Joe Hockey (North Sydney, Liberal Party, Minister Assisting the Prime Minister for the Public Service) Share this | Hansard source

I move:

That this bill be now read a second time.

The purpose of the APEC Public Holiday Bill 2007 is to ensure that employees in the Sydney metropolitan area receive a public holiday on Friday, 7 September 2007 if they are covered by certain pre-reform industrial instruments, including transitional awards, pre-reform AWAs, pre-reform certified agreements and preserved state agreements.

This public holiday is necessary to facilitate the holding of the Asia-Pacific Economic Cooperation meetings that will be hosted in Sydney over the week of 2 to 9 September 2007. The APEC Economic Leaders Meeting is one of the most important annual meetings of world leaders.

In order to allow for the smooth running of the event, the New South Wales government has declared a one-off APEC public holiday for the Sydney metropolitan area for Friday, 7 September 2007. Currently, while many employees covered by the federal workplace relations system in the Sydney metropolitan area will receive public holiday entitlements for the APEC public holiday, some employees covered by pre-reform industrial instruments do not have an entitlement to this special one-off holiday.

This bill proposes to ensure that all employees covered by these federal industrial instruments receive public holiday entitlements for the APEC public holiday. The public holiday will have effect in relation to workplaces within specified local government areas of metropolitan Sydney, not on the basis of a person’s place of residence within those areas.

Debate (on motion Mr Crean) adjourned.

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