The Federal Government has announced ten new National Employment Standards (NES) as part of its commitment to restoring workers rights taken away by WorkChoices.
The new standards, which were announced this week, will ensure that all Australian workers have a guaranteed set of minimum employment conditions that cannot be negotiated away.
These standards will help prevent workers suffering the widespread loss of entitlements to public holidays, overtime pay, penalty rates, leave loading and other conditions that occurred under the former Liberal Government's WorkChoices IR laws.
AMWU National Secretary, Dave Oliver, said that the standards were important in providing the bare minimum that every Australian worker should expect.
"WorkChoices laws were riddled with inconsistencies and gaps which made many workers, particularly young, vulnerable workers, worse off.
"It is good to see that the Rudd Government has moved to fill these gaps and provide an absolute safety net that no one can fall through.
"The standards will also put into place an important right for working parents to request flexible and part-time work from their employer – a right which WorkChoices took away.”
Mr Oliver said that the Government could still do more, including giving workers the right to appeal unreasonable refusals of requests for flexible arrangements.
"We will be looking for improvements to these minimum standards. We will particularly be looking to campaign for a basic maternity leave entitlement for women workers.
"While we welcome the National Employment Standards, it’s important to remember that much of WorkChoices is still in operation while the Rudd Government's main set of new IR laws has yet to be introduced into Parliament,” said Mr Oliver.
“AMWU members are still subject to Work Choices and they, like all workers around Australia are impatient for new fairer laws to be brought in.”
The New Employment Standards are:
1. Maximum weekly hours of work;
2. Request for flexible working arrangements;
3. Parental leave and related entitlements;
4 .Annual leave;
5. Personal/Carer's leave and compassionate leave;
6. Community service leave;
7. Long service leave;
8. Public holidays;
9. Notice of termination and redundancy pay;
10. Fair Work Information Statement.