Through EB11 negotiations, the QNMU and QH reached an agreement on various work arrangements for public holidays – many of which had been issues for QNMU members for many years. Now, under EB11:

• Annual leave is exclusive of all public holidays – ie: you can now never have annual leave deducted on a public holiday.
• Employees will have the ability to opt out of the additional week of annual leave and working on public holidays if they work in a unit that closes on public holidays. This is a new provision in EB11 and will be rolled out by June 2023.
• The requirement to give a minimum of 24 hours’ notice for stand down on a public holiday has been written into EB11 (it was previously only contained in the guide). This makes it more enforceable.