Changes to Timber Award

22 Sep Changes to Timber Award

As a result of an application and a hearing of Fair Work Australia, certain variations of the Award have been made which apply immediately.

HAULAGE DRIVERS

The first is the inclusion of haulage drivers to the Award. 

Through the award modernisation process the imported classification for drivers had been left out of the Timber Industry Award 2010.   The TTIA and other parties believed that the alternate driving awards were not suitable for these workers.  Haulage drivers i.e. the removal of logs from the forest, are now based on level 5 of the award.

PAYOUT OF SICK LEAVE

The next variation is the payout of sick leave.   The payout of sick leave had always been a feature of the Timber and Allied Industries Award 1999 until it was removed by WorkChoices.  WorkChoices allowed it only where it was included in an Enterprise Agreement.  There were a number of Members who did do single clause agreements but they were daunting, with one member having the regulator wanting 13 pages of amendments for a 2 page document.

Prior to the award modernisation process the TTIA ran a survey of our Members in relation to payout of sick leave and we found that a majority of Members wished it to be included into the award.  Our Members found that it was a way of regulating sick leave.  Our submissions therefore reflected the views of the majority of the Members.  The FWA however, did not include the clause.

The TTIA found an award where it had been included and so it was decided that we would seek, in conjunction with the Union, to vary the modern award.

We are pleased to say that the Commission agreed to the variation sought.

The features of the sick leave payout are as follows.

• The employee must apply for the payout
• The employee must retain a bank of sick leave of 15 days
• The maximum payout per year is up to 64 hours