The University of New South Wales is one of Australia’s most prestigious Universities. This is mostly due to the excellent contribution of its academic, technical and professional staff staff to teaching and research.

Those staff are angry with UNSW management about how long it is taking to negotiate a new collective workplace agreement. All universities that have made agreements on staff conditions so far, have reinstated fair limits on the use of fixed-term staff, and significantly improved pay and conditions for all staff, including casuals. UNSW Management, in contrast, is proposing an agreement which would degrade the quality of its education and research by allowing the unlimited use of fixed-term and casual employment. Fixed-term staff numbers have already grown by 36% in the last four years.

In proposing this, UNSW is seeking to set aside basic award conditions, and retain draconian industrial arrangements introduced by the previous Federal government of John Howard, which have now been abolished. Moreover, it is doing so alone – all of Australia’s other top Universities are taking a different course, and reaching fair agreements with the unions who represent their staff.

If UNSW is the only university unwilling to provide job security, and UNSW trails its competitors in other work conditions, its chances of attracting quality staff and maintaining its academic profile will be threatened.

This is why UNSW staff have now taken the unprecedented step of imposing bans on student results.

This is why senior staff of the University have written to the Vice-Chancellor urging him to break the deadlock.

UNSW staff are committed to delivering excellence in research, teaching and professional administration. All we ask is that our workplace conditions support this.

VU Management Revisits Workchoices

Management at Victoria University are in the process of breaching agreements on workloads, said Dr Jamie Doughney, Victorian President of the National Tertiary Education Union today.

“Victoria University management are using sleight of hand to unilaterally impose higher workloads on fewer academic staff. This means more threats to jobs and higher student-staff ratios,” Dr Doughney said.

“Last year, staff at Victoria University voted in good faith for a new collective agreement. That agreement between the NTEU and Victoria University said there would be no change to existing workloads unless agreed jointly between the union and management.

“The holiday season has caused a technical delay in Fair Work Australia approving the new agreement. There is a short time before the new agreement becomes technically binding, but it is certainly morally binding,” he said.

“The University is relying on relics from the Howard-Government imposed collective agreement from several years ago that technically is still in place until the new agreement comes into effect,” said Dr Doughney.

Dr Doughney continued: “To use a technical delay and the annual leave period to sneak through changes is bad faith. It also means that management with malice aforethought will breach the Heads of Agreement, signed officially by the University last year.”

“No changes means no changes, unless agreed on jointly by the union and management. We just want fair negotiation, without a Howard-Government gun pointed at our heads,” said Dr Doughney.

The NTEU has created a website to raise awareness about this issue with staff, students and the community: www.vufacts.org.

For further information contact:

Alex White, Communications and Campaigns Officer

Email: awhite@vic.nteu.org.au,

National Tertiary Education Union (NTEU) members at two WA universities – Curtin University and  Murdoch University- will take industrial action tomorrow, Wednesday 16 September 2009.

NTEU members at these universities will participate in a 24 hour work stoppage to help win new collective agreements that deliver manageable workloads, increased job security, a fair wages outcome and other improvements to conditions that will ensure staff can continue to deliver quality educational outcomes for their students. The work stoppage will involve both academic and general staff.

In secret ballots conducted recently at both Curtin and Murdoch, over 80 per cent of voting members supported conducting industrial campaigns to secure new collective agreements. Tomorrow’s strike action are the first stoppages in support of the bargaining claims after over 12 months of negotiations.

NTEU WA Division Secretary Dr Lyn Bloom commented that “NTEU members have been negotiating  new collective agreements with each institution. The failure of managements to offer a fair deal, and their attempts to reduce staff working conditions,  has resulted in strike action being taken. University staff are notoriously reluctant to take industrial action and are doing so now because they have been forced into it by the failure of Managements at both Curtin and Murdoch to listen to their staff. In particular, Murdoch staff are calling for their salaries to be lifted to the level of those of their counterparts at Curtin, ECU and UWA.”

“It is time for management to invest in quality educational outcomes by ensuring improved staff : student ratios, more resources, improved conditions and a reduction in the casualisation of the sector through improved conditions and more secure jobs for casual staff,” Dr Bloom said.

There will be a Rally at 11:30 am on Wednesday 16 September 2009 at Victoria Gardens in East Perth. Speakers will include NTEU National Assistant Secretary Ted Murphy.

For further information please contact:

Dr Jan Sinclair-Jones, NTEU Curtin Branch President on  0417 953 822

Janice Dudley, NTEU Murdoch Branch President on 0403 380 667

Dr Lyn Bloom, NTEU WA Division Secretary on 0417 930 113