SALARY & CONDITIONS

Twilight Aged Care employees voted YES on a new wages and conditions agreement. The Agreement is effective from October 2007. Employees covered under the agreement include: Personal Care Assistants, Cleaners, Laundry workers, kitchen hands and some recreational activities staff.

The highlights of the agreement are:

Wages:

Twilight Aged Care is offeringincreased hourly rates with this Agreement. Rate are 3% higher than the current award rate of pay. The new rate is also higher than the Australian Fair Pay Schedule and takes into account the AFPC decision on wages effective 1 October 2007. Leave loading is included in the base hourly rate and will be paid weekly instead of when annual leave is taken. Annual pay rises are guaranteed throughout the life of the agreement based at a minimum on CPI changes. Movements in the Australian Pair Pay Commission Wage Scales are also accounted for in the Agreement.

New evening penalty rate:

There have been changes made to shift penalty rates and how they are applied. In the new agreement there is a single day rate and a new single 20% night penalty rate that applies from 5pm Monday to Friday. This is 5% higher than the Award. People who start prior to this time will be paid at the morning rate till 5pm and then the evening rate for the remainder of the shift. This is different from the Award that provided for a lower penalty rate from the commencing time to be applied to the whole shift.

New Incremental progression for Carer positions:

Two new grades have been introduced that allows a Personal Care Assistant Graded CSE 3 to progress up three wage levels provided certain conditions are met. When qualified this represents 25c per hour increase over the next two years. Also staff graded at CSE 1 can after 3 years service be graded to CSE 2 under certain conditions. 

Cash out Annual Leave:

The Agreement also allows 2 weeks of annual leave to be cashed out each year.

Personal Leave:

10 days personal leave is provided each year and accrues monthly. Personal leave can  be used for sick leave, carers leave and compassionate leave and the new agreement provides for up to 10 days of personal leave to be used each year for carers leave.

New provisions for Grandparents:

A new provision in the agreement is Grandparent Leave. There are two types of Grandparent leave. Personal Leave can be used as Paid Grandparent leave. People may use personal leave to under take planned Grandparent responsibilities. Grandparent leave may also be taken unpaid for a period of up to 12 months.

New provisions for people with pets:

Another new provision is Pet Carers Leave. People with pets may take paid leave from their personal leave to attend to an ill pet.

New provisions for people with cultural or ceremonial responsibilities:

A final new provision is to enable people to take paid leave from their personal leave to attend to cultural or religious ceremonial responsibilities.

Parental Leave:

The new Agreement preserves the existing entitlement to 9 weeks paid parental leave and up to 12 months unpaid leave.