Page 1753 - Week 06 - Thursday, 30 July 2020
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The structural trend away from long-term employment is limiting access to long service leave for a large portion of the workforce. This is a limitation that is particularly pronounced for women, who are much more likely to take a break from the workforce, and therefore lose the right to long service leave.
Portable long service leave was introduced to mitigate these inequalities by allowing workers to move between employers in a specific industry without losing credit for the time worked in that industry. The industries selected for portable schemes are characterised by short-term employment, contract work, high mobility, and part-time and casual employment. Several of the industries covered by portable long service leave in the ACT also have a relatively low average salary.
By recognising and encouraging loyalty within these industries, portable long service leave schemes benefit workers by facilitating sustainable career paths while providing a variety of work opportunities. The schemes benefit the consumers of industry services by encouraging the attraction and retention of skilled workers within the industry.
To achieve these benefits, the schemes may disadvantage employers by reducing worker loyalty to individual employers. They also require employers to pay projected entitlements up front into a public fund. However, one of the benefits of this is that it allows employees to leave situations where they are mistreated or treated unfairly at work without the fear of losing their long service leave entitlements.
Portable long service leave in the territory is governed by the Long Service Leave (Portable Schemes) Act 2009. The act established portable long service leave schemes for the building and construction industries, contract cleaning, community sector and security industries.
The building and construction industry scheme came into effect in 1981, and an equivalent scheme exists in most states and territories. The contract cleaning scheme came into effect in 2000, the community sector scheme in 2010 and the security scheme in 2013. In 2016 access to portable long service leave was extended to additional classes of workers. The coverage of the cleaning and the community sector schemes was expanded to include waste disposal and aged-care workers, respectively.
The portable long service leave schemes are administered by the Long Service Leave Authority. Employers for each covered industry must pay a quarterly levy into a fund managed by the authority, from which workers are paid when they access long service leave. Currently, levies are 1.0 per cent of wages for the security industry, 1.2 per cent for the contract cleaning and the community sector industries, and 2.1 per cent for the building and construction industry.
The authority maintains separate funds for each scheme, and separate registers for employers and workers. These costs are partially offset because employers are not required to make a provision for long service leave under the Long Service Leave Act 1976 for workers that are covered by a portable long service leave scheme.
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