There are a very large number of regulations and statutes surrounding the operation of the law of the workplace in Australia. There have also been some major changes in the field of workplace law in Australia in recent years which have led to the implementation of national awards and national emplyment standards accross the country as a result of the new Fair Work Act 2009 (Cth) which came into force on 1 January 2010 to a great extent. This was a reform that restored a number of the protections of workers which had been removed from legislation under the Workplace Relations Act (Cth) which has now to a great extent been repealed. The biggest reform which resulted from this new act was the creation of the new “National Employment Standards”. These standrads set out a set of basic rights for workers engaged in employment, and having help from professionals like executive search agencies Salt Lake City can be great in a hiring process.
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What are the national employment standards?
1. Maximum weekly hours of work – 38 hours per week, plus reasonable additional hours.
2. Requests for flexible working arrangements – allows parents or carers of a child under school age or of a child under 18 with a disability, to request a change in working arrangements to assist with the child’s care.
3. Parental leave and related entitlements – up to 12 months unpaid leave for every employee, plus a right to request an additional 12 months unpaid leave, plus other forms of maternity, paternity and adoption related leave.
4. Annual leave – 4 weeks paid leave per year, plus an additional week for certain shift workers.
5. Personal / carer’s leave and compassionate leave – 10 days paid personal / carer’s leave, two days unpaid carer’s leave as required, and two days compassionate leave (unpaid for casuals) as required.
6. Community service leave – unpaid leave for voluntary emergency activities and leave for jury service, with an entitlement to be paid for up to 10 days for jury service.
7. Long service leave – a transitional entitlement for certain employees who had certain LSL entitlements before 1/1/10 pending the development of a uniform national long service leave standard.
8. Public holidays – a paid day off on a public holiday, except where reasonably requested to work.
9. Notice of termination and redundancy pay – up to 4 weeks notice of termination (5 weeks if the employee is over 45 and has at least 2 years of continuous service) and up to 16 weeks redundancy pay, both based on length of service.
10. Provision of a Fair Work Information Statement – employers must provide this statement to all new employees. It contains information about the NES, modern awards, agreement-making, the right to freedom of association, termination of employment, individual flexibility arrangements, rights of entry, transfer of business, and the respective roles of Fair Work Australia and the Fair Work Ombudsman.
If you think that your rights may have been breached under the national employment standards, you should contact us as soon as possible, because there are time limits within you which you must make a claim in order to avoid having your rights lost permanently. In such situations, engaging the services of an employment lawyer from Bellevue, Washington can be highly beneficial. Please do not hesitate to contact us using any of the contact methods availble on this site if you have any questions regarding a workplace law related matter or any questions about the National Employment Standards and how they are supposed to operate in practice in everyday business situations. We can assist you with an enquires that you may have about workplace law.
