Thursday, 23 June 2022

Ministers statements: sick pay guarantee

Mr ANDREWS (Mulgrave—Premier) (14:36): I am delighted to rise on behalf of all Victorians to thank the thousands and thousands of insecure and casual workers right across our Victorian economy and community who worked tirelessly throughout our most difficult of times, through the worst of this one-in-100-year global pandemic. On this side of the house we know that casual and insecure workers are the workers that Victorians have relied on. They have got us through. Without them, well, who knows where we would have been in the most difficult of times: the supermarket and warehouse workers, factory workers, hospitality workers, disability care workers, aged care workers, cleaners, chefs, waiters, service station attendants, goods receivers, call centre workers and many, many more. I want to thank each and every one of them for their amazing commitment, their hard work, their passion and their dedication to the wellbeing of others, often putting themselves in harm’s way—particularly in those early and most uncertain days of this global pandemic event.

They are, sadly, though, some of the most vulnerable and lowly paid workers in our community. That is why the government, acknowledging the toxicity of insecure work, has acted in a nation-leading way to do something about this. The Victorian sick pay guarantee, a two-year pilot, is giving Victorian workers in a number of key industries an opportunity to get what many of us take for granted—a sick pay entitlement, those basic entitlements—so they do not have to make a choice between keeping themselves, their co-workers, their customers and their clients safe or feeding their families. It is not that they made the wrong choice; what is wrong is that they had to make that choice at all. Because of insecure work, so many have to make that choice. Well, we can change that, and we must. There is over $3 million in sick and carers pay that has already been paid out. Thousands have registered. We support this. We are delivering it. Others have bagged it, and that tells you all you need to know.