The grand final eve public holiday last Friday has drawn criticism from StawellBiz president Chris Waack.
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Mr Waack, owner of Waack’s Bakery in Stawell, Ararat and Horsham, said the introduction of the public holiday was absolutely ridiculous.
“Businesses are struggling to meet penalty rates at the moment as it is,” Mr Waack said.
“The extra public holiday either forced businesses to close and miss out on a day’s trade, or open and pay obscene penalty rates.
“If employees were casual, and the business closed, that family missed out on a day’s pay.
“Most of the businesses in Stawell don’t open Sundays anyway, so they may have made the decision to close Saturday and make it a long weekend.
“If that was the case, then the same family will have missed out on two days’ pay.
“The day was a burden on businesses and people who work casually.”
Mr Waack supported calls to scrap the holiday.
“It had no benefit to regional areas at all,” he said.
“The government need to look at it now and wind it back.”
Mr Waack had previously indicated to his StawellBiz members that the organisation would be providing a response to the report on the grand final public holiday and additional Victorian public holidays.
The submission related to issues contained a number of negative impacts that the public holiday would have on small business, including:
- Increased wages for employees - Increased wages are paid to those employees who work on public holidays, with penalty rates often providing an additional 50 per cent to 150 per cent loading beyond the rate that would otherwise be applied on those days.
- Increased labour costs for employers - While increased wages provide a benefit to employees, those employers that continue to operate on a public holiday are subject to increased labour costs. These costs are broadly equivalent to the increased wages received by employees. This impact tends to be concentrated in those industries that operate across the entire week, such as retail, hospitality, accommodation and essential emergency and community services.
