We recently communicated to our Clients that we are preparing for the introduction of the Labour Hire Licensing Acts that are now in place in both Queensland and South Australia. We are very pleased to announce that we have been granted our Labour Hire License in Queensland and are awaiting the outcome of our application for our license in South Australia.

As a reminder, the Labour Hire Licensing Acts of both States:

• Requires labour hire providers to have a licence
• Make it an offence:
• to provide labour hire services without a licence
• to acquire labour hire services from an unlicensed provider
• to engage in avoidance arrangements
• to fail to report avoidance arrangements
• impose detailed obligations to provide information to the regulator about labour hire arrangements, including information about how workers are engaged, the locations where they work, and arrangements for their accommodation

Both Acts impose heavy penalties for offences, including fines and prison sentences.

Although the commencement date for the Labour Hire Licensing Act in South Australia was March and April in Queensland, each of the Acts provides a transition period to allow labour hire providers to apply for and obtain their licenses. In South Australia, the transition period is six months from commencement; in Queensland it is 60 days . This means it is not an offence for you to continue to deal with an unlicensed labour hire provider during the transition period. Provided that your labour hire provider has applied for a licence within the transition period it will also not be an offence to continue to deal with the provider until the licence application has been decided – even if it is after the end of the transition period. As mentioned, we have applied for our South Australian license and are confident of this being granted shortly.   It is important to understand that the Act will make it an offence to acquire labour hire services from an unlicensed provider. As such, the onus will be on you to ensure you are only working with labour hire suppliers who have been granted a licence. We recommend you make enquiries with your other suppliers regarding their approach to the licensing regime and the status of applications they may have made for a licence. We would welcome the opportunity to have a conversation with you about how we could assist if any of your other suppliers have decided to strategically withdraw from the market as a result of the introduction of this Act or do not obtain a licence.

Our Managing Director, Mathew Westcott continues to lead the management of our Labour Hire Licensing Response Plan. If you have any questions or concerns arising from the new labour hire licensing laws or your current provider, we invite you to speak with Mathew about them.

Mathew can be contacted on 03 9981 5900 , or by email  mwestcott@fuserecruitment.com .