Rachel Siewert (WA, Australian Greens) Share this | Hansard source

The Greens will be supporting this amendment. As I articulated in my second reading contribution yesterday, older workers are being very significantly hit by the pandemic. In fact, new research out this morning shows how heavily older workers have been hit by the pandemic and the recession. I also articulated that age discrimination and ageism are significantly affecting older workers trying to find work and that older workers are the fastest-growing cohort of long-term unemployed. It is essential that action be taken to help older workers. While this mechanism will help older workers, they will need additional support on top of it. But this will go some way to helping. With the amendments that the Greens will move in seeking to improve this legislation, this would take away the discrimination that's built into this legislation and assist older workers. More needs to be done about age discrimination, but we will be supporting this amendment.