Page 5669 - Week 17 - Thursday, 5 December 1991
Next page . . . . Previous page . . . . Contents . . . . Debates(HTML) . . . . PDF . . . .
maximum of eight weeks' pay after four years' service and capping it, the weekly payment for employees is still around the $20 mark. In fact, some actuarial computations put it at $19.20, I am advised.
Despite this and despite the national wage fixation principles which Mr Berry in another speech in this house has endorsed, a package was issued for the Gordon Primary School by his colleague the Minister for Urban Services, Mr Connolly, who is ministerially responsible for this, which required through the schedule of industrial requirements, which I earlier quoted into the record, an effective payment of $41.60 per week per employee from all contractors. As Mr Berry well knows, this initiative by the Government has not stopped there.
There appears to be some endorsement by the Minister for industrial relations and other concerned parties for bringing the civil engineering sector within the building and construction payment circuit for these purposes. I am advised that potential civil engineering contractors have not responded to recent tender arrangements, for that reason.
Mr Speaker, it is incumbent upon the Minister for industrial relations, Mr Berry - himself a long-time union boss - to explain in the public interest just what the background to this matter is. Why has the Government, through the schedule of industrial requirements, pressed for the redundancy payments required by the AFCC?
I stress that there may be an historic background to this. There may have been a requirement over some time. On the best advice available to me, this is a new requirement at the Gordon Primary School site since the advent of the Follett Government. Of course, we want to see whether that is the case and whether Mr Berry can make a clear response to what appears to be a new move on this issue.
In responding, the Minister also needs to advise the house what steps he proposes to take to deal with those recent revelations before the royal commission in Sydney. As Mr Roger Gyles of queen's counsel, the commissioner, said in referring to these payments from CERT to a Federal fund:
The only respectability it gets in my eyes is that some people may imagine it is going to the workers. The thought that it is going to the AFCC or the Building Trades Groups means that it is no more or no less than a tax.
Mr Speaker, surely the Government must act now to create a secure statutory fund in the Territory. The Rally commends, as it did once before in this house, the Long Service Leave Board, which of course operates effectively in this Territory. Members have had to hand recently the clear and unambiguous report by the Building and Construction Industry Long Service Leave Board chairman, Mr Bob Yeomans. I commend that report to members.
Next page . . . . Previous page . . . . Contents . . . . Debates(HTML) . . . . PDF . . . .