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Legislative Assembly for the ACT: 1999 Week 11 Hansard (20 October) . . Page.. 3349 ..

MR STEFANIAK (continuing):

An employee must not accept a payment from an employer if the employer would contravene subsection (1) by making the payment.

And, yes, Mr Berry, it is true in (3) that it is not an offence and it is not a criminal offence. What it is, Mr Speaker, when one goes to section 187AD of the Act, is that it is a civil matter. There are other ancillary matters in section 187AA, or in section 187AB which deal with organisations, but section 187AD, which relates back to 187AA, states that a court can make certain orders. And the crucial point here is 187AD(1) says:

In respect of contraventions of sections 187AA or 187AB, the Court may, if the Court considers it appropriate in all the circumstances of the case, make one or more of the following orders:

(a) an order imposing on a person who contravened or is contravening that section a penalty of not more than $10,000;

I will read that again:

... an order imposing on a person who contravened or is contravening that section a penalty of not more than $10,000;

And it makes certain other orders including injunctions and interim orders to stop the contravention of that, or indeed to remedy the effects. That is 187AD, subsection (c). Mr Speaker, quite clearly that could be taken against the department.

Now, who can make an application? As Mr Berry said, it can be made by the Minister. Yes, it is the Federal Minister. But it can also be made by any person who has an interest in the matter, or any other person prescribed by the regulations. It is quite broad. Mr Speaker, I am happy to table those documents in the Assembly, as I think that is important for this debate.

Now, clearly, the department did not have any real options in this. It was not a situation where it could continue paying, and the department took the action that it did. Mr Speaker, in fairness to the bursars, no-one disputes that our bursars do a good job. I will come to a couple of points Mr Berry raised shortly.

But the department made sure that the bursars were well aware of what the department had to do and what their rights were. On 20 July, Anne Thomas, who is the Director of Human Resources, sent a letter to the bursars in relation to industrial action taken, quoting what the department had to do, and emphasising the Act stipulates that payments must not be made by an employer during a period of industrial action and informing bursars that the principal of the school would inform the school's pay centre, if they failed to undertake the full duties, what the ramifications would be. The letter concluded that not every bursar may do it, but was merely pointing out to them what would occur if they decided to take action.

Mr Speaker, I will table that letter too. Twenty-nine bursars subsequently did take action. It was quite clear that they were well aware of their rights and what would occur if they took action. There is nothing wrong, Mr Speaker, under this Act with people

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