GIVING employers the incentive to take on more workers could relieve the jobs crisis caused by the closure of Electrolux, according to Country Labor.
Subscribe now for unlimited access.
$0/
(min cost $0)
or signup to continue reading
Calare spokesman Jess Jennings and Orange branch president Bernard Fitzsimon said the federal government already had the capacity to ease unemployment through the Restart program, which was announced at the federal budget last year.
The program offers a payment of up to $10,000 during a 12-month period if a business takes on an employee aged 50 or older.
The job seeker must be registered as unemployed with Centrelink for six months after they have spent their redundancy.
“It’s prolonging the agony for two years . They are unemployed, as far as we’re concerned, until they find another job,” Mr Fitzsimon said.
“With the influx of jobs being lost, the prospects of finding one are not great.”
Mr Jennings and Mr Fitzsimon said an exemption could be applied to Calare, removing the six-month waiting period to start, followed by the age requirement.
“We’re suggesting to incentivise the employers to make them confident enough to take on more employees,” Mr Jennings said.
“It’s going to be better for the employers, the workers and the economy.”
Of the 310 employees still working at the Electrolux refrigeration plant, 212 of them, or 70 per cent, are aged 50 or younger.
Many of the employees at, or close to, retirement age have already taken a redundancy.
Mr Jennings said the shrinking mining workforce at Cadia Valley Operations was also reflected in Lithgow and there had been additional job losses at the NSW Trustee and Guardian in Bathurst and Essential Energy, making it an electorate-wide problem.
He argued redundancy payments should be able to be spent securing assets like a house, or in superannuation.
Mr Fitzsimon said while Electrolux employees had been offered training in other employment sectors, the jobs were not yet available, and employers in other industries could offer on-the-job training.
“They might not get a job because the training is not what the employer wants,” he said.
“If it costs $10 million for the Electrolux workers [to be re-employed], it’s a drop in the ocean.”
danielle.cetinski@fairfaxmedia.com
