President's Message

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Phone: 02 9242 4000 
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The Industrial Relations Commission of New South Wales (the “Commission”) has varied the Local Government (State) Award 2017 (the “Award”) to provide an entitlement of up to 10 days paid leave to employees who require flexibility to deal with the impacts of family and domestic violence.

Following the passage of a motion at the 2019 LGNSW Annual Conference that endorsed 10 days leave for local government employees dealing with domestic violence, the New South Wales Local Government, Clerical, Administrative, Energy, Airlines & Utilities Union (the “USU”) filed an application on 13 February 2020 to vary the Award. The variation to the Award, which took effect on Monday 24 February 2020, was made by consent of all parties to the Award.

The notable features of the new Family and Domestic Violence Leave provision are as follows:

  • Family and domestic violence is defined to mean “…violent, threatening or other abusive behaviour, by a family member of an employee or another person living in the same household as the employee, that seeks to coerce or control the employee and that causes them harm or to be fearful”.
  • Family member is defined to mean “… a spouse, de facto partner, child, parent, grandparent, grandchild or sibling of the employee; or a child, parent, grandparent, grandchild or sibling of a spouse or de facto partner of the employee; or a person related to the employee according to Aboriginal or Torres Strait Islander kinship rules”.
  • Employees, other than casual employees, experiencing family and domestic violence and who require flexibility to deal with the impact of family and domestic violence are entitled to up to 10 days’ paid family and domestic violence leave (casual employees, whilst not eligible for paid leave, may make themselves unavailable for work without consequences to deal with the impact of family and domestic violence).
  • Family and Domestic Violence leave is available at the start of each 12-month period of an employee’s employment;
  • The leave does not accumulate from year to year; and
  • Time where an employee is on paid leave to deal with family and domestic violence counts as service and does not break the employee’s continuity of service.

Members that subscribe to LGNSW’s online Human Resources Toolkit, LGNSW HR Advance, will be able to download a consolidated copy of the Award from the LGNSW HR Advance website in due course. Members that subscribe to LGNSW’s Award Supply Service (loose-leaf version of the Award) will receive an update in coming weeks.

For further information, please contact LGNSW Workplace Relations on 02 9242 4142 and ask to speak with an Industrial Officer.

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