On Thursday 13 January 2022, National Cabinet made amendments to the current COVID isolation rules that potentially apply to critical workers. The operation of correctional centres and community corrections are defined as critical workers.
Up until that decision, persons defined at the category of “close contact”, being people that share a household with a positive COVID case, were required to self-isolate for an already reduced six days.
The latest amendments to this rule means critical workers are exempt from this obligation. You can view the exemption Order here.
Your Union, the PSA, has grave concerns regarding the workplace health and safety of our members with the removal of this requirement. The completely foreseeable outcome is that more of your colleagues would inadvertently come to work carrying COVID and transmit it to their colleagues, and in turn exacerbate staff shortages.
CSNSW has confirmed in discussions with the PSA that there are no plans to change isolation periods for CSNSW employees in line with this “minimum standard” national cabinet decision.
These National Cabinet rules appear to be attempting to address the labour shortages in some industries not by addressing the spread of COVID through increased availability of PPE, vaccines and testing, but by attempting to stoically ignore its existence. The PSA is calling for greater access to RAS testing for all staff in CSNSW, including Community Corrections.
The PSA has little confidence that these lax National Cabinet rules would reduce worker absenteeism and in fact may do the reverse, as they come after a successive weakening of our isolation requirements that now put your workplaces at the frontline not of just service delivery but of transmission.
As your Union we remind you that if you are a close contact at home, in that someone in your household has been diagnosed with COVID, you are, pending the relationship, entitled to access up to 20 days Special Leave to care for sick family members, as per the Circular C2021-14 Employment Arrangements during COVID-19 HERE.
Additionally, the PSA would like to clarify that if you are sick, including from COVID-19, you are entitled to sick leave and cannot be forced to attend work.
These changes are a minimum standard set by National Cabinet and does not have to be adopted by an employer. You Union will be advocating your employer to have better infection controls in place than what is being recommended for the protection of all our members, their families and the members of the community you may come in contact with during your duties.
Workplace health and safety is always paramount. And at a time when a pandemic is ripping through our community, never has it been more so.