{"id":8049,"date":"2020-03-23T12:22:57","date_gmt":"2020-03-23T01:22:57","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/development.uwu.org.au\/staging\/?p=8049"},"modified":"2025-07-28T13:59:12","modified_gmt":"2025-07-28T03:59:12","slug":"aged-care-workers-win-two-weeks-of-paid-covid19-leave","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/development.uwu.org.au\/staging\/archive\/aged-care-workers-win-two-weeks-of-paid-covid19-leave\/","title":{"rendered":"Aged Care workers win two weeks of paid Covid19 leave"},"content":{"rendered":"

One of Australia\u2019s largest Aged Care providers has agreed to pay staff two weeks of special \u201cCovid19 leave\u201d if they or their close family have to deal with the fallout from the coronavirus.<\/p>\n

The measures apply to both permanent and casual staff, with the payments for casuals based on their last two-week roster period.<\/p>\n

In addition, a major Western Australian Aged Care provider, Brightwater, has agreed to pay their staff during Covid19 leave.<\/p>\n

\u201cUnited Workers Union wrote to Aged Care providers putting our demand for an extra two weeks paid leave for Aged Care workers, because they need their employers\u2019 support if they are going to keep providing quality care,\u201d Carolyn Smith, United Workers Union National Aged Care Director, said today.<\/p>\n

\"\"<\/p>\n

\u201cIt\u2019s great to see an employers as big as Bupa and Brightwater committing to two weeks paid leave for their staff if they or their family have to self-isolate due to coronavirus.<\/p>\n

\u201cBy looking after their staff, they are going to be looking after their residents who rely on staff to give them the quality care they need in these difficult times.\u201d<\/p>\n

Ms Smith said Bupa and Brightwater set an example that other employers must follow if they wanted to minimise the impact of the coronavirus crisis on their staff and residents.<\/p>\n

\u201cGiven Bupa and Brightwater have recognised the merits of looking after their staff, it\u2019s now time for other aged care providers to follow suit,\u201d Ms Smith said.<\/p>\n

\u201cThey should not be relying on low-paid and often casual staff to dip into savings or \u2013 if they are lucky enough to have permanent jobs – their personal leave to deal with this unprecedented crisis.<\/p>\n

\u201cAged care workers are going to be on the front line of this crisis, and they require the support of their employers to provide the quality care residents expect and deserve.<\/p>\n

\u201cUnited Workers Union is calling on all employers to treat their staff fairly and introduce at least two weeks paid leave if they are affected by the impact of the coronavirus.<\/p>\n

\u201cIndeed, in Western Australia and Queensland some public sector employees are being offered an extra 20 days paid leave if they or their families are affected.\u201d<\/p>\n

Ms Smith said paid Covid19 leave was a minimum standard employers should be adopting, alongside providing all necessary personal protective equipment for staff members working in aged care facilities.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

One of Australia\u2019s largest Aged Care providers has agreed to pay staff two weeks of special \u201cCovid19 leave\u201d if they or their close family have to deal with the fallout from the coronavirus.…<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":9,"featured_media":7991,"comment_status":"closed","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"_acf_changed":false,"content-type":"","footnotes":""},"categories":[202],"tags":[97],"class_list":["post-8049","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","hentry","category-archive","tag-aged-care"],"acf":[],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/development.uwu.org.au\/staging\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/8049","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/development.uwu.org.au\/staging\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/development.uwu.org.au\/staging\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/development.uwu.org.au\/staging\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/9"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/development.uwu.org.au\/staging\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=8049"}],"version-history":[{"count":1,"href":"https:\/\/development.uwu.org.au\/staging\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/8049\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":65085,"href":"https:\/\/development.uwu.org.au\/staging\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/8049\/revisions\/65085"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/development.uwu.org.au\/staging\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/7991"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/development.uwu.org.au\/staging\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=8049"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/development.uwu.org.au\/staging\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=8049"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/development.uwu.org.au\/staging\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=8049"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}