In February this year, the LGEA Committee of Management established a set of principles around the rollout of the COVID-19 vaccine for our members. These principles included an expectation that employees be granted
paid leave to receive a COVID-19 vaccination.
In April, we successfully negotiated for paid leave to be included in the Local Government (COVID-19) Splinter (Interim) Award 2021, so that local government employees who elect to receive a TGA-approved COVID-19 vaccine have access to paid time off work to receive their vaccination.
NSW local government employees have had access to this paid leave since the new Splinter Award was made in April, and many LGEA members have accessed this paid leave to receive their COVID-19 vaccine.
This entitlement has
recently made the news, as such an entitlement, surprisingly, does not exist in the public sector.
Many commentators have referenced the fact that such leave has existed for NSW local government employees for months, putting pressure on Premier Gladys Berejiklian to introduce vaccine leave for the NSW public sector workforce, in-line with the entitlement available to many NSW local government employees.
For more information around your rights in relation to COVID-19, please refer to our
COVID-19 factsheet.