I make a brief contribution to the Community Services Sector (Portable Long Service Leave) Bill 2024. The Government committed to establishing a portable entitlement scheme for community sector workers, and we are delivering. The bill will create a new portable long service leave scheme for community service workers. As we have heard from members in this place, the scheme will give eligible workers access to paid time off based on how long they work in the sector rather than with a single employer. It will build on the success of two existing schemes in New South Wales for the contract cleaning and building and construction industries.

The bill was developed following extensive consultation with stakeholders across the community services sector, and they tell me that they feel heard. Those stakeholders included peak bodies and unions representing workers and employers as well as New South Wales government agencies and Australian jurisdictions that already have portable long service leave benefits for community service workers. It is exciting to hear such good news that up to 250,000 community sector workers will see their leave rights expanded under this remarkable legislative reform. The reform will allow community sector workers to access their long service leave sooner and accrue leave based on the time employed in the sector rather than time employed by a single employer. Workers across the disability care and family and domestic violence services, homelessness services, neighbourhood centres and many other essential services in all of our communities will benefit from the reform.

The move responds to the rise of insecure work in the disability and community sectors and forms part of the Government's commitment to attract and retain key workers across our State. Members often acknowledge the good people who are our community services workers as part of our community recognition statements and private members' statements in this place. Those people work not for recognition but because they want to support the communities in which they live. They are dedicated to social justice. They are dedicated to promoting social inclusion. They care about the wellbeing and mental health of their community. But, as has been pointed out, so many workers face issues such as stress, job insecurity and burnout, and the high level of casualisation impacts this sector more than any other.

Employers and employees have told us for a long time that a portable leave scheme would help address those particular issues, and I am proud to be part of a Labor Government that is delivering this reform. It is great to have a shared vision for supporting workers. As the member for Newtown and many other speakers have pointed out, the fact that more than 75 per cent of those 250,000 workers in the community services sector are women must be noted in this contribution. Women play a strong role in our community services sector in those caring roles and on those tough issues that are not easy to get up and speak about. I feel that I have heard so many stories over the years that I have worked in the political field from many of those women, who have had to put their families and their time out aside in order to continue earning a wage.

I acknowledge, for the record, that the key elements of the scheme include offering paid long service leave up after seven years, rather than 10 years, and allowing workers to accrue long service leave across multiple employers within the sector, ensuring the portability of leave. Under existing rules, community service workers lose that leave if they move from one employer to the next, despite the nature of the sector seeing workers frequently shift between organisations and employers. Having one central agency administer that long service leave, including records and leave payments, is also an element of the scheme. As the Minister pointed out, we are bringing New South Wales in line with other jurisdictions that have already established portable long service leave for those sectors, and the Minns Labor Government has decided that New South Wales cannot be left behind. We value those essential workers.

I now acknowledge the words of the mighty Australian Services Union [ASU] in its booklet that it has shared with many members in this place—and I note that I am a proud member of that union:

"This bill comes after years of campaigning by ASU members who know that this change would improve the sector, keeping workers … in the …. sector, no matter happens to funding."

It is a basic working right for so many of those dedicated employees, but workers have found that they have rarely been able to access that right. I acknowledge the fabulous Angus McFarland, a Blue Mountains boy. I also acknowledge all the other ASU members and workers in the sector whose faces are in the booklet, including the fabulous Jan Primrose, Narelle Clay, Amanda Carr—one of the ASU organisers, again from the mountains—and my mate Helen Westwood, a former member of the other place, who now works and campaigns for the ASU and maintains her belief in workers' rights. I express gratitude to the Blue Mountains Community Interagency and its hundreds of member organisations. I cannot possibly list all of them in 2½ minutes, but I have always said that my community services sector in the Blue Mountains is a best-practice model. I have said that to every Minister from across the political sphere.

Stories from Blue Mountains community services workers often speak to vicarious trauma, fatigue and employment disadvantage. Those people step in and care for some of the most vulnerable members of communities, and they work in precarious and insecure work themselves. Finally, like other members—and rightly so—I thank the Minister and her team for their commitment to supporting workers across this great State. I congratulate the Minister, and I commend the bill to the House.