House of Assembly Fifty-Fifth Parliament, First Session (55-1) 55 1 Parliament of South Australia House of Assembly published Question Time Public Sector Psychologists Public Sector Psychologists Mr TEAGUE House of Assembly Heysen Deputy Leader of the Opposition Public Sector Psychologists Mr TEAGUE (Heysen—Deputy Leader of the Opposition) (14:21): My question is to the Premier. Will the government reach an agreement with public sector psychologists and, if so, when? With your leave, sir, and that of the house, I will explain. Leave granted. Mr TEAGUE House of Assembly Heysen Deputy Leader of the Opposition Mr TEAGUE: On 4 June, the president of the South Australian Psychologists Association told FIVEaa radio that 'psychologists across the public sector will take action to disrupt bureaucratic processes'. She continued, 'At the core of our issues are pay and conditions for psychologists.' Further, she stated: This is the last opportunity we're going to have to do this, my fear is that if the Government doesn't take action at this point in time when we come to negotiate an agreement again in four years' time there simply won't be a psychologist at the table because there simply won’t be any left. The Hon. P.B. MALINAUSKAS House of Assembly Croydon Premier The Hon. P.B. MALINAUSKAS (Croydon—Premier) (14:22): Thank you, Deputy Leader of the Opposition. For reasons that the Deputy Leader of the Opposition will appreciate, during the course of any industrial negotiation, they all occur on a without-prejudice basis and there is a lot of back and forth. In that climate, one tends not to reveal their position on particular issues in the public realm. That's best done through the negotiating parties in an industrial negotiation. However, in general terms, I would say this, which goes directly to the deputy leader's question. As a government, we don't just value the work of our psychologists; we are investing in them. We are investing in them by increasing their number, both in terms of psychiatrists but also psychologists, because we see both of them playing a really important role, but not just psychologists—a lot of people in the allied health sector. We frequently—and the government is guilty of this ourselves—talk about the big investments in nurses and doctors, because it's well understood in the public the need but also the work that they do. We don't talk about allied health nearly as frequently, which is regrettable given they are just as an important part of the system as nurses and doctors, or even orderlies in a hospital for that matter. We are aware that there have been particular issues in regard to psychologist pay. We are aware of the advocacy to which the Deputy Leader of the Opposition refers. When I say 'we', I am not just talking about myself and the health minister, but this is something that we have discussed quite thoroughly around the Budget Cabinet Committee subcommittee of the government, as all our IR matters get discussed in the context of EBAs. So this is something that we are working to seek a resolution on. The government does have a number of industrial agreements up for negotiation at the moment—SASMOA, general public sector, nurses, fireys, doctors; the ambos are coming up—so there's a lot on our plate in this regard, and that is the responsibility of government. I have said publicly, and I am happy to reiterate in this forum, in a way that won't surprise anybody that, as a Labor government, we have abandoned the policy of the past. We have seen previous iterations of governments having hard caps on pay rises; that is out the window. We have seen refusals to negotiate around back pay; I have taken that off the table too. We think that everything should be put on the table. We have abandoned the policy of real wage decreases. We will not support real wage decreases, which means, of course, we are in favour of real wage increases. We are alive to the fact, both for the general public sector and doctors, the former government imposed upon them 1½ per cent wage increases that manifested in very substantial real wage cuts; that is regrettable. My commitment to them is that this government is committed to real wage increases, whether you be a psychologist, a nurse, a doctor or anybody else in the public sector that we have got negotiations on with at the moment. In regard to psychologists, we are alive to the challenges and we want to see if we can find a resolution. We believe that's best achieved through good faith bargaining, to which we remain absolutely committed.