In 2018 and 2019, many ADHSU members were directed to take additional annual leave because the service told them they had ‘excess annual leave’ – even though, as most members know, almost every paramedic and control centre officer takes their 6 weeks per year, each year. This was because NSWA was trying to enforce a public sector-wide rule that no public sector employee was permitted to have an annual leave balance greater than 30 days.

At the time, ADHSU delegates warned NSWA that this would cause a problem for paramedics and control centre officers who accrued 6 weeks of annual leave each year. The problem occurs when paramedics start accruing their leave in the current year, to be used in the following year after their anniversary. The Service saw this accrual on their leave balance and directed the employees to take that leave in the current year, even though it was being accrued for the following year. This meant these employees had little or no leave left for when they were supposed to take that leave in the following year.

ADHSU delegates have been repeatedly trying to get the Service to fix this problem and pay back all the leave that they stole from members in 2018/2019 for the 2020/2021 years. 

Delegates have successfully fixed the problem for 2 members, but we know there are more members out there that have been incorrectly forced to use their hard-earned annual leave.

We’re looking for members to email the HSU and let us know if you were directed to take your excess leave and it resulted in a deficit of your leave balances for subsequent years.

If you think this has happened to you, please follow this link to provide your details so the ADHSU Industrial Officer can get into contact.