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Legislative Assembly for the ACT: 1999 Week 9 Hansard (1 September) . . Page.. 2689 ..

MS CARNELL (continuing):

Mr Speaker, under what circumstances would this Assembly go ahead with legislation - I think Ms Tucker needs to think about this - where significant stakeholders have not been consulted adequately on the legislation? You would only do it, I think, in a situation where there was a very pressing problem in the area, where people were likely to be disadvantaged this week, next week and the week after. For example, unless we passed this Bill, people would be disadvantaged before the next sitting period; otherwise you would consult, would you not, Ms Tucker?

I would be interested to know how many members of the Assembly have had letters and deputations from people who have been disadvantaged by the absence of this legislation. I understand from the area of government that deals with this matter that there are a few every year, but not many, and they are predominantly solved by mediation. Mr Kaine may like to indicate to the Assembly how many representations he has had from people who have been disadvantaged.

That does not mean that it does not happen, but what we are saying is that there have not been any examples of why this legislation needs to be passed prior to the stakeholders being consulted; there has been no indication at all. I have to say that I get an enormous number of letters and representations on all sorts of things. On this one I have had none - zero. Mr Smyth, how many have you had?

Mr Smyth: I have had none.

MS CARNELL: Not a one. That tends to indicate the urgency of the problem. Shall we go then to jobs. Jobs have to be the most important issue that this Assembly deals with. We know from an enormous amount of work done by all sorts of people in the social welfare area, such as the councils of social service Australia-wide and the Institute of Health and Welfare, that the thing that makes the most difference to people in terms of their quality of life, even their general health status, is having a job. Having a job is by far more important than any other factor in anybody's life.

Mr Speaker, if we passed this legislation and it did cost jobs, which the industry tell us it would - I will explain why in a minute - what would we have done as an Assembly? What we would have done as an Assembly is made life worse, not better, for a group of people. Why would jobs be lost?

Mr Corbell made the comment that, under current legislation, employers must meet their obligations, and they must. Under current legislation there is an obligation to pay long service leave to people who have worked in the industry for 10 years. But the thing that Mr Corbell does not understand, maybe purposely, is that an employer does not have an obligation - he actually said that they did have an obligation, but they do not - to put the money aside in a separate fund or anywhere else on a fortnightly basis. They do have an obligation to meet the long service leave payment when it falls due. As we know from the data for this industry, very few people stay in the industry for the full 10 years; so all employers would have a contingency fund for all sorts of things - not just for long service leave - in their business, but not everybody gets to serve for 10 years.

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