The QUT Branch wishes you good luck and bon courage in your campaign to resist the dastardly UWS management offer.
EB negotiations here have not been easy, but with the practised skills and perseverence of NTEU negotiator, Cathy Grant, we are progressing towards an acceptable agreement. In praise of QUT management, they have not stooped to the depths of your UWS management’s dirty tricks.

Please let us know if we can help you.

Best regards,
Evan Jones
President
QUT NTEU Branch

Your colleagues at the University of New England (UNE) are aware of the proposed ballot for a general staff agreement, and subsequently the ballot for an academic staff agreement. It appears that the academic ballot is being conducted by the management of UWS because the NTEU had the audacity to urge UWS colleagues to vote ‘no’ in the general staff ballot. From our perspective at New England, it can be said that this is a rather typical reaction from university managements that are increasingly hysterical about hanging on to whatever amount of control that they think belongs to them.

There is a strong pattern emerging in management-CPSU behaviour in the higher education sector, marked by: 1. A resistance to NTEU claims; 2. An obsequiousness by the CPSU (which they would describe as a ‘can-do’ approach); and, 3. Arranging a behind-the-scenes deal about when to go to ballot to further undermine the NTEU.

Even without the problems contained in the present UWS offers, this approach would be concerning enough, as it sets up a sweet-heart arrangement that is unhealthy in and of itself.

But the situation becomes significantly more worrying when you look at the problems in the current proposal before UWS academic colleagues. Several of the diminutions in the proposed UWS academic agreement have been tried out at UNE (which has been nearly 18 months without a new agreement).

1. As at UWS, the management at UNE tried out the idea of academic workloads being ‘negotiated’ between individual academics and the Head of School. We defeated that proposition, but they still want as much prerogative as they can possibly claw back in our present draft. As professionals we must insist that we know best how to regulate workload among ourselves, and have those principles upheld in the collective agreement.

2. As at UWS, appeal rights in other universities have been attacked, including at UNE. It seems that university managements have not accepted that the Howard Government’s defeat came about as a result of its attacks on working conditions, including the right to due process. University educators have an obligation to set these sorts of standards at the highest level possible. If they cannot be maintained in universities, there is much doubt about whether they can be maintained elsewhere.

3. In particular, it is vital that UWS colleagues have just procedures restored in disciplinary committees. In several universities, there has been obdurate resistance to the restoration of a mutually agreed chair of such committees. At UNE, we have dragged the management, kicking and screaming, to a position of restoring the mutually agreed chair in the disciplinary committees. The tribunal model of the mutually agreed chair and the balance in the remainder of the committee is just, and is seen to be just.

4. UWS proposes something extremely dangerous in excluding Deans and Heads of School from the academic agreement. Perhaps the single most retrograde step at UNE over the past three years is the offer of exclusionist contracts to its senior staff (which are, to all intents and purposes, AWAs by another name). This has had a significant effect on how these staff relate to those they supervise. It sets up an ugly us-and-them situation so insidious that one can be criticised for simply observing that it has occurred.

There are other aspects of the UWS proposal that seem to be UWS management’s own creation, such as a reduction in accrual entitlement in annual leave, an imposition of ‘peer review’ (!), an increase in the probation period, and less secure employment.

For all of these reasons the hope of your colleagues at UNE is that you do not approve the proposed academic agreement. We ask you to vote no on 22-23 December. This ballot is an ambush, and it displays the utter lack of respect that currently prevails among managements in the sector. There is no need to rush a decision. We can all have decent conditions if we stick together for whatever time it takes us.

Tim Battin
Branch President
University of New England

The University of Sydney NTEU Branch wishes you all the best in your campaign for a good Enterprise Agreement. It seems some university managements and their friends believe John Howard and his anti-union attitudes and practices are still the way to go when you are dealing with employment relations. At Sydney University we have a new Enterprise Agreement that includes the provisions your management want to avoid. Our Agreement covers all staff who work at the University, has good workloads provision for academic staff and reclassification provisions for general staff. There are limits on the numbers of academic casuals – this means more ongoing positions. We have restored the job security provisions lost under Howard and enhanced annual leave entitlements. Our campaign was hard and well supported. We wish you all the best. University managements are isolated and removed form the university community – they need to show respect to those of us at the coal face.

If we can do anything to assist you please let the Branch know.

Regards
Michael Thomson
President
University of Sydney NTEU Branch

Also consider how many more admin roles there are in the banking and finance sector, they are also probably below average when you compare years of experince and qualifications.

http://content.mycareer.com.au/salary-centre/

Personally I would prefer that the people teaching me are some of the best in their field, and not the left overs from the private sector.