Moves are being made on the federal government’s industrial reform agenda, with very little media or public reaction.

Votes will soon be cast on the Fair Work Amendment Bill 2014 and changes to the Building and Construction Industry Bill 2013, which some say will restore arrangements widely condemned by workers under the Howard government.

But there is a change in the Fair Work Act that probably warrants some attention.

The FWA Bill seeks to modify individual flexibility arrangements (or IFAs), to allow employers and individual employees to depart from the terms of an award or enterprise agreement.

The proposed change would allow a current requirement that an IFA must leave an employee better off overall to be satisfied by non-monetary benefits.

Essentially, it means workers can have perks such as pizza at an office party used as part of the calculation that they are ‘better off’.

Another amendment will make it easier for employers to avoid prosecution when their IFAs are sub-standard.

The bill includes a new provision requiring both employer and employee to sign a “genuine needs” statement, in which both parties agree the employee will be better off.

So if there is a new employee who does not want to argue with their employer before they officially get the job, they sign their benefits and concessions away and agree they are “better off overall”.

The Fair Work Review that outlined the changes did recommend that employers have some improved defences, but specifically stated that employers should have to notify Fair Work Ombudsmen (FWO) about the IFAs with employees, how many have been signed and with whom.

There is no hint of this protection in the Bill, despite a Coalition promise to fulfil the review’s recommendations.

The Fair Work Review also dealt with the issue of employees being paid in pizza.

It recommended that including non-monetary benefits in the ‘better off’ test should only happen when “the value of the monetary benefit foregone is specified in writing and is relatively insignificant”.

This limitation does not appear in the legislative note either.

In an extended missive explaining the changes and their risks, Professor of Employment Relations at Griffith University David Peetz said they “will make exploitation of vulnerable workers through underpayment easier to undertake than at present, while being much harder to research and detect”.

“If you hear someone saying that the government is reintroducing the WorkChoices [Australian Workplace Agreements], it’s not really.

“Instead it is are doing something quite different, something that focuses much more on vulnerable workers’ lack of knowledge of their rights and entitlements under industrial law, and the difficulty that enforcement agencies, unions and others have in reaching, advising or protecting them,” Dr Peetz said.