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Legislative Council - Fifty-Fourth Parliament, Second Session (54-2)
2021-05-12 Daily Xml
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Workplace Bullying And Harassment

The Hon. C. BONAROS (15:48): As we have said many times, bullying and harassment, including sexual harassment, is rife in the Public Service. Disturbing figures that SA-Best has obtained reveal that South Australian taxpayers have forked out almost $40 million to public servants harassed in the workplace over the past five years. In total, 841 public servants received payouts for work-related harassment, including 24 for sexual harassment, between 2015 and 2020.

The worst offending agency was the Department for Education, which reported 253 cases of harassment, including 10 of sexual harassment, for a total payout of nearly $13 million over the five-year period. The 10 sexual harassment claims were also the highest across the whole of government, followed by SA Health with seven cases, according to figures released by the Commissioner for Public Sector Employment, Ms Erma Ranieri.

These statistics are extremely disturbing and further proof that much more needs to be done to stamp out all forms of harassment in the workplace. They also confirm what SA-Best and others have long suspected and feared, that workplace bullying and harassment is rife in the Department for Education. We know this because my colleague the Hon. Frank Pangallo and I have met with a number of teachers who have experienced such behaviour, some by their own principals. One of my concerns is that, if principals and teachers are harassing their own, then what chance have we of teaching our children about the insidious nature of harassment and the damage it can cause?

On the back of these figures, we have asked the Treasurer to investigate the extent of harassment in the public sector, including the unacceptable number in his own department. The disturbing statistics reveal that, between 2015 and 2020, ten Department for Education employees received payouts, totalling $374,781, for sexual harassment claims, at an average of $37,478.10 each. More than $12.5 million was paid out to a further 243 Department for Education employees for work-related harassment, at an average of $51,749.95.

Across the whole of government, 24 public servants received compensation for sexual harassment, totalling $701,079, or $29,211.65 on average. Across the whole of government, 817 public servants received payouts for other work-related harassment, totalling $37,620,485, at an average of $46,050.77 per claim.

SA Health, SAPOL, the Department of Human Services and the Department for Correctional Services rounded out the worst government agencies for general workplace harassment, with 227, 72, 61 and 44 claims respectively. All South Australians should be alarmed at these figures, including the fact that such a staggering amount of taxpayers' money has had to be paid to victims of workplace harassment over the past five years.

If the government was doing more to tackle harassment and bullying in the Public Service, that money could have been redirected to fund critical public health and other crucial support services cut by this government. To have more than 800 public servants in a five-year period, or about 160 average a year, or more than three every week over the past five years, report cases of harassment against them shows the widespread extent of public sector workplace bullying and harassment.

It is a sad indictment on the current workplace harassment policies of this government and reinforces the fact that it has a lot more to do. We all have a lot more to do to address the scourge of harassment in the public sector, and indeed across workplaces.

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