Annual leave under the national system

Federal and state legislation provides employees across all jurisdictions with minimum annual leave entitlements.

For national system employees, these entitlements are provided under the National Employment Standards (NES), as set out in the Fair Work Act 2009 (Cth) (FW Act): Pt 2-2 Div 6. For non-national system employees, annual leave entitlements are prescribed by the relevant state or territory legislation.

The minimum entitlement to annual leave of an employee under the NES is 4 weeks’ paid annual leave for each year of service with the employer. Annual leave accrues throughout the year and unused leave is rolled over to the following year. Shift workers are entitled to one additional week of annual leave.

Modern awards and enterprise agreements made under the FW Act may also contain provisions dealing with annual leave, although such provisions must not derogate from the annual leave entitlements of employees under the NES.

See Annual leave under the national system.