Click below for your PDF version of the Jan 2010 issue of ACU Union News, the NTEU ACU Branch national newsletter.

Click below for your PDF version of the Dec 2009 issue of ACU Union News, the NTEU ACU Branch national newsletter.

After careful consideration of the information presented, the National Tertiary Education Union ACU Branch rejects – as patently inadequate, and not in the spirit of the University’s mission statement – the offer made to staff to achieve a Collective Agreement. This proposal, rather than initiating the process, is a belated response to submissions made by the Union to get this process started.

The salary offer, set against the recent decisions on expenditure, presents a 10% (13% with strict conditions attached) increase over four years. This compares with the minimum of 16% at all other Australian universities. Claims that the University can’t afford such an increase must be measured against the funds being invested in new buildings, senior staff and related activities.

The excessive hours created by the very prescriptive academic workload proposals stifle the career prospects of those academics that have been loyal servants, as well as discourage the development of an academic culture that is inimical with the great Catholic tertiary institutions such as Leuven, Fordham and Catholic University of America.

What is needed is for the University to address the matters contained in the NTEU Log of Claims as originally submitted in June 2008, and updated in November 2009. This presents opportunities to develop a positive and productive working relationship between the immediate stakeholders that control the fate of this University.  To seize this moment would make this University special, both in terms of the Australian, and the international tertiary education sector.

The Next Steps

• Communicate a detailed breakdown of our position and the rationale behind our decisions.
• Meet with our members to allow them to further express their views on this proposal and come to positions on which the Branch and the union may act.
• Seek a meeting with the University and commence negotiations in good faith. There is a commitment for parties to join to accept difference and come to a just and fair resolution that will benefit all involved, as well as provide a basis of development and expansion for this important part of ACU’s future.