Page 17 - Week 01 - Tuesday, 15 February 2011
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trainees across six ACT government agencies; continued the Aboriginal and Torres Strait Islander traineeships; and provided learning and development places for both target groups.
This bill will ensure that the legislative employment framework for the ACT public service fully supports these initiatives under the respect, equity and diversity framework. By amending the merit principle, this will enable chief executives to identify specific positions within their agencies to be filled exclusively by Indigenous persons and persons with a disability. Chief executives are aware of my commitment and expectations around the creation, support and continuity of these types of positions. I expect the ACT public service to respond positively to the opportunity the bill offers in providing a pathway to employment for Indigenous persons and persons with a disability.
On some other aspects of the bill, the Public Sector Management Act 1994 along with the subordinate public sector management standards and industrial agreements constitute the ACT public service legislative employment framework. Successive rounds of agreement making in the ACT public service have resulted in matters originally covered exclusively in the Public Sector Management Act and standards being modified or overridden by agreements. The bill and concurrent amendments to the standards aim to address, in part, the overlap of matters across the employment framework and inconsistencies which have arisen over time as a result of these overlaps.
The majority of the amendments to be made by the bill result from the 2010 round of enterprise agreement negotiations between the territory and its employees. Other amendments are directly attributed to changes in legislative provisions at the commonwealth level and the ongoing evolution and maturity of the ACT public service. As a result, a number of anachronistic provisions and practices carried over from the commonwealth at the time of self-government have been removed.
To support a simpler, more consistent and coherent legislative employment framework, the Public Sector Management Act, public sector management standards and agreements ought to provide a coherent framework while ensuring appropriate flexibility in making employment decisions.
The Public Sector Management Act should also include provisions covering the establishment of the ACT public service and matters dealing with the administration and management of the service, such as how persons join, leave and move within the service. In addition, the public sector management standards should continue to support the act, providing detail on the operation and application of the principles established by the act.
Finally, agreements should provide conditions of employment and entitlements agreed between the territory and its employees, including hours of work, rates of pay, leave entitlements and rights of review and appeal.
The bill is the first step in giving effect to this realignment of matters between the act, standards and agreements, relocating and updating matters as appropriate to achieve greater harmony across the framework. Specifically, the bill deals with matters across
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