Page 627 - Week 03 - Tuesday, 30 March 2021
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As such, the motion calls on the government to consult with workers’ representatives regarding the implementation of these changes. I am confident that the Minister for Industrial Relations and Workplace Safety will find an appropriate forum in which to undertake this consultation.
As part of this policy direction, the motion moved in my name includes calls for regulations, a code of practice and guidelines to be developed in order to help PCVUs to comply with any new framework. This is of benefit to both employers and employees, as workplace safety and culture affects everyone.
It is also important that the ACT begins to make changes rather than waiting for changes to the model act and regulations to be agreed. The last meeting of WHS ministers, which was organised by the federal minister, occurred two and a half years ago, and little to no progress has been made on implementing the recommendations of either the Boland review or the respect at work inquiry.
There are a number of references in this motion to the respect at work inquiry, a report which was released in 2020 by the Australian Human Rights Commission. This national inquiry into sexual harassment in Australian workplaces identified widespread sexual harassment in many industries and among different demographics. It recommends a change in the way this issue is dealt with, including a move towards prevention and hazard identification as opposed to post-incident management. The report also calls for changes to the federal Sex Discrimination Act. These policy directions are set out in the motion I have moved today. Additionally, the motion calls on the government to take into consideration the principles of recommendation 17 of the Respect@Work report when further reviewing our own Discrimination Act in future.
The Boland review is a 2019 report on a review of the model work health and safety laws. The report makes 39 recommendations in total, among which are recommendations around psychosocial health and risk identification in the regulatory framework. It has good recommendations. The federal government has made no effort to implement the recommendations from these reports. It is not interested in fixing the psychosocial work health and safety framework with regard to sexual harassment and bullying, or any other issues.
The motion appearing on the notice paper in my name also calls on the ACT government to include some statistics in the state of the service report and also to require that these statistics be provided by government partners and contractors in relation to the period in which they are contracted by the government. These statistics pertain to non-disclosure agreements entered into because of bullying and harassment, and sexual harassment, and also incidents of both bullying and harassment, and sexual harassment. In many workplaces non-disclosure agreements are used by powerful individuals to effectively silence victims of bullying and harassment, and sexual harassment, in exchange for a provision of compensation after incidents—compensation which, in reality, should come without strings attached.
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