Craig Thomson (Dobell, Australian Labor Party) Share this | Hansard source

I rise to support the Coal Mining Industry (Long Service Leave Funding) Amendment Bill 2009. The aim of the bill is to ensure that, from 1 January 2010, employers who make long service payments to employees can be reimbursed from the Coal Mining Industry Long Service Leave Fund and to define the ‘black coal mining industry’ in the funding act and related legislation to align with the modern award and ensure that the scheme applies universally in the black coal mining industry. In particular, this amendment will ensure that the reimbursements of employers from the fund for long serve leave payments to an eligible employee are matched over time by contributions into the fund in respect of that employee. It will also ensure the portability of entitlements for employees. The bill provides that the Coal Mining Industry (Production and Engineering) Consolidated Award 1997, which is the main industry award, applies to all eligible employees who do not otherwise have an award-derived long service leave entitlement. From 1 January 2010 this will become an applicable award-derived long service leave term for the purpose of section 113 of the Fair Work Act. In effect, all eligible employees who do not have an award-derived long serve leave entitlement will be deemed to have such an entitlement by reference to the main industry award. Amendments made by this bill will commence on 1 January 2010.

I will endeavour shortly to look with some detail into what exactly this bill does, but first I would like to examine the background of this bill—that is, long service leave generally. Long service leave is an almost uniquely Australian product. For a history of the scheme I looked at a research paper from the Labour Ministers Council. It said that long service leave was a period of paid leave granted to employees after a period of continuous employment with the one employer. In certain industries, such as construction, stevedoring and coalmining, policymakers in the past have allowed the entitlement to vest after a period of continuous service in that industry, regardless of the number of employers. Hence its portability between employers. The entitlement has its origins in the 19th century Victorian and South Australian civil service acts. These provided for civil service officers who had completed at least 10 years of service to be granted leave of absence with pay for periods of six to 12 months. The purpose of the leave was to reward those who had performed long and faithful service in the colonies by providing an opportunity for them to return to the United Kingdom. All state and Commonwealth public servants were subsequently granted the entitlement. It was then gradually extended to other public sector employees.

Long service leave began to be included in federal awards by consent in the late 1940s. It did not become a standard employment condition for all employees until the passage in the 1950s of long service leave legislation in all states. The purpose of such legislation, according to parliamentary debates prior to the introduction of the Long Service Leave Act 1955 in New South Wales, was to reduce labour turnover, provide a reward for long, faithful service and enable employees halfway through their working lives to recover their energies and return to work renewed, refreshed and reinvigorated.

In 1964 the Commonwealth Conciliation and Arbitration Commission arbitrated its first long service leave award to provide what has become the standard provision for non-Public Service employees—that is, 13 weeks leave after 15 years service, with a pro rata payment in lieu on termination of employment after 10 years. State legislation and existing awards were amended to provide the same entitlement. South Australia later introduced a 10-year qualifying period for the full 13-week entitlement, but this has not been followed by other states. Public sector employees generally have more long service leave entitlements. Whilst long service leave entitlements are currently predominantly provided for under state laws, the Commonwealth makes legislative provision for long service leave entitlements for those employed in the Commonwealth Public Service.

You can see that there is quite a long history of this particular provision in Australia, and the next stage in the evolution of this almost uniquely Australian entitlement of long service leave is being developed now. We are developing a national employment standard in long service leave. This next step will apply to all employers covered by the Fair Work Act. Long service leave is one of the 10 national standards to be introduced by this government. The others will be a standard 38-hour week, annual leave, parental leave, flexible work for parents, sick leave, community service leave, public holidays, information in the workplace, notice of termination and redundancy pay.

Of course, talking about coalmining and long service leave in one breath was unheard of back in the days of early coalmining. As a reflection, a recent report published by the University of Queensland on the Australian coal industry said:

Work in early Australian coal mines was hard. In convict times, being sent to Newcastle was a punishment, above and beyond ordinary transportation, and the early Newcastle mines were dangerous places, with poor ventilation and inadequate drainage.

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