CPSU Federal Office

Pandemic Leave Disaster payment is a payment available to workers who are required to self isolate or quarantine due to COVID-19, or care for someone required to do so.  Eligibility criteria may vary slightly across states and territories. #1  The following changes to the Pandemic Leave Payment have been announced by the Federal Government.  The payment is now $750 for a 7-day period (which reflects current isolation and quarantine requirements). #2  A second application may be made if required to isolate or quarantine for longer

Whether it's casualised jobs with less rights, labour hire that underpays for the same job, part-time work without meaningful guaranteed hours, or years of low pay growth, insecure work is a serious problem for our community.  People with insecure work can’t plan their lives, struggle to pay their rent or mortgages, always worry if they’ll have enough to pay the weekly bills. Having a secure job is connected to so many basic things – mental health, food, housing.

The release of our audited accounts and operating report for the previous financial year shows the overarching and significant factor in our work this financial year has been the pandemic. The various industrial and health and safety issues that arose for hotel quarantine staff, contact tracers, prison officers, occupational health and safety inspectors, health workers and child protection workers to name but a few, have been our main focus.

As the world prepares to meet at the United Nations climate summit in Glasgow, activists from the union movement around Australia will join together to hear from workers, climate change experts and movement leaders about the next steps in our campaign.

The union movement will be uniting behind workers and individual unions pursuing job security claims as the ACTU declared unions will be “turning up the heat” on employers as the economy emerges from the pandemic, flagging more action, picket lines, and product boycotts, to pressure companies to offer more secure employment conditions to workers.

The Federal Government succeeded in passing their Respect@Work Bill which legislates for about five and a half of the 55 recommendations in the Sex Discrimination Commissioner’s landmark inquiry into sexual harassment at work.  The ACTU pressed for amendments to the Bill for the full implementation of the Respect at Work report.

Australian workers used to have secure jobs with secure pay but the Federal Government keeps putting big business ahead of workers.  Let's do something, before it's too late - if we don't act now, reliable work will be gone for good. 

Join us and together we can restore job stability for all.

Casual Work

Unions and business are committed to working cooperatively with governments to keep workplaces safe and to achieve the highest possible rates of vaccination though building confidence in the vaccination program and supporting workers to get vaccinated. The ACTU and the BCA acknowledge that the Federal Government’s COVID-19 vaccination policy is that it should be free and voluntary. We believe that for the overwhelming majority of Australians your work or workplace should not fundamentally alter the voluntary nature of vaccination.

The ACTU has called on the Morrison Government not to ratify the Regional Comprehensive Economic Partnership (RCEP) agreement, which includes Myanmar’s military junta, at the JSCOT inquiry.  RCEP has been negotiated behind closed doors between Australia, China, Japan, New Zealand, South Korea, Brunei, Cambodia, Indonesia, Laos, Malaysia, Myanmar, the Philippines, Singapore, Thailand, and Vietnam. Despite its size, there is no evidence that the RCEP agreement will benefit Australian workers.

The ACTU argues that ratifying RCEP will:

Reactive economic policy is no safeguard in a public health crisis.  From yawning gaps in the vaccination rollout to reactively cobbling together a below-poverty-line disaster payment during Victoria’s lockdown, the brunt of the Federal Government’s refusal to actively plan for public health during a pandemic has consistently fallen on those already hardest hit. As case numbers rise in New South Wales and other states remain on the alert, the Federal Government shows little attempt to meaningfully break this cycle.