CORONAVIRUS —
SCHOOLS — CLEANING
423. Hon DONNA FARAGHER to the Minister for Education and
Training:
I refer to the new cleaning regimes
that have been implemented in public schools in response to the COVID-19
pandemic.
(1) Since April 2020 —
(a) how many additional cleaners have
been employed by the department;
(b) how many cleaners already
employed by the department have increased their working hours;
(c) how many contract cleaning staff
have been employed; and,
(d) how many
cleaners in the department's pool can be diverted to schools that
request additional assistance?
(2) Have any
schools requested more cleaners in addition to those that have been allocated
in response to the pandemic or any other additional cleaning support since the
commencement of term 2; and, if so, how many and have all requests been
accommodated?
Hon SUE
ELLERY replied:
I thank the honourable member for
some notice of the question.
(1) (a)–(b)
The department has allocated an additional 1 108 full-time equivalent of
cleaner time to schools in response to the revised cleaning regime for term 2
in 2020 in response to COVID-19. When compared with term 1, for the pay of 14
May 2020, an additional 864 FTE of cleaning time will be paid. This comprises
344 FTE of new and casual cleaners and 520 FTE of existing cleaners who have
had their hours increased.
(c) If schools
require the services of a contract cleaning company, each school will enter
directly into a contract with the company; the process is not managed
centrally.
(d) As of 8 March
2020, there are 1 400 applicants in the department's cleaner pool.
(2) There is no
outstanding request for additional cleaning support. Schools have met the
regime through the allocated additional
cleaning FTE or may have used contracted cleaners. Some schools may not have
been required to use their entire site, resulting in some saving of
total cleaning time. This time will be available to be reallocated to the revised cleaning regime for the areas of the
school that were operational. In addition to the 1 108 FTE of cleaner
time allocated to schools on 23 April 2020, a further 49 FTE of cleaner time
was subsequently made to accommodate schools with split sites and those with a high
proportion of students with disabilities, and to facilitate the reopening of
residential and agricultural colleges.