Susan Lamb (Longman, Australian Labor Party) Share this | Hansard source

Thank you to the member for Bruce for that interjection. He's absolutely correct.

I remember once in bargaining with a particular employer, sitting down, the delegates were calling upon the employer to move on a log of claims, and one of those claims was for paid DV and family leave. I will tell you, Deputy Speaker Claydon, it was frustrating being knocked back constantly, hearing the predominantly female workers being knocked back on their log for DV leave. I remember at that time that the employer wouldn't budge until there was this one day. I remember really clearly how quickly the employer's stance changed and it seemed to be overnight. What had happened was one of the union delegates at the bargaining table shared her personal story. It was very brave. I know it was incredibly hard for her to retell her experience of domestic abuse. She directly made a huge impact on the lives of her colleagues that day, many of whom may not even have known she had been suffering at the hands of an abuser. It had a huge impact because the employer abruptly changed their stance and added 10 days paid DV and family violence leave to their agreement immediately after hearing that story. With this move, they joined countless businesses who have shown support for their workers. Businesses like Telstra, Virgin Australia and IKEA were among more than 1,000 businesses that had enterprise agreements approved under the Fair Work Act between January 2016 and June 2017 providing 10 or more days of paid domestic and family violence leave. I was speaking with the regional general manager from Westpac bank just yesterday, and he advised me that Westpac provides for 20 days of domestic violence and family violence leave for their employees.

Let me be clear: this isn't a paid holiday for any of these men and women who may need to access this leave. It's an opportunity to get your affairs in order, an opportunity to escape abuse. Escaping isn't just as easy as walking out of the door. For some, it can be as significant as restarting your life, starting your life over again. It can mean having lots of meetings with doctors, lawyers, financial advisers and support groups. It can mean making arrangements for your children. It can mean finding new accommodation, getting electricity connected and meeting the real estate agent at the new home. If the children have to go to a new school, you have got to get them enrolled and purchase new uniforms. All of those things happen during business hours, Monday to Friday. As we all know, some abusers like to use financial control as a means of power, so it could also mean opening a new bank account and securing funds just to put food on the table. Getting through all of this can be extremely difficult at the best of times; there's no doubt about that. But, for a victim who is already in a vulnerable state, struggling just to keep things together, it can be next to impossible. So imagine trying to do that without an income.

In its submission to the Senate Education and Employment Legislation Committee inquiry into this bill, the Law Council of Australia, in speaking to the employment related impact of domestic violence and family violence, at point 8, said:

The implications of this are serious for victims, who may be suffering financial abuse, and may feel that they are unable to take time-off work in order to leave an abusive relationship out of fear of losing their job. Financial hardship can bind victims, often women, to abusive relationships.

That was part of the Law Council's submission to this Senate inquiry. Legislating for paid domestic violence leave isn't just about the money. Obviously that's a huge part of it, but it can also be about time. I was speaking to a young lawyer recently in Brisbane who was telling me about a case she had worked on. It was a DV case where a woman was looking to escape the abuse she suffered from her partner. Every day, she would go to work. Every day, she would come home to an incredibly toxic environment. This agonising cycle continued for some time until the victim decided that she had enough. So, one day, when she clocked off from work, she went to a friend's home to start the process of getting her affairs in order. She didn't go home to her family home; she went to a friend's home. That she didn't come directly home sent her abuser into a frenzy. The next day he showed up at her workplace and caused a huge scene which ultimately saw her position terminated. If this woman had had access to paid domestic violence leave she could have covertly got her affairs in order during work hours. She could have organised accommodation and sought police support so that her abuser could not follow her to her place of employment. And she could have retained her position.

I'm not sure that we need any better example than what I've just given to get this amendment about 10 days paid family and domestic violence leave up. I don't think there could be clearer example than the one I've just given. It's our job to make sure this doesn't happen again. It's our job to support vulnerable Australians when they need it the most. Last year, Labor sought to do exactly that, announcing that a Shorten Labor government would introduce 10 days paid domestic violence leave into the NES, the National Employment Standards. We've been advocating strongly for it ever since.

In March this year the Fair Work Commission inserted into modern awards a clause providing for five days of unpaid domestic violence leave. This decision came into effect on 1 August this year, meaning that two million award-reliant employees are now entitled to five days of unpaid DV leave. This amendment bill amends the National Employment Standards to provide all employees with an entitlement of five days of unpaid domestic and family violence leave if they are experiencing family and domestic violence, need to do something to deal with family and domestic violence, and it's impractical to do that thing outside their ordinary hours of work. The story I've just shared with you shows that even the simplest of duties can be impractical to achieve outside work hours when you are a victim of abuse constantly being controlled by your abusive partner. I would argue that we need to be careful with the interpretation of what is practical or impractical when quite literally we're talking about someone's life being at stake here. We know the most dangerous time for a woman is when she's leaving a violent relationship, so we need to do what we can to ensure that women can do that safely.

While this bill is, of course, a step in the right direction, it simply does not go far enough. It still leaves the federal government standards out of step with thousands of businesses and falls short of what is offered by the state governments all across Australia. It's very disappointing that it has taken the government so long to move from their absolute opposition to family and domestic violence leave to this belated and, seemingly, begrudging support for unpaid leave. The minister first committed to unpaid leave in March but, as I said, we're at the end of November and we're only now debating it. It's frustrating that they have waited so long to even bring it up for debate.

We don't expect there will be a huge uptake of domestic violence leave when this bill passes. We don't expect every victim to access it in its entirety. For many, particularly in small businesses where employers and employees have a really close working relationship, the workplace acts as a support mechanism for victims. It's where you spend a lot of your time. You are able to discuss with friends and colleagues what you're experiencing. Work offers the semblance of normalcy and routine that can be so important when you're trying to get your life back together. Because we don't expect there to be a huge uptake of this leave when the bill passes, we don't expect there to be too much cost to business. In fact, it's likely to have a positive effect. In May 2016, KPMG estimated that the cost of violence against women and their children on production and the business sector was sitting at $1.9 billion for 2015-16. This, of course, doesn't include the terrible personal and social cost of domestic violence.

In closing, I'd like to share with the chamber part of the QNMU submission to the Senate inquiry. It said:

As the bill provides five days unpaid domestic violence and family violence leave to be included in the National Employment Standards (NES), it will likely affect nurses who are remain award reliant or who have no such provisions in their enterprise agreement. AINs—

assistants in nursing—

who are employed in aged care comprise a significant proportion of these workers. They are amongst the lowest paid and therefore most in need of a secure, continuous income during periods of domestic violence.

I call on the government members to take a greater interest in this. Like I said, disappointingly, we've got one government member speaking on this bill. I say to government members: if you genuinely care about the Australian people, your constituents, and if you care about Australian small business, stand up and speak on this bill. There is still time. Or, better yet, stand up and throw your support behind Labor's call for a legislated 10 days of paid domestic violence leave. Our country is in crisis. We are in crisis. We must lead the way for this change.

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