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Speaker 1: Genative trainee on that Gen Taylor's got a nice little

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Speaker 1: boost from that t Y announcement last week. We're going

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Speaker 1: to have a chat to Milford Asset Management and then

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Speaker 1: Precinct Properties on their new purchases, a couple of them

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Speaker 1: to talk about after half past six at seven pass

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Speaker 1: six right now now, the Coalition government is going to

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Speaker 1: shake up the Holidays Act. Two big changes are planned

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Speaker 1: pro rat a sick leave and a switch from an

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Speaker 1: entitlement system to an a cruel system. There'll be targeted

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Speaker 1: consultation on a draft of the bill in September and

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Speaker 1: the minister behind this is the Workplace Relations and Safety

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Speaker 1: Minister Brook van Valden, who's with us now, Hey, Brook, Hey, how,

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Speaker 1: I'm very well this sounds really technical? Is that what

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Speaker 1: it is? Just a technical change?

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Speaker 2: Basically, Well, the Holidays Act is really technical as a

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Speaker 2: piece of law, which is why there are so many

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Speaker 2: businesses who've got it wrong in the past. You know,

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Speaker 2: government agencies have been falling foul of the law all

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Speaker 2: the way down to small businesses. And what I'm aiming

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Speaker 2: to achieve is to simplify the law so that businesses

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Speaker 2: and workers know what their rights and obligations are, which

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Speaker 2: is in the benefit of businesses, so they're not spending

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Speaker 2: so much time on admin but actually doing work. And

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Speaker 2: it's in the benefit of workers, so they know what

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Speaker 2: their obligations are, what they are entitled to, and can

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Speaker 2: make sure that their bosses are paying them correctly.

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Speaker 1: Rook. What is complicated about it? You work for a company,

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Speaker 1: you're entitled to four weeks and you're leaving your entitled

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Speaker 1: to ten days sickly, what's complicated about that?

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Speaker 2: Well, you talk to any of the payroll providers or

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Speaker 2: any small businesses, they'll tell you that it's really complicated

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Speaker 2: and it's very hard, especially because it looks at what

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Speaker 2: was really an old school way of working five days

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Speaker 2: forty hours in a week. It hasn't really adapted to

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Speaker 2: a modern flexible work environment, which is what we're aiming

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Speaker 2: to achieve. One of the areas that I've heard a

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Speaker 2: lot of concern by is that businesses have struggled to

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Speaker 2: adapt to the last government's increase in the sickle to

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Speaker 2: ten days. And I'm trying to bring in a bit

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Speaker 2: of proportionality there. Yes, if you've got part time staff members,

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Speaker 2: is it proportional for all of those part time workers

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Speaker 2: to also have ten days. And I'll give you a

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Speaker 2: really good example of how this works. I had a

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Speaker 2: person who works in a dental practice reach out to

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Speaker 2: the office. They said, this person who's a dental hygienis

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Speaker 2: works two days a week for them, two days a

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Speaker 2: week for another company. They're entitled to twenty days sick

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Speaker 2: leave under the law. That's disproportionate to what a full

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Speaker 2: time worker would get. So we're making it easier to

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Speaker 2: understand and comply with for a whole range of different

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Speaker 2: work environments.

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Speaker 1: Does that mean brook that if you are that part

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Speaker 1: time worker at the dentists and you're only working two

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Speaker 1: days a week, you're not going to get the same

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Speaker 1: amount of sickly as I get when I work full

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Speaker 1: time and get ten days.

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Speaker 2: Well, we're bringing in that proportionality. Is it right that

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Speaker 2: a person who might work two part time jobs get

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Speaker 2: double the sickly of allocation? Those are the types of

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Speaker 2: questions that I'm hoping to ask in that consultation. So

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Speaker 2: we're asking that of businesses, workers, legal experts, as well

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Speaker 2: as payroll providers to make sure that the law is simple,

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Speaker 2: it's easy to understand, it's clear businesses know what their

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Speaker 2: obligations are, workers know what their rights are, and that

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Speaker 2: we can all get on and as part of a

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Speaker 2: thriving economy.

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Speaker 1: Okay, So if we're talking about sickly being proportioned, is

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Speaker 1: it the same for annual leave.

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Speaker 2: Well, annual leave is currently a proportionate, so you might

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Speaker 2: get four weeks annual leave at the end of twelve

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Speaker 2: months of continuous employment. We're bringing that back to a

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Speaker 2: cruing annual leave, which means that you're accrue it over time,

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Speaker 2: doesn't matter that you've been there for twelve months or not.

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Speaker 2: But one thing I'd make clear is that doesn't mean

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Speaker 2: that people would get less annual leaves than what they

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Speaker 2: currently get. That is part of one of those technical

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Speaker 2: changes that you were talking about.

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Speaker 1: Brook Listen. I was talking earlier to David Seymour about

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Speaker 1: the health and safety legislation, which is obviously a terrible

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Speaker 1: thing inflicted upon this country, and he said, you're taking

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Speaker 1: a look at it, but he didn't know where you're

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Speaker 1: at with it. Where are you at with it?

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Speaker 2: It's possibly because I can't really talk about it yet.

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Speaker 2: So we've gone through cabinet processes and I'll be making

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Speaker 2: announcements in due course on where we're landing with that.

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Speaker 2: But I want to make it very clear to anybody

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Speaker 2: who's listening that health and safety compliance is one of

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Speaker 2: my top priorities to get down and work on this term,

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Speaker 2: not just the Holidays Act, but health and safety as well.

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Speaker 1: But are you looking at a wholesale change or are

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Speaker 1: you just going to tweak.

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Speaker 2: Well, we'll be asking that question as well, so I'll

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Speaker 2: be doing an in depth consultation making sure that we're

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Speaker 2: asking all of the right questions. So I'm not making

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Speaker 2: tweaks to the overall legislation if that's not needed, but

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Speaker 2: also not just tweaking regulations if it really is the

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Speaker 2: law that needs a change. But any large, any large

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Speaker 2: scale announcements too to come on that.

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Speaker 1: You give me hope, Brook, Thank you for that. Brook

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Speaker 1: van Velden, Minister of Workplace Relations and Safety. I mean

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Speaker 1: the health and safety legislation in this country. Jeez, it's

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Speaker 1: written for idiots, right, it really is. It's written for idiotic,

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Speaker 1: like the dumbest and drunkest person. You know. It's written

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Speaker 1: to keep them safe and keep them alive. I would

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Speaker 1: argue we shouldn't. I would argue Darwinism. Just let them

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Speaker 1: go for it. The rest of us and don't need

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Speaker 1: those rules. We're keeping ourselves alive.

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