Underpaid work experience: what’s the big deal?

You're approached by an ambitious student, or fresh faced graduate, bemoaning the tight labour market. It's impossible, they proclaim, to secure a role without some experience. And so they beg and plead for an unpaid internship or work experience. Initially you resist, explaining you don't have any available jobs. But they persist, you relent, and secretly you're filled with a warm glow for being so magnanimous and helping to launch this person's career.

But then enter, stage right, the Fair Work Act 2009 (Cth). The Act mandates that employers pay employees a minimum wage, with hefty penalties attaching to non-compliance.

So what, you say. An unpaid intern is a volunteer not an employee, right? Alas, it's not that simple.