Brian Mitchell (Lyons, Australian Labor Party) Share this | Hansard source

Richmond Fellowship Tasmania has been operating for 30 years offering mental health service provision in Tasmania. Just this year it created a shell company, Richmond Futures, and through that shell company it is offering staff their jobs back on fixed term contracts and lower pay. It has done this with no consultation, which is a breach of the law under the EBA. It took a union, the Health and Community Services Union, to step in and sort this out.

What are we talking about here? What we're talking about is a pay cut of $150 a week for workers who provide mental health services. They are already low paid. These are already low-paid workers, and Richmond Fellowship Tasmania is expecting them to cop a $150-a-week pay cut. One of the workers said they feel like they have been lied to and that the organisation has a 'caring facade'. How are they going to cope on less money? They say having a fixed term contract seems like a bad joke when they are told that the company will just re-sign the fixed term contract when it expires. This is Work Choices by another name—have a fixed term contract on low pay and then redo it again in a few years time. It is an absolute disgrace, and Richmond Fellowship should be condemned for it.

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