drivers, funeral workers, bar staff, aged care nurses and clerks are furious at award changes.

Union leaders claimed the Government had breached its promise that no worker would be worse off.

And the ACTU has warned "unscrupulous" bosses would exploit the new industrial framework to rip off workers and cut pay and conditions. Nearly 50,000 NSW truck drivers stand to lose up to $200 weekly because they will come under a new national award scheme from July 1.

They now plan to take their protest direct to Canberra with a 1000-strong convoy organised for June.

While the Prime Minister and Workplace Relations Minister Julia Gillard promised no worker would be worse off under their industrial reforms, a Daily Telegraph investigation reveals this declaration to be another Rudd Government broken promise.

As the ACTU yesterday launched a new assault against Opposition Leader Tony Abbott warning he would bring back WorkChoices and individual contracts Labor's reforms also carry serious consequences.

The loss of pay and conditions is a result of the Government's plan to condense the numbers of national and state awards - from more than 2000 to 130.

As secretary of the Funeral and Allied Industries Union of NSW, Aiden Nye went to the barricades to oust John Howard and his dreaded WorkChoices. Now the 35-year industry veteran is fighting to ensure his members are not short-changed.

"Mate, it's terrible. And we can only see it getting worse," Mr Nye says. "At least a couple of thousand" of funeral sector workers will be hit by award changes from July 1, including embalmers, who the union boss said would be stripped of up $370 a week.

Ms Gillard defended the Award Modernisation and said workers could apply to Fair Work Australia to ensure their pay was not cut.

Vanessa McGrath has worked for the past eight years at Campbelltown RSL and will see her hourly rate of pay fall from $20 an hour to $17 an hour from July. "It makes me very angry," Ms McGrath said yesterday.

Originally published as Rudd slashes your pay