Wednesday, 15 November 2023

Statements on tabled papers and petitions

Portable Long Service Benefits Authority

Report 2022–23

Ryan BATCHELOR (Southern Metropolitan) (17:16): I rise to speak on the Portable Long Service Benefits Authority report, which was tabled yesterday, 14 November 2023, and details the operations of the Portable Long Service Benefits Authority for 2022–23.

A member interjected.

Ryan BATCHELOR: I don’t know; I’m excited by it. Victoria is home to one of the largest portable long service leave schemes in Australia. The Portable Long Service Benefits Authority in the annual report reported that there are now over 3000 registered employers covering over 290,000 ‍registered workers. Nearly 200,000 of these workers are employed across the community services sector, with the remainder in contract cleaning and security services. The Victorian government introduced portable long service leave for those industries through legislation several years ago – the authority came into effect in 2019 – and since that time it is very clear that employers in these industries, in community services, in contract cleaning and in security, have embraced portable long service leave and the scheme as a way of both attracting and retaining staff in obviously an increasingly competitive labour market.

Portable long service leave schemes like the one in Victoria operate particularly in those industries where, through the nature and structure of the market force services, so to speak, contracts pass between agencies often on a three-, four- or five-year cycle. As members are no doubt aware, the qualification period for long service leave requires, under the Long Service Leave Act 2018, for individual workers to spend longer than those contracts normally run for with a single employer, which means that prior to the introduction of portable long service leave, every time a contract changed and a worker moved between employers – often doing the same job but for a new employer, whether that is in the community services area, whether as a cleaner or whether as a security guard – they would lose their accrued entitlements.

The introduction of portable long service leave covers the workers in those industries, who are often some of the lowest paid in our community doing some of the hardest jobs in our community, either in the caring sector – the disability sector or aged care, for example – or as security guards and contract cleaners. We could not operate in our lives without the work that they do on a day-to-day basis. It is often little remarked upon but incredibly important, and sadly it is often very low paid. Workers who spent long times in these industries were being denied access to long service leave because of the structure of those industries and the nature of contract lengths and contract terms, which was largely driven as a result of government decision-making about contracting out of government services.

The introduction of portable long service leave was designed to ensure that the benefits of long service leave are not denied to these workers. It was an incredibly important commitment of this Labor government to set up this scheme following significant advocacy from the trade union movement and particularly from the Australian Services Union and the United Workers Union, who represent these exceptionally hardworking and, disappointingly, lower paid workers in our community.

What the report tabled yesterday demonstrates is that the scheme is working. In reading the report, there are incredibly moving case studies of people who are feeling a greater sense of security in their work because of the benefits the scheme will bring them when their qualification period rolls around. They will be able to access long service leave like so many others in the community who work in different professions and in different employment arrangements and are not subject to the same sort of insecurity that people in community services, contract cleaning and security face. Workers in these industries, thanks to the Portable Long Service Benefits Authority, thanks to the Labor government, are getting access to long service leave for the first time, and it is a great benefit to them.