Page 963 - Week 03 - Wednesday, 25 February 2009
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MR HARGREAVES (Brindabella—Minister for Disability and Housing, Minister for Ageing, Minister for Multicultural Affairs, Minister for Industrial Relations and Minister for Corrections) (12.01): I move:
In paragraph (2)(b), after “maternity leave”, add the following words: “if the final report of the Productivity Commission mirrors the interim report in this respect.”.
I advise members that on their printed sheet it has the term “paragraph (2)(b)(ii)”. That was the term on the original motion that I had when I drafted the amendment. It should just read “paragraph (2)(b)”, and members should ignore the roman numerals.
Madam Deputy Speaker, I will speak to both the amendment and to the main substantive motion. The motion is that the Assembly acknowledge the benefits of a national paid maternity leave scheme. Before I go on, I would like to indicate that the government will not be opposing the amendment circulated by Mrs Dunne. My colleague Ms Burch will speak to the promise to implement 18 weeks maternity leave for ACT government employees, and I will address the benefits of a national paid maternity leave scheme funded by the Australian government and what the Productivity Commission might recommend.
I say “recommend”, because we do not know what the final recommendations of the Productivity Commission will be until this Saturday. Maybe this motion would have been better debated in the March session where we would have been able to discuss the actual recommendations rather than to speculate today on what might be based on an interim report that may have limited relevance for final recommendations. However, we did not determine the timing of this debate.
I wish to speak to that part of the motion which concerns the ACT government’s commitments to implement 18 weeks paid maternity leave within the ACT’s public service. Paid maternity leave entitlements have been a feature of public sector employment in Australia for more than 20 years and have increasingly been introduced into the larger private sector employers. Unions and interest groups have long campaigned for both the right to unpaid maternity leave and for a paid leave entitlement. The paid maternity leave debate, as we have seen, has received renewed impetus in Australia since the federal government commissioned the Productivity Commission to conduct an inquiry into options for a national scheme in early 2008. The renewed interest in paid maternity leave reflects, in part, government and employer concerns over the national skills shortage.
Nationally, the declining fertility rate and the retirement in the workforce of large numbers of the baby boomer generation are contributing to a significant skills shortage. Equally, research into early childhood development education has identified bonding between mother and child as ever more critical for the life outcomes of the child. The ACT Labor government has responded to the skills shortage through a $50 million program announced as part of last year’s budget. This includes responding to the recommendations of the ACT Skills Commission that all new ACT government offices with 500 or more employees will include childcare facilities and lobbying for an extension of fringe benefit tax exemptions for childcare expenses.
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