Julia Gillard (Lalor, Australian Labor Party, Deputy Leader of the Opposition) Share this | Hansard source

by leave—I move opposition amendments (6), (7) and (11) to (14) as circulated in my name:

(6)    Schedule 1, after item 8, page 33 (after line 26), insert:

8A Subsection 354(4) (after paragraph (i) of the definition of protected allowable award matters)

insert:

     (ia)   notice periods for the notification of working days or hours and variations to those days or hours;

(7)    Schedule 1, after item 8, page 33 (after line 26), insert:

8B Subsection 354(4) (after paragraph (i) of the definition of protected allowable award matters)

Insert:

       (ib)    redundancy pay;

(11)  Schedule 1, after item 39, page 40 (after line 20), insert:

39A Subclause 25A(4) of Schedule 8 (after paragraph (i) of the definition of protected allowable award matters)

insert:

       (ia)    notice periods for the notification of working days or hours and variations to those days or hours;

(12)  Schedule 1, after item 39, page 40 (after line 20), insert:

39B Subclause 25A(4) of Schedule 8 (after paragraph (i) of the definition of protected allowable award matters)

insert:

       (ib)    redundancy pay;

(13)  Schedule 1, after item 41, page 42 (after line 31), insert:

41A Subclause 52(3) of Schedule 8 (after paragraph (h) of the definition of protected allowable award matters)

insert:

      (ha)    notice periods for the notification of working days or hours and variations to those days or hours;

(14)  Schedule 1, after item 41, page 42 (after line 31), insert:

41B Subclause 52(3) of Schedule 8 (after paragraph (h) of the definition of protected allowable award matters)

insert:

             (hb)         redundancy pay;

To very briefly explain these amendments: as the Minister for Employment and Workplace Relations, who is at the table, would be aware, under the Howard government laws there are things that are called protected award conditions. These are the things supposedly protected by law which of course have been taken away from so many workers. These are the things that are supposed to be looked at for the government’s new test. They are just the award conditions that are protected award conditions. As we have made the point in question time over a number of days, there are conditions of great importance to people that are not currently so-called protected award conditions. One of those that is of great importance to working men and women who need to balance up family obligations is getting appropriate notice of a change of shift or roster and not being able to have that condition stripped away from them.

A second very important condition for working people is an entitlement to redundancy pay, which has always been in our system something that applied to bigger businesses, not small businesses. That entitlement to redundancy pay is to help people to have something to live on in the case of the loss of a job until they can get the next job.

The force of these amendments would be to make those two conditions effectively protected award conditions under the Howard government regime, which means they would need to be weighed in the balance for this so-called test that the government is introducing. I commend these amendments to the House.

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