Book 8 - Parliament of Victoria

PUBLIC HOLIDAYS AMENDMENT BILL 2011
1714 COUNCIL Thursday, 2 June 2011
Mr P. DAVIS — The interjection is that they are
not doing it. This legislation has not yet been passed;
we are here debating it today. If it is passed, as I hope it
will be, then obviously those councils will be able to
make an application to have a different holiday, and
that day may be a day across the whole municipality or
it may be two half-days. It could be different half-days
or whole days in different parts of the municipality.
Ms Pennicuik need not be confused about that; she
need not go outside Southern Metropolitan Region and
be confused by it at all.
The people in my region of eastern Victoria and the
various municipalities of Gippsland are pleased that
their local council can reflect their will — that the
Yarram community can have a Yarram show day or
half-day, that the Sale community can have a Sale show
day or half-day or that the Maffra community can have
a half-day or a whole day for the Maffra show. That is
what local people would like to think will happen. That
is what this bill will deliver, and the only people who
will be confused about it will be people who simply do
not relate to local community events and the
significance of them as regional events.
I am sure there are very important local events in
Ms Pennicuik’s metropolitan region, but these are
whole towns or districts that focus around one major
event in a community, be it an agricultural show, a race
day or a cup day — major red-letter days, you might
say. All the bill seeks to do is give those communities
some flexibility, and if they do not want to choose that
option and they do nothing, the default position is that
the holiday will be Melbourne Cup Day. Everybody
wins; everybody gets a public holiday. If they want to
have some discretion, they can make local
arrangements to suit them locally.
That is not confusing to anybody but somebody who
lives in Southern Metropolitan Region, I suspect,
because the people in the country know exactly what is
going on. If they know there is a half-day holiday in
their local community to reflect the day of their
important icon event, race meeting or agricultural show,
they will simply choose to trade or not trade on that day
according to the nature of their business. For example,
it might be a business that supports the activity of an
agricultural show — it might be somebody selling
saddles, bridles, grain, hay or other agricultural
supplies, in which case they will think, ‘It is a good day
for us to trade today because all the farmers will be in
town’. All that flexibility is retained.
Mr Ondarchie interjected.
The DEPUTY PRESIDENT — Order! Mr Davis
may think everyone is a winner, but the Deputy
President does not feel like he is winning right at the
moment in terms of controlling this committee stage.
However, I intend to win, and I intend to bring some
order into this debate. I ask all members to cooperate in
relation to providing some order to this debate. We
have spent well over an hour on clause 1, and I think
we are ranging over the same issues repeatedly. I will
not allow that to continue. I will also remind all
members, in particular Mr Ondarchie, that it is
disorderly to interject and particularly disorderly to
interject out of one’s place.
Ms PENNICUIK (Southern Metropolitan) — I
know everybody fell about the room laughing when I
said that, but I was actually quite serious. The Kennett
government did take away public holidays — Easter
Tuesday and show days. There used to be 13 public
holidays, and what I was pointing out was that rural
communities are now having to choose between a race
day and an agricultural show day as full-day public
holidays. It can either have one or the other or two
half-days. I think that is confusing, and I suggest that
show days be reinstated.
Clause agreed to; clause 2 agreed to.
Clause 3
Mr SOMYUREK (South Eastern Metropolitan) —
Creating a conducive business environment is
important for small and medium enterprises, as it is for
most businesses. I am concerned about the regulatory
burden, which obviously comes under the heading of
creating a conducive business environment. I am
concerned about the regulatory burden on small
businesses as a result of having half-days in a number
of places.
Hon. R. A. DALLA-RIVA (Minister for
Employment and Industrial Relations) — It is my
understanding, based on my briefing — and it is written
here — that clause 3 is consequential on clause 4.
However, I am happy to answer the question by
pre-empting what is in clause 4, because clause 4
crosses over with clause 3.
On the issue of the impact on businesses in regional
Victoria, the businesses in the townships that may
choose alternative arrangements are themselves active
participants in their local communities and form a part
of the local events support network. These businesses
often provide organisers, committee members,
volunteers, attendees and vital sponsorship.
Metropolitan residents may overlook the important