Page 1749 - Week 06 - Thursday, 30 July 2020
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It is our vision that ultimately everybody who is not employed in the public sector will be able to have their long service leave transferred from one industry to another. The challenge for us into the future is going to be having a scheme where a person can be, for example, a shop assistant during the day and a cleaner at night. If that particular individual works for 10 years or so continuously, they are entitled to long service leave from both sectors. At the moment, we do not have one single mechanism to allow them to achieve that. That is our aim and that is where we are headed.
That former member for Brindabella, Mr Hargreaves, was very passionate about seeing the beginnings of a scheme which would cover many industries.
Whilst the particular industry today I am pushing for is hairdressing, I believe that everyone should get long service leave, because the people of the Australian Capital Territory should be the best paid and have the best entitlements and the most workplace rights of anyone in the world.
I was lucky enough in the lunch break to spend some time with a couple of hairdressers, and they were so excited to have the opportunity to speak to me and to Minister Orr about how hard it has been for them to not have these entitlements, to not be able to access something that a lot of public sector workers take for granted. We have it in the construction industry, we have it in the security industry, we have it in the contract cleaning industry. We should be looking at other industries that also deserve these entitlements.
MR WALL (Brindabella) (2.46): I rise to speak to Ms Cody’s motion, which she has brought here today. My thoughts on the long service leave scheme and how it has operated are well known, and my view on Ms Cody’s pitch today will not surprise anyone in this place. When it was first brought to the ACT Assembly, the idea of the portable long service leave scheme was fundamentally flawed. As the security industry, the cleaning industry and the community sector joined the construction industry in the scheme, we have not seen any real consideration of the effects on the industries or their employees and employers.
As usual, ideas such as these are not put before industry first, because, in all probability, those opposite have an idea of what the response will be. Little consultation occurs unless, of course, it is with the union movement. Like many decisions made by the Labor-Greens government, these have been made without any consideration of the impacts they will have on employers, with no measure of the cost implications and with no idea of the impact they could have on the ability of a business to employ a person.
Even before the pandemic hit and began impacting our economic stability, the Labor government took a sledgehammer to vocational education, training and apprenticeships at the beginning of this year. Courses and course funding were slashed in January to the point of triggering what many described as a pending skills shortage in some industries. I find it extremely disappointing but not surprising that this government would choose to pursue or even suggest placing further imposts and barriers in the way of creating and retaining jobs in our community, particularly at this time.
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