Brooke van Velden: Workplace Relations Minister on the Government's changes to the Holidays Act

There's hopes new changes around leave entitlements will mean employers can focus on their core business.

The Government has announced a new hours-based annual and sick leave accrual system as well as the right to take bereavement leave from day one.

The changes also mean part-time workers will no longer have a minimum sick leave entitlement - it'll instead be calculated by hours worked.

Workplace Relations Minister Brooke van Velden says businesses have been struggling under Labour's changes to leave entitlements - and changes need to be made.

"What I've been hearing, loudly, from the business community is that they want it to be proportionate to the number of hours that people actually work."

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Episode Transcript

Speaker 1 (00:00):
Major shake up coming to how your leave is calculated.
The workplace Relations Minister Brook van Velden says the Broken
Holidays actor is going being scrapped replaced with a more
streamlined system. One of the big changes part time staff
will no longer get a flat minimum sick leave entitlement.
Entitlement's moving to a pro rata basis. Brook van Velden

(00:20):
with me now, Minister, good.

Speaker 2 (00:21):
Evening, Good evening, Ryan.

Speaker 1 (00:23):
Why a pro rata system? Why that rather than everyone
just getting the same.

Speaker 2 (00:29):
Well, because this is about fairness across the system. You know,
there are a lot of businesses that have seriously struggled
with the labour's changes to sickly when everyone went to
ten days no matter how many hours they worked. And
what I've been hearing loudly from the business community is
they want it to be proportionate to the number of
hours that people actually work. And I'll just give you

(00:50):
an example of how that works out. You know, if
you've got someone who works full time and they've got
the flu for the week, they're going to need five
days sicklyve for that to recover. However, if that worker
is only working one day a week, they don't need
five days sick leave to recover. They only need the
one day because they were only expecting to work one

(01:10):
day out of that five. So this is actually proportionate
for the hours worked and it's much fairer for business.

Speaker 1 (01:16):
Thanks sad to me. What about the minimum sickly But
if you're a part time worker, you don't get a
minimum sickly entitlement anymore? Why no minimum?

Speaker 2 (01:29):
Well, the way that we're wanting it to work is
based on this basic principle. People will earn leave for
the hours that they actually work. That will be across
annual leave and sick leave. So from the first day
of work, everyone will earn for the hours that they
actually do. This means for a full time employee, the

(01:50):
status quo will still remain. Most people won't notice any
difference other than the calculations behind the scene. So a
full time employee will earn from day one rather than
being entitled to leave after twelve months of employment, but
they'll get still the equivalent of four weeks. The same
for sick leave. If they've done that full year at

(02:11):
a full time rate, they'll still get ten days of
sick leave. However, for someone who's working fewer hours, they
won't be entitled to the ten days sick leave, but
it will be based on how many hours did you
actually work. And if you look at that from the
annual leave side, that means that you get the same
proportion of annual leavers. This is fair.

Speaker 1 (02:34):
Who gets? Does anyone miss out or lose out more
than others? I mean, do employers benefit here or employees
more or is it pretty much even stevens across the
board or you don't know.

Speaker 2 (02:46):
Well, the way it will work across the overall economy
is it should be cross neutral. But there have been
trade offs that do need to be made. Not possible for.

Speaker 1 (02:56):
You are and what your hours are, all that kind
of stuff.

Speaker 2 (02:58):
That's exactly right.

Speaker 1 (03:00):
What about labor. But I think the big problem here
is labour going to agree to what you have proposed,
because if they get in interf it out, we are
back to square one.

Speaker 2 (03:10):
I certainly hope that that's not going to happen because
what I've tried to do this whole way through is
not try and be ideological. I've been very pragmatic about
the trade offs. There will be some employees who do benefit,
and there will be some employers who benefit as well.
It'll be based on all of those individual circumstances. But
my overall aim here is to create a law that

(03:32):
would be enduring, because we know the worst thing for
business is when they don't have stability or know that
it's going to be a political football that goes back
and forth. So instead of looking at this and saying
all employers win on every single part, I've tried to
make as many pragmatic calls as possible about employee and
employer trade offs to ensure that this bill, once it's

(03:56):
an act, will endure for decades to come.

Speaker 1 (03:58):
Right, mister, appreciate you time, Brooklyn Valden, Workplace Relations Minister.
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