Page 624 - Week 03 - Tuesday, 30 March 2021
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(g) reporting in the State of the Service report, as three separate reporting categories, the number of non-disclosure agreements entered into which pertain to incidences of bullying and harassment, sexual harassment and gender-based violence in the ACT Public Service;
(h) requiring all government partners and contractors to publicly report, as three separate reporting categories, the number of harassment, sexual harassment and gender-based violence incidents that occur within the organisation while contracted by the ACT Government;
(i) requiring all government partners and contractors to publicly report, as three separate reporting categories, the number of non-disclosure agreements entered into which pertain to incidences of bullying and harassment, sexual harassment and gender-based violence within the organisation while contracted by the ACT Government;
(j) developing guidelines to put clarity and rigour around how this information is to be reported;
(k) writing to the Federal Government calling on them to ratify the ILO C190—Violence and Harassment Convention and adopt in full the recommendations of the Respect@Work report;
(l) taking specific consideration of the principles of Recommendation 17 of the Respect@Work report when conducting future reviews of the Discrimination ACT 1991; and
(m) provide an update to the Assembly every six months on the implementation of this motion for a period of 12 months.
The revelations of the past several weeks in both the federal parliament and the wider community bring to the fore yet again the plight of many women in society and the unsafe spaces which workplaces can and do create. While by no means isolated to Canberra and federal politics, it is particularly galling that the most recently spotlighted instances of sexual assault, rape and other awful behaviour have occurred in Parliament House.
It should be uncontroversial to say that this is foul behaviour. But can any of us here even claim that we are especially surprised! I think what we are seeing here is an intersection. What we are observing is the natural consequence of institutionally entrenched misogyny and classism. I worked in several industries before I was elected to this place, and federal parliament certainly is not the only place where problems exist. This is a social problem. What we have right now is eye-watering inequity and it is incumbent on us to do what we can to combat this disparity.
Work health and safety is one of the most important elements of our working lives. We have come a long way over the centuries in developing this code of laws, regulations and legal precedents that keep us safe at work.
There would not be one member of this Assembly who does not understand the importance and history of work health and safety regulation. We are a long way from the bygone days of systemic lost fingers and systemic industrial deafness and conditions that caused the deaths of 16 people while building the Sydney Harbour
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