The existing employees will have their base rates preserved as part of a temporary transition arrangement that is designed to eventually bring their wages in line with new employees. A Woolworths spokesman said it was critical that it preserved higher base rates for existing team members. "Our aim with the new [enterprise agreement] EA was also to achieve a national and consistent wage rate and by the end of this agreement all preserved rates and base rates will align for all employees," the spokesman said. The Shop, Distributive and Allied Employees' Association (SDA) said 93 per cent of the 67,774 Woolworths supermarket workers who took part in the ballot voted in favour of the new wages deal, which creates a two-tiered system for new and existing employees. SDA national secretary Gerard Dwyer. Credit:Tamara Dean SDA national secretary Gerard Dwyer said the 67,774 workers represented 62 per cent of the Woolworths workforce of 110,000 employees.

Mr Dwyer said existing employees could expect to be paid the same as new staff by the end of the four-year term of the enterprise agreement. Loading He said the union could not accept an arrangement that would have seen existing employees who worked standard weekday hours going backwards under a lower base rate of pay. "We didn't accept the maths that they should go back to the new base rate," Mr Dwyer said. "It's not about new people losing out coming onto a lower rate. They will be new employees coming into a union agreement that has a base rate that is 1.25 per cent above the award with a full suite of penalty rates.

"They have never been in a position where they received a rate that was in part compensating for changes to penalty rates. They come in on a penalty rate scheme which is exactly like the award." Mr Dwyer said that while newer employees would receive less than existing staff in the short term, all staff would eventually be on the same base rate. "What will happen over the next few years is that will wash through and everyone will be on the same base," he said. "My expectation would be at the end of this agreement, is that [old and new employees] would be largely in line. "None of us can predict that with certainty."

When parity is reached, the SDA will push to get an increase that is higher than 1.25 per cent above the minimum rate under the retail award. "This union will be working hard then to lift that 1.25 per cent premium even higher because we will be back in clear uncomplicated bargaining space," Mr Dwyer said. "In four years time it should be a whole lot simpler." "The company should be in a position to be able to negotiate around that because they won't be paying on both fronts for the previous employees. It will all have evened out." ARA executive director Russell Zimmerman. Russell Zimmerman, executive director of the Australian Retailers Association, said it was not unusual to have new employees on a different wage rate to old employees.