Advocate, Nov 2015

Advocate vol. 22 no. 3 • November 2015 • www.nteu.org.au • ISSN 1329-7295

$100,000 degrees – Delayed, but not ditched ɓɓALP higher education policy ɓɓMembers defending our unis ɓɓThe case against deregulation ɓɓGovt withdraws Lomborg $4m ɓɓInvestigating research institutes

ɓɓNational Council Meeting ɓɓFederal Court wins for NTEU Victoria ɓɓEducation for sale around the world ɓɓTackling attrition rates ɓɓInnovation Revolution blues

ɓɓDivestment as a powerful tactic ɓɓAcademic workloads examined ɓɓThe misuse of metrics ɓɓAcademic freedom in Hong Kong ɓɓ... and much more.

Contents Cover image: Compilation of ‘No $100K Degree’ photos tweeted to new Education Minister Simon Birmingham in September.

Graphic: Toby Cotton

2

New Liberal ascendancy From the General Secretary

3

Changing university conversations Editorial, Jeannie Rea

4

Outsourcing at Newcastle and the business of detention

UNE shrouds Council decisions in cloak of secrecy

5

Two Federal Court wins for NTEU in Victoria

6

NTEU joins ACTU to Save Paid Parental Leave

Bjørn Free! Government withdraws Lomborg $4m

7

EI President speaks at UN for public education

New Greens higher ed spokesperson

8

2015 Women’s Conference & Bluestocking Week: Spin a Yarn, Start a Fire

Dream jobs at UC? Think again

10 Investigating research institutes 11 The unstoppable tide of marriage equality 12 Something big is happening: are you in?

13 This Changes Everything: responses to climate change

Global Climate Change Week for uni staff, students & communities

UNICASUAL NEWS 14 Workplace Gender Equity Reports reveal true levels of casualisation 16 Dear Casual Academics

Environment ISO 14001

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All text and images © NTEU 2015 unless otherwise stated.

p. 24

NTEU National Office, PO Box 1323, Sth Melbourne VIC 3205 1st floor, 120 Clarendon St, Sth Melbourne VIC phone (03) 9254 1910 fax (03) 9254 1915 email national@nteu.org.au Division Offices www.nteu.org.au/divisions Branch Offices www.nteu.org.au/branches

p. 48

UPDATE

9 Women in Science

In accordance with NTEU policy to reduce our impact on the natural environment, Advocate is printed using vegetable based inks with alcohol free printing initiatives on FSC certified paper under ISO 14001 Environmental Certification.

Advocate ISSN 1321-8476 Published by National Tertiary Education Union ABN 38 579 396 344 Publisher Grahame McCulloch Editor Jeannie Rea Production Paul Clifton Editorial Assistance Anastasia Kotaidis Feedback, advertising and other enquiries: advocate@nteu.org.au

900 STF jobs. Has your uni filled them yet?

A&TSI NEWS 17 Change of PM does not equate to a change in the agenda

New A&TSI Caucus logo

18 A&TSI bargaining outcomes 18 The return of Mal Brough 19 Unaipon Centre to close

Different White People

FEATURES 20 University deregulation: Delayed, not ditched Does the appointment of Simon Birmingham as the new Minister for Education and Training signal a new approach to higher education policy? Or will it be a case of the more things change the more they stay the same?

22 Pollies speak out against $100K degrees NTEU has released a series of short videos featuring some of Australia’s most prominent politicians voicing their opposition to the Coalition Government’s higher education agenda.

23 Defending our unis NTEU members and volunteers were out in force during September as part of a coordinated campaign targeting the Government’s unfair plans for higher education funding cuts, deregulation and $100,000 degrees.

26 ALP higher education policy The ALP’s higher education policy stands in stark contrast to the Coalition’s deregulatory agenda.

27 Divestment as a powerful tactic Our universities are under attack from governments and the powerful corporate interests pulling their strings. But divestment can be used as a tool to benefit both the environment and our sector.

28 The case against the deregulation of tertiary education A deregulated education market has been on trial in Victoria’s VET sector since 2008, and it has been a failure.

30 Education for sale An international panel at NTEU National Council 2015 explained how the privatisation and commercialisation of education is undermining the expansion of educational opportunities for children and adults around the world.

33 Time to strengthen University Acts?

WA University Acts are foreshadowed to replace elected staff representatives on with appointed ones. But the changes also present opportunities.

34 Singing the Innovation Revolution blues National innovation has come into sharp relief in 2015, with competing reviews looking for new thinking on national innovation policy and the regulation of public research signalling some big implications for universities.

36 Tackling university attrition rates Opposition Leader Bill Shorten has revealed Labor’s policy platform for higher education, saying the focus would be on retaining students in higher education and curbing the numbers dropping out.

37 What is the value of postgrads?

Univeristy students do not simply consume, they contribute towards the business of their university. Yet this is often overlooked or undervalued.

38 The misuse of metrics The widespread use and misuse of research metrics is leading to increased concern in scientific and broader academic communities worldwide.

40 Not waving, drowning NTEU’s Expert Seminar series on academic workloads examined the problems and possibilities of fairly regulating academic workloads.

41 TPP, copyright law & education There is much concern about the impact of the TPP upon public education.

42 Hong Kong: Protests in support of academic freedom When an academic accused of plagiarism makes front page headlines for three to four days, there has to be more to it.

43 Zimbabwe: A tough road for unionist lecturers COLUMNS 44 iPhone, uPay News from the Net, by Pat Wright 45 A chat with the Beloved Supreme Leader Lowering the Boom, by Ian Lowe 46 Dear Mr Turnbull Thesis Whisperer, Inger Mewburn 47 We can’t and shouldn’t teach people into a job Letter from NZ, Sandra Grey, TEU YOUR UNION 48 National Council 2015 determines secure jobs critical for quality 54 2015 Life Members 56 Round 7 bargaining in universities 57 A most unlikely union: launch of NTEU history 58 New NTEU staff 59 Obituary: Maarten Rothengatter

NTEU ADVOCATE • vol. 22 no. 3 • November 2015 • www.nteu.org.au/advocate • page 1

From the General Secretary Grahame McCulloch, General Secretary

New Liberal ascendancy Malcolm Turnbull’s overthrow of Tony Abbott as Prime Minister is reflected in generational changes with the rise of Mitch Fifield, Peter Hendy, Michaela Cash, Kelly O’Dwyer, Josh Frydenberg and Arthur Sinodinos. In wider political terms, this group is dynamic with a blend of youth and experience and is – for the union movement at least – potentially lethal.

The new Prime Minister and his ministry are economically dry and have much more socially liberal views than those of the paleo-Liberals associated with the former Prime Minister. Many have backgrounds with merchant banks and traders, resource and energy companies and international corporate, legal and accounting services.

By and large they are a well- educated, cosmopolitan and cultured group. They are independently wealthy and some are a little detached from reality (perhaps a little like today’s Vice-Chancellors).

We can expect a more professional and articulate advocacy of cuts to, and a greater role for markets in, many aspects of health, social welfare, public universities and colleges, and other forms of public service delivery.

The new Government will continue the regime of boat turnbacks and the offshore processing and detention of asylum seekers, and is vocal on the need to reduce penalty rates and to increase the rate and base for the GST – both standard Liberal

hunting grounds. Above all, the new Government will remain anti-union and will press for lower minimum industrial standards in awards and collective agreements.

Turnbull has already shown his ability to project social liberalism while maintaining conservative unity. The subtle but creative shift on the nature of any marriage equality plebiscite, a thaw in (if not the end of ) the culture wars with the ABC, Fairfax, and the wider liberal intelligentsia, and the abolition of Abbott’s ill-fated return to royalist honours, are markers of this.

This new Liberal ascendancy exposes the Labor Party’s key weakness – the leadership of Bill Shorten who is sleepwalking his shadow ministry to defeat.

This new Liberal ascendancy exposes the Labor Party’s key weakness – the leadership of Bill Shorten who is sleepwalking his shadow ministry to defeat.

He is wooden, projects as old-fashioned and is factionally tarnished. Bill has had a life-long commitment to the trade union movement, but this commitment was always borne of wider calculation. When the public reports lacking trust in the Labor leader, they sense that he is no more than pragmatism seeking principles. There is no authentic narrative. I don’t think Labor can win with Shorten.

NATIONAL EXECUTIVE

NATIONAL OFFICE STAFF

National President Jeannie Rea Vice-President (Academic) Andrew Bonnell Vice-President (General Staff) Michael Thomson

Industrial Unit Coordinator Sarah Roberts National Industrial Officers Linda Gale, Wayne Cupido,

Susan Kenna, Elizabeth McGrath

General Secretary Grahame McCulloch National Assistant Secretary Matthew McGowan

Policy & Research Coordinator Policy & Research Officers

Aboriginal & Torres Strait Islander (A&TSI) Policy Committee Chair Terry Mason National Executive: Stuart Bunt, Carolyn Cope, Gabe Gooding, Genevieve Kelly, Colin Long, Virginia Mansel Lees, Kelvin Michael, Michael McNally, Anne Price, Kevin Rouse, Cathy Rytmeister, John Sinclair, Ron Slee, Mel Slee, Lolita Wikander

National A&TSI Coordinator National A&TSI Organiser

Paul Kniest Jen Tsen Kwok, Terri MacDonald Adam Frogley Celeste Liddle

National Organiser Michael Evans, Rob Binnie National Publications Coordinator Paul Clifton Media & Communications Officer Andrew MacDonald National Membership Officer Melinda Valsorda Education & Training Officers Ken McAlpine,

Helena Spyrou

page 2 • NTEU ADVOCATE • vol. 22 no. 3 • November 2015 • www.nteu.org.au/advocate

There is an irony at work here, because at the same time the new Labor higher education policy (under Kim Carr) has disavowed Labor’s previous spending cuts with a commitment to at least 2.5 per cent increases in annual funding and a greater role for a re-vamped planning and performance commission.

This is the wider political terrain in which the Union will prosecute the upcoming 2016-19 Enterprise Bargaining Round and our political campaign against university deregulation and funding cuts. This will require NTEU and the union movement more widely to review tactics and strategy. Despite the Liberal dominance, the power of public campaigning and opinion remains strong. New Higher Education Minister, Simon Birmingham has backed away from the Pyne $100,000 degree deregulation model, and it is clear that our campaign (together with problems in the private VET college market) has forced a new policy debate where planning, price caps and regulation are part of the discussion.

Our challenge is to organise in the workplace, in the Parliament and in the wider public arena. A Turnbull Government is as dangerous as its Abbott predecessor. Mark its position on industrial relations, penalty rates (on which many students depend), climate change, industry superannuation and trade union regulation. We have the power to check and eventually defeat these policies in the university sector and beyond.

Grahame McCulloch, General Secretary gmcculloch@nteu.org.au

Executive Manager Peter Summers ICT Network Engineer Tam Vuong Database Programmer/Data Analyst Ray Hoo Payroll Officer Jo Riley Executive Officer (Gen Sec & President) Anastasia Kotaidis Executive Officer (Administration) Tracey Coster Admin Officer (Membership & Campaigns) Julie Ann Veal Administrative Officer (Resources) Renee Veal Receptionist & Administrative Support Leanne Foote Finance Manager Glenn Osmand Senior Finance Officer Gracia Ho Finance Officers Alex Ghvaladze, Tamara Labadze,

Lee Powell, Daphne Zhang National Growth Organisers Gaurav Nanda,

Rifai Abdul, Priya Nathan

Editorial Jeannie Rea, National President

Changing university conversations At our National Women’s Conference in August we had a Q&A where a panel of university staff, union officials and students were asked: What would you do if you were ViceChancellor for a day?

Not surprisingly panellists focused upon respecting staff; workloads, career progression and job security; reallocating funds away from the latest bright and shiny fad; introducing transparency and accountability of management; fair dinkum staff and student involvement in decision making; and not just acknowledging, but dealing with the real impacts of gender discrimination (see p. 8).

It was a quite different discussion to that witnessed by the few staff and students on major university decision making forums – academic boards and University Councils/ Senates. When we protest the downgrading of the powers of academic boards, and attempts to remove elected staff and student voices from Councils (see p. 33), it is not just because we should be represented, but because we want to know what is being talked and to influence the agenda. Staff and students need to be there to counter the corporate narrative where students are customers and staff are production inputs.

A bigger conversation is needed throughout the university community that grapples with the big issues occupying the attention of politicians, business, unions and the community sector. At the National Reform Summit in August, no one was invited to represent the education sector. It fell to the Australian Education Union President and myself to speak up for education. However, the prevailing narrative was that there is a mismatch between what is being taught in TAFE and universities and the job market.

Everyone has an opinion on what schools, TAFE and universities should be doing, and will happily offer criticism, too often based one personal negative anecdote. This negativity is at odds with the reality that increasing numbers of students are succeeding at university and going onto good careers. Public perceptions of universities are overall highly positive. However, this does not mean ignoring the real issues, which staff cope with every day working to maintain high quality education and

research. We need to be inserting ourselves much more strongly into the public conversations, which also influence the external members of University Councils.

Scanning the agendas of recent forums, political speeches and media commentary, the big issues which universities are expected to address are the impact of ‘disruptive technologies’ and Australia’s place in the global economy and polity.

There are demands that universities must teach the right stuff for graduates to walk straight into jobs. Yet at the same time we are told that we must ensure that graduates are able to nimbly jump from job to job adapting to technological change.

Insecure work is a given in this discourse, not a policy or political choice which should be challenged.

Demands are made of ‘universities’ but university staff are largely invisible in the commentary, except for the old ‘academics must get out of their ivory towers’ trope. ‘University work forces must change’ is the mantra, but there is little respect for university workers. Replacing staff with technological fixes dominates the advice to university managers. So while staff support the education of students for a rapidly changing workforce, we are treated as redundant if we do not fit neatly with the latest restructure.

With international education being Australia’s third largest export, universities contributing more than 1.5 per cent of GDP and the stock of knowledge generated by university research equivalent to almost 10 per cent of GDP (Universities Australia policy statement, Oct 2015), there should be greater acknowledgement that is the staff that make this happen, whether in educating and supporting international students, international research collaboration, or contributing to global policy making and implementation. However, the internal and political discourse is trapped by the obsession with international research rankings, which arguably universities also jeopardise by employing researchers on shorter and shorter contracts (see p. 10).

‘Defending our universities’ is a terrific slogan, but we must get more canny and explicit that this includes advocating for university staff to be centrally involved in debates and decisions about ‘our’ universities. Few could be satisfied with communication limited to the Vice-Chan-

cellors’ global emails or management ‘roadshows’. Whilst appreciating those Vice-Chancellors who come to meetings organised by the NTEU, these too are largely asynchronous. In an environment of redundancies and non-renewal of contracts most staff are reluctant to speak up. Consultative processes are increasingly dismissed as farcical with all sides cynical about changing anyone’s mind. The only consultative committees with real power are in the Collective Agreements (EBAs) because they have legal force. However, union representatives are continually frustrated at trying to get decisions made and implemented.

So what would we talk about if we set the agenda for university community conversations? A focus on what is happening to our public universities is clearly pivotal, and there is a good initiative in the conference on challenging the privatised university organised by the UQ Global Change Institute with Friends of the Earth in late November (http://privatiseduni.com).

Environmental sustainability and human rights, though, are the issues mobilising staff and students on campuses. Successfully campaigning against establishing a platform for Bjørn Lomborg (see p.

6), convincing universities not to do business with companies like Transfield (see p. 4), and the rapidly spreading fossil fuels divestment campaign (see p. 27) are indicative.

NTEU National Council decided to investigate developing a campaign to boycott Pearson Education because of its global dominance in the privatising education (see pp. 28 & 49). This could lead to lively debates on campuses. Sexual violence on campus is an issue that cannot be ignored with staff speaking to the media about sexual harassment and NUS’s ‘Talk about It’ survey finding the problem is getting worse. Now we know, the NTEU cannot avoid getting involved.

The NTEU took the leadership in what has become characterised as the ‘No $100,000 Degrees’ campaign and we will keep opposing deregulation and proposing a fair, principled and sustainable alternate funding policy. But we also expect to be influencing the debate about what goes on in our universities.

Jeannie Rea, National President jrea@nteu.org.au

NTEU ADVOCATE • vol. 22 no. 3 • November 2015 • www.nteu.org.au/advocate • page 3

Update Outsourcing at Newcastle and the business of detention NTEU University of Newcastle (UON) Branch is calling on University management to find a way to lawfully terminate its outsourcing contract with Transfield Services.

Like administrations in many Australian universities, senior management of the University of Newcastle (UON) are attracted to contracting out an increasing range of work. After a December 2012 review of the Infrastructure and Facilities Services unit, the University chose a hyper-outsourcing option and awarded an $88 million/five-year contract to Transfield Services, to act as the ‘head contractor’, and ‘to manage and coordinate the provision of infrastructure management and maintenance services across our campuses’. The claimed benefit is avoiding dealing directly with the cited ‘32 separate maintenance suppliers over 14 service areas’.

Knowledge of the Transfield deal provoked immediate responses from staff, including

UNE shrouds Council decisions in cloak of secrecy In February 2015, the University of New England (UNE) accused the NTEU Branch President, Professor Margaret Sims, who also sits on the UNE Council, of a conflict of interest.

The University effectively stated that Professor Sims’ duties as Branch President inherently conflicted with her duty to act on University Council in the best interests of the University.

a snap letter to the Vice-Chancellor signed by more than 80 staff members, and a resolution from the NTEU Branch opposing the contract and calling on UON management to reverse the decision. This followed many months of work by the Branch seeking assurances from management to protect local jobs, and working conditions, of staff affected by the (then foreshadowed) outsourcing arrangements.

Our Branch resolution focused on the bizarre contradiction between the University publicly promoting its commitments to equity and social justice (most recently embodied in the creation of its Centre of Excellence for Equity in Higher Education), while also choosing to do business with a company complicit in ongoing abuses of vulnerable men, women and children, through lucrative contracts to run Australia’s offshore detention centres on Manus Island and Nauru.

NTEU members will be aware of the 2014 National Council motion calling on UniSuper to divest from companies that receive money for the mandatory and offshore detention of refugees, based on NTEU’s opposition to the policy of mandatory detention. There is a high level of support at UON amongst NTEU members and other staff for the NTEU Branch’s actions opposing the deal with Transfield.

NTEU is working effectively with the local undergraduate (NUSA) and postgraduate (NUPSA) student associations on this campaign, as well as a broad, grassroots collective of staff and students. We are

Despite Professor Sims’ protestations and assurances that if any matter presenting a conflict arose on Council, she would recuse herself (a duty that is incumbent on all Councillors), the University proceeded to remove her access to Council papers and meetings where, in the opinion of the Chancellor, a conflict arose.

Importantly, Professor Sims is not permitted to know even the general nature of the material or discussions she was excluded from: her access to papers and meetings was determined by the Chancellor’s unilateral recommendation.

Subject headings in agenda and minutes were redacted. She has no way to be sure that she has not been excluded from key decisions about finances, University policy or strategy.

It is open to NTEU to conclude that this approach is intended to ensure staff are not informed of key university decisions

page 4 • NTEU ADVOCATE • vol. 22 no. 3 • November 2015 • www.nteu.org.au/advocate

also liaising with the national No Business in Abuse group. One example of effective collective action is the successful Ethics 101: UoN and the business of detention public forum held on October 20. At the forum we also launched an open letter to the Vice-Chancellor, Professor Caroline McMillen, calling on the University to: 1. Lawfully withdraw UON from its dealings with Transfield.

2. Adopt the No Business in Abuse pledge to ‘only support companies, institutions and organisations that refuse to support or profit from abusive practices towards people seeking asylum’.

We see this as a great organising opportunity to further push the case for ethical investment and procurement policies in the higher education sector, ruling out doing business with those in the business of detention.

Dr Tom G. Griffiths and Dr Liam Phelan, University of Newcastle We encourage NTEU members to sign on to the open letter to the VC: communityrun.org/p/uon-no-abuse

that might be considered sensitive in nature.

In taking this step the University fell foul of the University of New England Act, which provides that the member has to judge for themselves, based on the subject matter, whether a conflict is likely to exist. Professor Sims was not permitted to make this judgement due to the conduct of the University.

The University has also taken adverse action against Professor Sims due to her holding an elected position in the Union, which is in breach of the Fair Work Act. By drawing a cloak over the proceedings of the University of New England Council, UNE has brought the quality of its governance into serious question.

Sarah Roberts, National Industrial Coordinator

Update Two Federal Court wins for NTEU in Victoria The Victorian Division of the NTEU had two important Federal Court victories in early October, which may have major ramifications for all members.

La Trobe University The first of these involved La Trobe University and saw the full bench of the Federal Court deliver a landmark judgement that effectively restores the job security rights of thousands of staff at La Trobe.

In 2014, La Trobe University Vice Chancellor and ally of Christopher Pyne, John Dewar, announced 350 staff would be sacked without any voluntary redundancies.

By August 2014, NTEU had exposed that Dewar sought to fund a massive new buildings project by slashing the number of people who actually make up the La Trobe University community.

NTEU took La Trobe to the Fair Work Commission (FWC), and in September the Commission required Dewar to properly consult with NTEU and staff, and consider all the feedback. Critically, the FWC also made clear that a policy only in favour of compulsory redundancies would not meet the obligations under the Job Security provisions of the Enterprise Agreement and that ‘all alternatives should be examined’.

However, whilst some areas at La Trobe University explored alternatives, other

areas vigorously pursued an approach we believe contravened the Agreement.

With little other choice, NTEU launched Federal Court action in November 2014 to stop senior management’s flagrant disregard for job security rights. That case was lost, but in May 2015 our Appeal of that judgement was heard, with the successful outcome in October. Very briefly, the majority of the full bench found that the university had an obligation to use compulsory retrenchment only as a last resort. The case has now been remitted to the primary judge for re-hearing.

This was an important case not just for the thousands of staff at La Trobe, but also because a number of other universities with very similar Agreement clauses.

Swinburne University The second of the cases involved senior management of Swinburne University threatening adverse action against their own staff by engaging in a process to de-unionise a part of the University (Swinburne College) and reduce the terms and conditions of staff in it.

In 2013, the University’s senior management created a shell company called Swinburne College Pty Ltd. Four positions were created within it and four people were moved or appointed to those positions.

Management then attempted to introduce an Enterprise Bargaining Agreement with much reduced conditions for those four staff, with the intention of then moving all the other people employed by Swinburne College into the new entity on those reduced terms and conditions.

When NTEU discovered this plot, as Swinburne was taking the new Agreement to the FWC for approval, the Union intervened. Swinburne withdrew the Agreement, but in the process NTEU was able to discover documents that showed that the whole scheme was concocted to discriminate against staff on the basis of

their union membership, to de-unionise the workforce and to reduce terms and conditions of employment. That is, Swinburne had threatened to commit adverse action against its staff.

In response, the NTEU took Swinburne to the Federal Court on the adverse action claim. In June 2015, the Federal Court of Australia heard admissions by Swinburne University that Senior Managers had threatened adverse action against staff.

In resolving the Court Action, Swinburne agreed to: • Pay $120 000 of the NTEU legal costs associated with the case.

• Close the secret phoenix company used to try to smash the conditions of workers and their unions.

• Plead guilty to threatening adverse action against its own staff.

• Pay a penalty for their conduct.

In a remarkable judgement, Her Honour Justice Mortimer was scathing in her assessment of the conduct of Senior Management, stating: …the seniority of those involved does say something about the calculated nature of the contravention, because for those at such senior levels to be involved, it is clear that this was a carefully planned course of action, over a considerable period of time, with objectives and outcomes to which experienced and senior people had turned their minds. Part of that plan (I accept, not the whole of it) included a consciousness that the entitlements of employees at Swinburne College could be adversely affected if the proposal went ahead. Indeed the cost savings and more favourable industrial landscape for Swinburne (especially at the expense of its casual and fixed-term employees) were motivating factors in the proposal.

Colin Long, Victorian Division Secretary Transcript of the La Trobe judgement: www.nteu.org.au/library/view/id/6573 Transcript of the Swinburne judgement: www.nteu.org.au/vic/article/NTEUHolds-Swinburne-to-Account-forUnion-Busting---Culprits-Must-Go-18032

Photo: NTEU members protesting at La Trobe in 2014.

NTEU ADVOCATE • vol. 22 no. 3 • November 2015 • www.nteu.org.au/advocate • page 5

Update NTEU joins ACTU to Save Paid Parental Leave The NTEU has joined the ACTU and other unions in the fight to defeat the Coalition Government’s so-called Fairer Paid Parental Leave Bill, currently before a Senate Committee of Inquiry.

In May this year the Government announced changes to the Commonwealth’s Paid Parental Leave (PPL) scheme, which would see 80,000 women lose access to the Government scheme, significantly reducing the time the majority of women can take to care and bond with their new baby.

The proposed downgrading of the PPL scheme is a complete reversal of the ‘rolled gold’ version the Coalition promised voters when they ran for election. Instead it re-positions parental leave from being a hard-fought for workplace entitlement to a welfare payment. No other form of leave is treated in this way.

Worse still, at the time of its announcement the Government attempted to garner popular support for their ‘fair’ changes by saying it was being ‘rorted’ by new mothers who were accessing both the Government PPL and (where available) and their employer supported PPL. However, what was deliberately omitted by the Government was that in accessing both schemes, mothers and other primary care givers were not ‘double dipping’, committing ‘fraud’ or ‘rorting’, but instead using the PPL framework as it was originally intended.

The Government’s PPL scheme provides 18 weeks’ leave at the minimum wage, with payments currently totalling $11,500.

There is no superannuation attached and it essentially replaces the (Howard Government’s) Baby Bonus for ‘working mums’.

The reason that the scheme was set so low was that it was always intended to be a base for unions and employees to negotiate for better employer supported

PPL, with the goal being to reach 26 weeks (approximately 6 months) as advocated by health professionals and experts, as well as the World Health Organisation (WHO) and the International Labour Organisation (ILO). This system is designed to provide a minimal safety net (the Government’s PPL) whilst ensuring that parental leave remains an industrial right. Unions and employers can negotiate to improve the Government’s PPL ‘base’, ensuring that the integrity of current employer PPL arrangements are maintained.

While the NTEU continues to lobby for improvements to the Government PPL framework (including superannuation and changes to the work test to encompass more casual, sessional and seasonal workers), a recent Government supported review of the PPL system found that overall it was working as intended, with more mothers and other primary carers accessing better parental leave provisions and returning to work when ready, instead of dropping out of the workforce.

For the Coalition Government to suddenly turn the tables and effectively deny almost half of eligible mothers (or other eligible primary carers) access to some, or all, of the Government’s PPL - when many have bargained around PPL with the 18 weeks as a base - is both reducing their conditions and downgrading parental leave as an entitlement. For those who are yet to win employer sponsored PPL this change is a disincentive for their employers to negotiate, potentially leaving them stranded with what is a substandard scheme.

Finally, should it be adopted, it’s likely that many employers would consider abandoning their current PPL provisions altogether, forcing more mothers and primary carers to rely on 18 weeks leave at minimum wage. It is, indeed, a step backwards for all.

NTEU has made a submission to the Senate Inquiry opposing the proposed Fairer Paid Parental Leave Amendment Bill 2015. We are also supporting the ACTU’s campaign to Save Paid Parental Leave.

To find out more head to the campaign page on the NTEU website, download the fact sheet and sign the ACTU’s Save Paid Parental Leave petition.

Bjørn free!

Government withdraws Lomborg $4m On 21 October the Federal Government withdrew its offer of $4 million to any Australian university willing to host the ‘Consensus Centre’ of Danish climate sceptic Bjørn Lomborg.

NTEU Flinders University Branch President Ron Slee welcomed the news on behalf of university staff, who had been contending with a pitch by management to house the centre.

‘An unprecedented groundswell of opposition from Flinders University staff and students arose in response to senior management’s play for the money,’ said Slee.

He said the decision ‘is a welcome relief for a university community that has been relentless in its campaign to protect against the reputational damage that would inevitably travel with the Lomborg money.’

The NTEU will continue to oppose attempts by governments or corporations to distort the autonomy of our public universities.

Such attempts threaten to undermine one of the core purposes of universities: to engage in free and curiosity-based research, undistorted by extraneous interests.

Andrew MacDonald, Media & Communications Officer

Terri MacDonald, Policy & Research Officer www.nteu.org.au/paidparentalleave

Our Paid Parental Leave (PPL) scheme for working parents is designe to ensure babies have the best possible start in life. So why does the paid parental leave: 6 months paid leave towant spend timeto with acut new baby.

Butfor the 80,000 families?

Abbott government PPL

page 6 • NTEU ADVOCATE vol.steadily 22 no. 3 •been November • www.nteu.org.au/advocate Australia•has moving2015 towards the highest international standards on

Update EI President speaks at UN for public education Education International (EI) President Susan Hopgood addressed the United Nations in New York on 26 September, focussing upon the critical role of educators in ensuring success of Sustainable Development Goal (SDG) No 4: Ensure inclusive and quality education for all and promote lifelong learning.

Education International (EI) represents 32 million teachers in 171 countries and had advocated strongly for focus upon quality and lifelong (not only basic) education.

The goal has powerful targets with a solid focus on gender equity rights for girls and women, and on adult education and training. The SDGs replace the Millennium Development Goals and will be implemented over the next 15 years.

Hopgood, who is also National Secretary of the Australian Education Union (AEU), was speaking at Global Education First Initiative (GEFI), with General Director of UNESCO Irina Bokova, UN Envoy for Global

New Greens higher ed spokesperson During the same week as the Liberal leadership spill, the Australian Greens confirmed their new SA Senator, Robert Simms, would take on responsibility for higher education within the party.

Senator Simms, a former NTEU member, was elected by SA Greens members to fill the Senate spot vacated by Penny Wright earlier this year. He replaced NSW Senator Lee Rhiannon as the Greens Higher Education Spokesperson.

Senator Simms has served as an Adelaide City Councillor, has a background in campaigning and communications, and has worked in the community sector. He holds a Bachelor of Laws and Legal Practice, a Bachelor of Arts and a Graduate

SDGs make the commitments to finance the goals.This is the tough part, because the SDGs force us to break down the silos.

Education Gordon Brown and Nobel laureates Malala Yousafzai and Kailash Satyarthi.

Hopgood’s speech challenged those now resting upon their laurels having achieved the tough words.

‘Yesterday, the governments of the world reached an historic agreement. They said that a critical priority of this generation is free quality primary and secondary education for all with qualified teachers in a safe environment,’ said Susan Hopgood.

‘Let us not be humble about Goal 4. Education’s inclusion is a major success. For the last two years Education International has worked tirelessly to see education made a goal for 2030. This wasn’t the case even a short time ago. Global stakeholders viewed ‘education for all’ as mission accomplished and saw no need to continue to prioritize it. We won that fight.

No matter how profound or unprecedented, these are words, not deeds. The game changes after the speeches when the players take the field; when the governments who’ve made the grand promises of the Certificate in Journalism.

He has also taught in the politics department of Flinders University, while undertaking a PhD. Senator Simms comes to the job with new Education Minister Senator Simon Birmingham having announced the Government will delay the re-introduction of its controversial deregulation legislation.

Senator Simms said the fight to have the legislation dumped altogether was not yet over.

‘Minister Birmingham has only ruled out deregulation up until the next election, suggesting that these reforms are really just resting rather than dead and buried.

The community must keep campaigning on this issue to ensure that these reforms stay in the ground,’ said Senator Simms.

‘University deregulation is absolutely not the answer. We don’t want to go down the failed US model of education that

On education, the world is more than ready for quality; it’s sick and tired of pretend solutions. Tablets don’t replace teachers any more than cassette tapes did.

More than two millennia of teachers and students have watched fads come and go while study after study reports the value of high-quality professional teachers. Teachers are not merely a ‘means of implementation,’ but change agents with transformative powers when they are qualified and supported with professional development, quality tools and safe environments for teaching and learning.

No single goal addresses these conditions of poverty, conflict, natural disaster, health, hunger, infrastructure. Civil society efforts and philanthropy are not enough.

And those public-private partnerships that drive private agendas with public money are a hoax that prey on weak governments and pick winners and losers among the population.’

Read or view Susan Hopgood’s speech: www.ei-ie.org/en/news/news_ details/3724 www.youtube.com/ watch?v=NnqHNjX4vVE SDG No 4 on Education: www.un.org/sustainabledevelopment/ education

means the quality of your education is determined by the size of your bank balance.’

Senator Simms listed under-investment in universities and the explosion of for-profit providers entering the VET sector as among the biggest issues facing higher education.

‘Nearly every major victory for the progressive cause has come on the back of unified and mobilised collective action,’ said Senator Simms. ‘The NTEU has been at the forefront of the fight against deregulation and there is no doubt that this strong community campaign lead the Government to back away from that agenda. We have to ensure, of course that it permanently abandons that agenda.’

NTEU publicly thanked former Greens spokesperson Senator Lee Rhiannon for her passionate and relentless advocacy for free and fair higher education and against deregulation and privatisation.

NTEU ADVOCATE • vol. 22 no. 3 • November 2015 • www.nteu.org.au/advocate • page 7

Update 2015 Women’s Conference & Bluestocking Week

Spin a Yarn, Start a Fire This year has been a busy one for the women of the NTEU, with the Union’s biennial National Women’s Conference also launching our annual Bluestocking Week.

National Women’s Conference Held in Melbourne on Friday 7 and Saturday 8 August, the Conference saw delegates attend from all Branches and Divisions of the Union. Working under the banner of ‘Women in Higher Education.

Now. ‘, delegates had the opportunity to talk with our guest speakers and each other about some of the most salient issues facing women in higher education today.

While women are now the majority of staff and students in our universities, we also continue to face petty and serious sex and gender based discrimination. We have made tremendous gains in participation across disciplines and occupations and yet both women students and staff still report feeling they are a minority with limited voice and agency. What do we want now?

What changes do we need to make? How can we be more effective?

The 2015 Women’s Conference addressed these questions, asking ‘where are women now?’, and through sessions and workshops on subjects as varied as intersectionality, cultural and institutional ‘bromance’, women and superannuation, industrial issues, women within the union movement and more, over two engaging days.

These conversations were supported with an impressive line up of thought provoking women speakers and panellists, including Professor Sharon Bell (DVC Charles Darwin University), Dr Sandra Grey (President, NZ Tertiary Education Union), Associate Professor Rae Cooper (University of Sydney), Liberty Sanger (Principal lawyer, Maurice Blackburn), Jennifer O’Donnell-Pirisi (former Victorian Trades Hall Women’s Officer) and Rose Steele (President, National Union of Students), just to name a few (for a full list of guest speaker and workshop attendees see link at end of this article).

Organised by the national Women’s Action Committee (WAC), which has an academic and general staff representative from each NTEU Division as well as a nominee from the Aboriginal and Torres Strait Islander Policy Committee, the Conference also launched the NTEU’s Bluestocking Week (10-14 August) on Friday evening, featuring a live performance by Melbourne comedian Monica Dullard.

Bluestocking Week Bluestocking week this year encouraged participants to tell their stories to stir the pot and fan the flames, and our members responded, with well over forty events organised by NTEU and student women on campuses. This is a clear affirmation of the 2011 decision of the NTEU and the National Union of Students (NUS) to bring back Bluestocking Week and enabled the reclamation of time and space on university campuses to talk about women’s rights and achievements in higher education.

The experiences shared by women at both the Conference and Bluestocking Week highlight that while our universities may have lots of women, most campuses are still masculinist spaces with decision making power and disciplinary dominance in the traditional male areas. Women are still reporting discrimination and harassment as they make their way around campus.

Gender continues to intersect with and compound the issues women face, and both the NTEU Women’s Conference and Bluestocking Week are important for not only ensuring women’s voices are heard, but in engaging with each other and creating activist networks, through which the patriarchal canon can be questioned and challenged.

To catch up on what happened in 2015 Bluestocking Week, see the link at end of this article.

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Agenda All women members (and men who have opted to subscribe) would have received their copy of the NTEU’s annual women’s magazine Agenda in September.

With articles covering the issues raised in the National Women’s Conference and in Bluestocking Week as well as more what is happening in higher education and unions for women, it is a must read. Download it from the link below.

Agenda: www.nteu.org.au/agenda Bluestocking Week: www.nteu.org.au/bluestockingweek National Women’s Conference speakers: www.nteu.org.au/women/ conference/2015/speakers

Above: ‘If we ran the university’ Q&A at the 2015 National Women’s Conference. Credit: Terri MacDonald Below: The Bluestocking Week 2015 poster.

Design: Maryann Long

Update Women in Science Professors Sharon Bell and Lyn Yates sought to be positive in the sub-heading on their latest research report on women in the science research workforce: ‘Identifying and sustaining the diversity advantage’.

The reality is that their investigation into the biology and chemistry research workforces confirmed that it is still (much) harder for women than men to get ahead in a science career.

Whilst many of the barriers identified decades ago remain, the big change is that women are now taking on undergraduate and postgraduate studies in much greater numbers, but for most women scientists, their university research careers still unwind.

Male bias continues to be a barrier to appointing and promoting women, but that, I would argue, is often due to fear of competition and disruption to the comfortable homogeneity of a largely masculine workplace. Women still have to be pioneers!

In launching the report on 7 September at the University of Melbourne, Vice-Chancellor Professor Glyn Davis acknowledged the seriousness of the key conclusions that the two major impediments to women are the ways that grants systems operate and the insecurity of research employment.

Women are disadvantaged by career stalls and stops due to not only having and raising children, but the assumption they will.

Jeannie Rea, National President Women in Science report: www.lhmartininstitute.edu.au/ documents/publications/wmn-insci-rsrch-rprt-web-070915.pdf Women in Science toolkit: womeninscienceresearch.org.au

Dream jobs at UC? Think again Assistant Professorships at the University of Canberra (UC) have attracted many great staff. But for many Assistant Professors, however, their role seems less like a dream than a nightmare.

The role may sound like a dream come true: Assistant Professors move through levels B and C of the seniority scale in seven years, with double-paced pay increments and no promotion barrier between Levels B and C. The sting in the tale is that incumbents must be promotable to level D – Associate Professor – by the end of the seven years, or lose their jobs. There is no in-between position.

The NTEU recently surveyed Assistant Professors in these contingent roles. The response rate of 70% of all staff in this category indicates they are keen to be heard.

Only 20% of the respondents believed their positions were likely to lead to a continuing role.

Insecurity + high expectations = vulnerability to exploitation The desperate race to be promoted rather than sacked makes these staff extremely vulnerable to unreasonable expectations, unsafe workloads, insecurity about speaking out, and the potential for bullying.

These roles were introduced in 2009 when, after a long, difficult bargaining period, Vice-Chancellor Stephen Parker made this a ‘deal-breaker’, without which he would not sign off on a new Enterprise Agreement. The NTEU was able to soften the original proposal so the roles were continuing, with a seven-year probation period, rather than fixed-term contracts.

On this basis we recommended the overall Enterprise Agreement package to members, who endorsed it.

The Assistant Professors’ bar for probation has been set so high, however, that the difference has proved to be fairly academic.

In bargaining now for a new UC Enterprise Agreement, the NTEU is seeking an option for staff who are performing satisfactorily at level C, but not yet promotable, to stay in their jobs on a continuing basis.

We are also negotiating to mandate more reasonable workloads for all UC staff.

We are aware that some supervisors of these hard-working staff know they are achieving well at Level C, and do not want to lose them. We entered bargaining hoping UC management also recognised this; instead its bargainers say they are very happy with the outcome of the Assistant Professorships and see no need for change.

Outcomes are good for UC, bad for most staff Management’s happiness is not really surprising. Most of these workers are teaching and researching at a frantic pace.

UC has jumped upwards in several world university ratings recently.

Some figures from our Assistant Professor survey will give an idea of what the results for the staff themselves have been: • 62% said the roles were extremely stressful.

• Only 11% said they were family friendly.

• 56% said the roles did not support research productivity, and 61% said they did not support research quality.

• 26% considered the role a career misstep, with another 22% saying it was somewhat of one.

• 64% believed workloads are unreasonable.

• 32% would not recommend that an acquaintance accept a UC Assistant Professorship; a further 54% would only recommend it with reservations.

Respondents also provided many comments, in which further common concerns appear: • People with family responsibilities are disadvantaged.

• Teaching loads are too high to allow research at the expected level.

• There is little support for professional development.

• Some Assistant Professors have taken extra leave simply to complete research.

• Due to the loss or burn-out of many staff, the strategy is not sustainable long-term.

Like many of those already in these roles, the NTEU warns academics to ask hard questions and think carefully before accepting an Assistant Professorship at the University of Canberra.

Jane Maze, ACT Division Organiser

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Update Investigating research institutes NTEU University of Queensland (UQ) Branch is approaching the halfway mark of a 6-month project investigating and organising in some of UQ’s major research institutes.

At one of the recent all-staff meetings at UQ’s Sustainable Minerals Institute (SMI), people were asked to describe some of their experiences working under fixedterm employment conditions. With tears in her eyes, one woman described the anxiety-inducing experience of rolling part-time, three-month contracts.

Another was spending her last day at the Institute attending the meeting, after having been employed for 18 years on fixed-term employment. For the last two years, she had been on rolling threemonth contracts. Despite having just won the Institute a three-year grant worth $3 million, management had decided not to renew her latest contract.

For one man, the sole income earner of his family, waiting for the next three-month contract offer to come through was understandably a rather stressful experience.

Admittedly, the SMI is a particularly acute case – for most other research institutes, fixed-term contracts are more likely to be around the 12-month mark and the rate of contract renewal tends to be a little higher.

Notwithstanding this, the levels of anxiety and uncertainty remain unsustainably high.

Fixed-term employment, like its equally damaging counterpart, casualisation, manages to sidestep many of the hardwon rights and conditions that permanent staff take for granted. While there may be no ‘instant dismissal’, there’s nothing to stop management from choosing not to renew a contract with little or no explanation. Amongst a group of over 2000 research-only staff, the prevalence of fixed-term employment at UQ currently stands at around 80 per cent – many of whom work in research institutes.

of a democratic system that characterised a distant past period in academia, research institutes are generally defined by structures that deny research staff even a modicum of influence in their workplace.

A suite of security measures physically restricts UQ’s research institutes, including swipe card access – not just to gain access to the building, but to different floors and workspaces. The result is a highly atomised workplace, where fostering a common worker identity and sense of collective power is hindered not just by hierarchical management structures, but by the very physical space in which researchers conduct their valuable work.

Further, thanks to the financial relationship enforced by most Australian Universities, research institutes are almost entirely reliant on grant funding for wages and associated costs. Thus the volatility of external research funding is used to propagate the false notion that fixed-term employment is an inevitability: permanency could impose an unsustainable financial burden on the Institute!

Whether intended or not, this combination acts effectively to discipline research staff and create a culture of subordination to even the most damaging of management practices.

In conjunction with the investigative component, the NTEU project is also focussed on building union strength in several of UQ’s major research institutes. At the Institute for Molecular Bioscience (IMB), we have formed a good relationship with the President of the Early Career Research Committee, who has partnered with us to run a seminar on early career progression and job security.

At the SMI, we have made some progress by first holding one-on-one meetings with both members and non-members and then shifting to holding regular all-staff meetings, where the focus was initially on airing staff members’ experiences with fixed-term employment.

Fixed-term employment forms the bedrock of the highly hierarchical and authoritarian management structures that define research institutes at UQ. Unlike most other schools and faculties, which have retained at least some of the vestiges

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It has now shifted to taking collective action by producing a group response to a proposed professional staff restructure.

The proposed structure involves significant reduction of professional staff, the creation of one new senior management position, and increased workloads for research and professional staff.

Our persistent presence at the Institute has already allowed us to wield some influence, with management agreeing to our request to extend the formal consultation period for the Professional Staffing Structure.

Over the course of this process there has been a discernable shift in the way that staff view fixed-term employment. No longer an inevitability, it has increasingly been viewed as a conscious decision by management and not a necessary evil to be tolerated.

And therein lies the crucial point. If research staff are to be mobilised against fixed-term employment, the terms of the debate must shift. Instead of accommodating the Institute and University’s apparent financial ‘realities’ when considering the working conditions of staff, we must instead frame it within the needs of staff – permanency and better working conditions are possible and the university’s finances must accommodate this.

Researchers produce enormous value for the University as an institution, not just through the millions of dollars of unpaid overtime, but also the countless grants, publications and significant publicity that the university values so keenly.

Tapping into this latent power requires a long-term, methodical process of organising that not only creates a powerful collective identity amongst the staff but also establishes novel and creative ways to overcome the severe legal restrictions on union activity.

Max Chandler-Mather, Project Officer, Queensland Division

Update The unstoppable tide of marriage equality The 2015 NTEU National Council reiterated support for marriage equality in Australia.

National President Jeannie Rea called upon the Australian Parliament ‘to legislate for marriage equality immediately’, noting the overwhelming support for marriage equality in the community and that being able to legally marry the person of one’s choice is a human right.

The Union has a long and proud history of campaigning on issues of equity and human rights, standing for equality, social justice, respect at work and a quality education for all. Members recognise that people of diverse sexualities and genders should be able to enjoy the full range of human rights throughout the world, without exception.

NTEU has been involved actively in the Australian marriage equality campaign, recognising that the marriage equality issue and campaign exits within a much larger context across the globe. This context includes violence against people of diverse sexualities and genders, prejudice and discrimination, equality of opportunity and medical issues including HIV/AIDS. Who can and cannot marry almost seems irrelevant when people are still being tortured and murdered for being gay, lesbian, transgender, bisexual, intersex or queer.

However, the Australian marriage equality campaign is not just about marriage. It is an issue that connects and unites allies, developing momentum for widespread change for people of diverse sexualities and genders across the world.

The movement for change Back in 2004 when the Howard Government changed the Marriage Act to discriminate against people of diverse sexualities and genders, just 38 per cent of the Australian public opposed that change. In July this year, Crosby/Textor released a sur-

vey showing support for marriage equality at 72 per cent, its highest level ever. The survey also showed majority support in every demographic, including people of faith, people in regional and rural areas and older people.

Earlier in 2015, some of Australia’s largest banks, airlines, department stores and finance companies publicly supported the campaign by placing an advertisement in The Australian. Even ‘shock-jocks’ Andrew Bolt and Alan Jones voiced their support for changes to marriage law.

Politicians on all sides are scrambling to be seen to be in tune with their electorates on this issue. A gay, lesbian, bisexual, transgender, intersex and queer issue has become a political hot potato, reported frequently in the mainstream media and openly talked about in ‘polite conversation’. In anyone’s terms that’s a significant shift.

THEIR FIGHT IS OUR FIGHT.

It is only a matter of time before marriage equality will occur in Australia. NTEU members will continue to agitate for this change, as well as challenge prejudice, discrimination and violence against people of diverse sexualities and genders throughout our union and through our connections with unions worldwide.

Virginia Mansel Lees, QUTE Convenor and President, NTEU La Trobe Branch Dave Willis, Division Organiser, RMIT Branch Queer Unionists in Tertiary Education (QUTE) is the Victorian GLBTIQ caucus.

Contact us if you are interested in establishing QUTE in your State, or you would like to be involved in Victoria. www.nteu.org.au/qute

Above: QUTE members rallying for marriage equality.

Dignified and decent work, hard won and defended by Australian workers and their unions, is still being fought for by our partners in developing countries around the world.

Union Aid Abroad-APHEDA needs more new monthly donors in our Global Justice Partner program, to enable people, like the Cambodian beer workers in this image, to lift themselves out of poverty by organising for and achieving decent work.

Become a Global Justice Partner today.

Union Aid Abroad APHEDA Call 1800 888 674 or visit www.apheda.org.au The overseas humanitarian aid agency of the ACTU Union Aid Abroad-APHEDA was established in 1984 to express the Australian union movement’s commitment to social justice and international solidarity for human rights and development.

We do this through support for adult-focused education, training and development projects overseas, working in partnership with those whose rights to development are restricted or denied.

You can show your solidarity by becoming a Global Justice Partner and making a tax deductible monthly contribution to our work.

30 years

of solidarity

Since 1984

NTEU ADVOCATE • vol. 22 no. 3 • November 2015 • www.nteu.org.au/advocate • page 11

Update Something big is happening: are you in?

On the night of the leadership change from Tony Abbott to Malcolm Turnbull, we all watched with baited breath to see if there would be any shift on the Liberal’s policy on climate change (Direct Action).

Yet how quickly we were disappointed to see that, in order for Turnbull to get the keys of the Lodge, a deal had been made with the conservative gatekeepers of the Liberal Party and the policy status quo would remain the same. If it works, Direct Action will provide a paltry five per cent cut in Australia’s carbon emissions by 2020.

Turnbull offered false hope for many of us who wish for a far more progressive, inclusive society who want real action on climate change. Once again, a great opportunity has been lost for clean renewable energy to take centre stage and drive a new economy for Australia. Over the years our politicians have clearly let us down on this matter. It seems the only way we can send a clear message is through demonstrating our collective will for change.

The science is quite clear on the impacts of climate change and time real for action is running out. The question is: ‘Can we turn the ship around before it’s too late’?

The CSIRO State of The Climate Report 2014 says: Data and analysis from the Bureau of Meteorology and CSIRO show further warming of the atmosphere and oceans in the Australian region, as is happening globally. This change is occurring against the background of high climate variability, but the signal is clear. Air and ocean temperatures across Australia are now, on average, almost a degree Celsius warmer than they were in 1910, with most of the warming occurring since 1950.

This warming has seen Australia experience more warm weather and extreme heat, and fewer cool extremes. There has been an increase in extreme fire weather, and a longer fire season, across large parts of Australia.

Rainfall averaged across all of Australia has slightly increased since 1900. Since 1970, there have been large increases in annual rainfall in the northwest and decreases in the southwest. Autumn and early winter rainfall has mostly been below average in the southeast since 1990.

Atmospheric greenhouse gas concentrations continue to rise and continued emissions will cause further warming over this century. Limiting the magnitude of future climate change requires large and sustained net global reductions in greenhouse gases. www.csiro.au/en/Research/OandA/Areas/ Assessing-our-climate/State-of-the-Climate/About-the-Report This summer we are heading into an extreme El Niño event which is stronger than the record breaking event in 1997.

If this trend continues it will mean drier and hotter weather with extreme weather events on more occasions greatly effecting NSW and Victoria.

People’s Climate marches Melbourne

5:30pm, Friday 27 November

Brisbane

9:30am, Saturday 28 November

Adelaide

11am, Sunday 29 November

Canberra

Noon, Sunday 29 November

Sydney

1pm, Sunday 29 November

Perth

1pm, Sunday 29 November

Hobart

1pm, Sunday 29 November So far Victoria is experiencing its second warmest start to October on record. The warning from the Bureau of Meteorology of extreme climate events to come should sharpen our resolve to take action to mitigate the effects of climate change.

We are heading towards a crucial meeting on the world’s climate future, the 2015 UN Climate Change Conference in Paris. From late November until early December, the leaders of the world will come together with the aim of negotiating a legally binding agreement on climate streaming from the Conference of the Parties to the 1992 United Nations Framework Convention on Climate Change and the 1997 Kyoto Protocol.

NTEU endorses the People’s Climate March In the week prior to the conference, People’s Climate Marches will be held around Australia. NTEU National Council endorsed the People’s Climate Marches and urged mass participation by members, their colleagues, friends and families.

NTEU is organising lead-up activities. If you want to get involved, contact your local Branch or Division and keep track of activities through the NTEU website and social media.

The People’s Climate Marches are organised by a broad coalition of ordinary people, unions and community organisations joining together to make change in our world. Similar events in hundreds of major cities around the planet will also take place. Please support the rallies and help send a clear message to our politicians and world leaders that it is time for real action.

Rob Binnie, National Organiser www.peoplesclimate.org.au

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Update This Changes Everything: responses to climate change This Changes Everything is an epic documentary about everyday people responding to the impacts of climate change. Directed by Avi Lewis and inspired by Naomi Klein’s international bestseller, it looks at the catastrophic consequences of capitalism through the eyes of seven diverse communities.

Global Climate Change Week for uni staff, students & communities October 2015 saw the first Global Climate Change Week (GCCW), an initiative launched by a group of Australian academics that aims to encourage academics in all disciplines and countries to engage with their students and communities on climate change. More than 250 academics from 39 countries, 6 continents, and a very wide range of disciplines registered for the event, and a huge range of activities took place.

Some universities organised panel discussions on climate change, such as the University of California Berkeley, Westfield State University, the University of Alberta, and American University Washington.

Some organised special seminars (such as this seminar series at Murdoch University) or lectures (such as this lecture series at the University of Bath). There was a Book Launch, ‘Global Energy, Global Climate’, at University College London; a comedy night, Fossil Fools, at Sydney University; a climate change video contest at Arizona State University; and a divestment debate at the University of East Anglia. Meanwhile, some universities organised a wide

range of activities through the week, such as Heythrop College London, the University of New South Wales, and the University of Wollongong.

‘Up till now relatively few academics from relatively few disciplinary areas have engaged with their students and communities on climate change’, says Dr Keith Horton, a Lecturer in Philosophy at the University of Wollongong and co-organiser of GCCW. ‘But climate change has become such an all-encompassing phenomenon that most disciplines have something to contribute to the debate about it. And it has become such an urgent problem that everyone needs to do what they can to help bring about strong action.’

Sign the Open Letter from Academics to World Leaders GCCW has also launched an Open Letter from Academics to World Leaders ahead of the Paris Climate Conference in December. It urges world leaders to limit global warming not only to the current target of no more than 2 degrees Celsius, but to no more than1.5 degrees.

Arguments that this is the appropriate target are provided by James Hansen and his colleagues, who write, ‘Evidence presented under Climate Impacts above makes clear that 2°C global warming would have consequences that can be described as disastrous’. The letter has already been signed by over 1000 academics from more than 60 countries, including luminaries such as Noam Chomsky, Kwame Anthony

Filmed over four years, This Changes Everything is an attempt to re-imagine the vast challenge of climate change. It presents seven powerful portraits of communities on the front lines, from Montana’s Powder River Basin to the Alberta Tar Sands, from the coast of South India to Beijing and beyond.

Interwoven with these stories of struggle is Klein’s narration, connecting the carbon in the air with the economic system that put it there. Throughout the film, Klein builds to her most controversial and exciting idea: that we can seize the existential crisis of climate change to transform our failed economic system into something radically better.

Screenings hosted by the Australian Conservation Foundation www.peoplesclimate.org.au/film_ screenings

Appiah, Naomi Oreskes, Michael E. Mann, Bill McKibben, and Peter Singer.

Academics are able to sign the letter until the end of November, when it will be conveyed to world leaders at the Paris Climate Conference. So if you are an academic and agree with the letter, please sign it and promote it through your networks.

There are currently translations into French and Spanish; more translations will be coming soon.

GCCW has also started promoting a thunderclap. A thunderclap is an automated tweet or facebook post; GCCW’s will be released to the world the night before the climate change talks start in Paris, and will share GCCW’s Open Letter. Everyone is welcome to join the thunderclap.

Finally, GCCW encourages everyone to take part in the People’s Climate Marches from 27–29 November. On the eve of the Paris Climate Conference, the organisers hope to create the biggest climate action the world has ever seen.

Keith Horton, University of Wollongong Sign the Open Letter from Academics: globalclimatechangeweek.com/ open-letter/

NTEU ADVOCATE • vol. 22 no. 3 • November 2015 • www.nteu.org.au/advocate • page 13

UniCasual News Workplace Gender Equity Reports reveal true levels of casualisation It is something that everyone working in the higher education sector has known about for years – that the levels of insecure employment have been increasing.

It is due to multiple and linked factors, from institution managements seeking to install a more ‘flexible’ workforce while they attempt to undermine wages, conditions and union representation, through to Government policy that has led to the largest ever growth of student numbers in the sector.

The Department of Education produces annual reports on staff numbers in public universities, which incorporate casual (non permanent) staff numbers. While the data shows a modest increase over time, these figures are not ‘real’ people, but what is known as effective full time equivalents (FTEs or EFTs). What this means is that the hours of many individuals are combined to make up what would be a full time position; so it does not count staff per se, but the hours that make up a single staff ‘unit’.

The upshot of this for institutions (and Government) is that it hides the real numbers of non permanent staff working in our universities, and while it has long been suspected that the official figures are severe underestimations of the true levels, it has been virtually impossible to obtain the data to show the real numbers for all institutions, and over time. Until now.

The introduction of the Workplace Gender Equity Act in 2012 opened up the door to accurate reporting on the levels of insecure work in universities. The Act requires non-public sector employers with 100 or more staff to submit a report to the Workplace Gender Equity Agency (WGEA) between 1 April and 31 May each year, for the preceding 12 month period. Universi-

ties are included in this cohort of employers, and as such must provide information, in actual numbers (headcount) on their total workforce – that is, their full-time, part-time, casual and temporary staff.

These annual public reports require employers to report against a set of standardised gender equality indicators including: • Gender composition of the workforce.

• Gender composition of governing bodies of relevant employers.

• Remuneration compared between women and men.

• Availability and utility of employment terms, conditions and practices relating to flexible working arrangements for employees and to working arrangements supporting employees with family or caring responsibilities.

• Consultation with employees on issues concerning gender equality in the workplace.

• Additional policies determined by the Minister, such as sex-based harassment and discrimination.

In order to do this, the current reporting structure breaks the staffing cohort into several categories, which also differentiate managers to non managers. In higher education, the non manager cohort is further divided into different categories which include professional, administration and clerical, and technical. These categories are used by universities in reporting on their staff. Importantly however, the employers must differentiate between their secure and non secure employed staff.

So what are the Reports revealing?

While a number of universities are still incorrectly reporting on their gender equity policies and, in particular, the numbers of staff with access to employer paid parental leave, this is improving over time as we continue to monitor and highlight these inaccuracies.

What is most startling is that there is a rising flood of insecure work in our universities. To illustrate, we analysed the workforce profile for the University of Melbourne (see boxed aside). It should be noted that this was certainly not the most extreme of the institutions in terms of casual employment, but given it is comparatively well resourced, it is certainly worth noting that even here there are significant issues.

As noted, other institutions’ reports are showing even greater levels of insecure employment. For example, at RMIT over continued opposite page...

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University of Melbourne: A case study As one of our most prestigious and well-resourced universities, the University of Melbourne is well placed to have policies that would attract and keep high quality staff.

However, based on their workforce profile, only 58 per cent of the total reported workforce have access to employer paid parental leave. This would be those in full and part time ongoing and contract positions, although there are probably contract positions that are not eligible.

Of the professional staff (mostly academic and research) 37 per cent are reported as casuals. If we add the numbers of full time contract or part time contract the number of professional staff in non secure employment is actually 69 per cent.

Of the technical and trades workforce, 64 per cent are casual.

Although the actual numbers are smaller overall, in adding the full time contract and part time contract numbers, the percentage of insecure workers is actually 88.5 per cent.

However, it is in administration and clerical jobs that the University has the highest levels of insecure employment. According to the workplace profile, there are 2778 clerical and administrative staff at Melbourne. Of these, 61 per cent are casuals. Adding the non secure contract categories, and a whopping 76 per cent are insecurely employed (that’s 2120 staff, out of 2778).

In the three pages of management categories there is not one casual recorded. In all the non-management areas of casual employment, the significant majority are women.

We can draw from this that the genderfication of casual employment (as we have known for many years) is continuing unabated, and what’s more, insecure employment is now the norm in all non management areas at Melbourne Uni, noting that this Go8 does not have the same funding constraints as smaller or regional institutions.

UniCasual News Workplace Gender Equity Reports reveal true levels of casualisation half of their non-management staff (6,326 out of 10,016) are casuals, with the majority of these women (that is not counting part-time and full-time contract staff, the majority of whom are also women). Even adding RMIT’s 493 managers, it’s still more than half the workforce that don’t have access to entitlements such as employer paid parental leave and are disadvantaged as a result of their insecure employment status.

At the University of Sydney, there are 2,672 casual professional staff, and another 1,524 contract staff. This represents 74.5 per cent of the total professional workforce. In clerical and administrative categories, the levels of insecure work are also high – there are 2,098 casual staff, and 768 contract staff. Together, these staff form 65 per cent of the total clerical and administrative workforce.

Again, in both the professional and administrative categories, it is women who are the majority in insecure employment. Sydney University’s high levels of casualisation are reflected in their self reported figure on staff with access to primary carer’s leave – at 33 per cent of the workforce, the vast majority of staff do not have access to this basic entitlement.

Looking at the figures for the University of Queensland (also in the Go8 category) shows that these levels of non secure employment are not isolated. There are 1,919 professional casual staff (1,033 women), with a further 2,940 contract professional staff (and 1563 of these women as well).

When combined, these staff form 73 per cent of the professional staff at the university. Looking at clerical and administrative staff, there are 833 casual and contract staff (633 of these women), which is 53 per cent of the total administrative and clerical workforce.

These few examples, from relatively better resourced institutions, show the levels of insecure employment, and how this impacts upon access to those entitlements that many managements like to use when promoting their gender equity credentials.

Insecure work continues to flourish in our universities, and the reports over time will track the further erosion of permanent employment in non-manager positions.

NTEU action The work for the Union is certainly clear cut. In addition to continuing to gather and publish the data provided in the WGEA Employer Reports, we need to work to reduce to levels of insecure employment. This year at the National Council it was determined that the Union would

Full time permanent

Part time permanent

Full time contract

Part time contract

Casual

Female

Male

21.4% 38%

36.6%

Professionals

30.3%

17.9% 7.7%

7.3%

15.4%

22.5%

2.9%

5%

16.7%

14.1% 4.2% Technicians & trade

9.5% 67.2%

58.8%

19.6% 3.9% 1%

16%

18.5% Clerical & administrative

56.5%

7.5%

11% 7.7% 6.3%

71.9%

2.8%

1.8%

Employment status of males and females in non-manager occupational categories collate, track and analyse the information provided in the WGEA reports.

To do this effectively, we are asking Branches, with the support of their Divisions, to obtain and review their university’s annual public WGEA reports, and to forward these, along with any comments regarding the accuracy of the reports, to the Policy and Research Unit in the National Office. NTEU will produce an annual report on trends emerging in the WGEA public reports for use in research, industrial work, campaigning and recruitment, and lobbying efforts.

The WGEA data provides us with a real opportunity to track the progress of important issues – such as the level of insecure work – in our institutions. With this infor-

mation, we can have a real impact in the public debates around the future of our sector and put pressure on both university management and government to address these risks to the quality and sustainability of our universities. This evidence will also be of local use in the next round of university collective bargaining.

Terri MacDonald, Policy & Research Officer

For more content of interest to casual members, see ‘Dear Mr Turnbull’ by the Thesis Whisperer, Inger Mewburn on p. 46.

NTEU ADVOCATE • vol. 22 no. 3 • November 2015 • www.nteu.org.au/advocate • page 15

UniCasual News ‘Dear Lecturers’, a plea from casual academic ‘Matthew Hagel’ to his less precariously employed colleagues, was posted on the CASA website in July and re-published in the September 2015 issue of Connect, the NTEU & CAPA magazine for casual academics. The following response is a plea from casual academics their fellow casual academics – to start change in concrete ways.

Dear Casual Academics...

Setting limits to exploitation and the plight of casuals Casualisation is one of the most acute problems in Australian tertiary education.

As conditions for casual staff continue to deteriorate, it is important for casuals to work collectively to protect their rights.

Management, staff and students need to understand what casualisation involves, as we are currently teaching the majority of classes in Australian universities, and as such, our working conditions are a matter of national significance. Working conditions for casual academics in Australian universities can be improved, and change can start with casuals themselves and their everyday work.

We are casual academics, like you, and we are asking you to consider, adhere to, or implement the following five points of action. We are writing these points based on our experiences teaching in the humanities at an Australian university.

We invite casual academic staff from other disciplines and institutions to give their input in the comments on other concrete ways in which we can change current conditions and create a better environment for our working, teaching and research.

1. Do not do extra work, unless it is clearly paid. For example, do not give unpaid guest lectures; do not offer student consultation times, including answering emails, unless consultation times are paid separately; request lesson plans from course convenors, given the very limited paid time for lesson-prep.

2. Ask to be included in course design and on administrative matters. You are entitled to have input on teaching and administrative matters that affect your work (negotiate marking deadlines; ask for one mandatory reading per week, no more).

3. Ask for transparency and consistency in hiring and contract renewals. Don’t be afraid of asking how the tutorials are allocated amongst staff. If conflicting or limited tutorial times are offered, talk to fellow casual staff and collectively negotiate for a more equitable distribution of workloads.

4. Use your academic freedom. Not only are you entitled to set your own agenda for class discussion, you are entitled to address the deteriorating conditions within Australian universities and the impact casualisation is having on teaching and learning (e.g., ‘soft-marking’, student consultations, marking deadlines, etc.).

5. Meet with your fellow casual academics and/or unionise. Break the isolation, stress, neglect and disempowerment of our work. Casuals are being encouraged to compete with each other for scarce hours of work. This can only lead to a further deterioration of working conditions.

We are suggesting these five points as a foundation for casuals to assert their dignity and rights. We know casuals’ working conditions vary widely and that there may be many more issues worthy of inclusion.

The main point is that we have to begin with ourselves if things are to improve.

Allowing ourselves to be exploited (or staying silent) sets a bad precedent for all casuals and perpetuates this critical situation.

If you would like to add to these points or expand on them, please include them in the discussion below, so that we can continue to build further networks of solidarity and support.

PL & J (casual academics since 2009) This article originally appeared on the CASA website. Reprinted with permission. actualcasuals.wordpress.com/ 2015/10/19/dear-casual-academics/

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900 STF jobs.

Has your uni filled them yet?

NTEU achieved around 900 Scholarly Teaching Fellow (STF) positions in the latest round of bargaining, converting previously casual work to on-going (or fixedterm and then conversion to on-going work).

At the time of writing, around one third of these positions had been created.

NTEU Branches need to be vigilant with management in ensuring these positions are established as soon as possible, to the agreed number, and in line with the provisions in the relevant enterprise agreement.

Attention should be given to whether or not these positions are overseen centrally or are devolved to individual faculties or departments; are they promoted as relevant across the University or do departments seek them out? In each case NTEU will ensure that the legal requirements of the Agreement are met.

Two NTEU members recently told Connect magazine of their relief at securing permanent work via STF positions. Both had six years as casual academics, followed by a period of short, fixed term contracts. They are both passionately committed to teaching and were now making plans for their families based on the certainty of a secure income.

At the University of South Australia, the number of appointments (91) has exceeded the target agreed in the Enterprise Agreement (40). The University of Western Sydney and Victoria University are also close to target.

Edith Cowan University is a third of the way to target while Murdoch has met their modest target of 8 STFs. The Swinburne University Agreement is yet to be approved following NTEU’s success in challenging the University’s voting process in the Federal Court.

Once approved, the Agreement will provide 50 STFs. Susan Kenna, National Industrial Officer

Aboriginal & Torres Strait Islander News Change of PM does not equate to a change in the agenda September 14, a day like any other. Historically, this date is peppered with a litany of significant events; for example, in 1752 the British Empire accepted and implemented the Gregorian calendar; in 1917 Russia was officially proclaimed as a republic and in 1985 the Golden Girls premiered on television for the first time.

The significant historical events on this date now encompass yet another auspicious occurrence, the rolling of the deeply unpopular Prime Minister, The Hon. Tony Abbott and the appointment of The Hon. Malcolm Turnbull as the 29th Prime Minister of the Commonwealth of Australia.

After the dust has settled, how has this change been viewed by the Australian populous? At the time of writing this article and a month after Abbott’s removal, Prime Minister Turnbull has shown to be a more popular leader than the previous in-

cumbent and vastly more popular than the current Leader of the Opposition, but do we simply want a popular leader or one that has the ability to deliver a narrative and implement a vision?

In contrast to the former leader, Prime Minster Turnbull is a small ‘l’ Liberal rather than a conservative; not a great deal better, but a win is a win no matter how small. While I am counting wins, the new leader is no longer the self-appointed saviour of Aboriginal & Torres Strait Islander peoples – this role is now firmly in the hands of Senator Scullion. So what policy changes can be expected from this important portfolio, how will policy be implemented and who will be the beneficiary of any policy change?

If history provides an insight to the future, then it would appear Prime Minister Turnbull will simply continue to follow the path of his predecessor. The new PM’s record on Aboriginal & Torres Strait Islander issues is anything but progressive, as can be evidenced in Parliamentary Hansard.

Turnbull has previous voted against increasing Aboriginal & Torres Strait Islander land rights and the increased protection of Aboriginal heritage sites and while a Minister in the Howard Government, Mr Turnbull also voted very strongly in favour of the Intervention into the NT. When in office, the former Prime Minister was keen to interact with Aboriginal & Torres Strait Islander people, spending a week

New A&TSI Caucus logo The new national Aboriginal and Torres Strait Islander Caucus logo was officially launched at NTEU National Council in October.

in a number of remote communities in an attempt to create his own ‘lived experience’. The new Prime Minister has made no similar promise and we are yet to see how the Mr Turnbull proposes to build relationships with Aboriginal & Torres Strait Islander peoples and what role the Prime Minister’s Indigenous Advisory Council will play in this endeavour. We must also remember that relationship building is paramount – particularly as the debate on Constitutional Recognition continues.

While the current Prime Minister maybe more socially progressive than his predecessor, we are yet to gain a clear understanding of his opinion on a number of issues important to Aboriginal & Torres Strait Islander people. A fear exists that the multi-layered factors of history, ideology and the need to maintain internal party-political affiliations will be the sole drivers of policy development from this point onward, with Aboriginal & Torres Strait Islander peoples again drawing the shortest straw.

Adam Frogley, National Aboriginal & Torres Strait Islander Coordinator

Photo credit: SBS

en colours, it is hoped they will make an eye-catching addition not just to the suite of designs the NTEU uses, but also on materials which contribute to the visibility of the NTEU A&TSI Caucus – a caucus which is unique amongst the union movement in Australia.

The old design, which incorporated the colours of both the Aboriginal and Torres Strait Islander flags in an eye-catching geometric design served the Caucus well for more than a decade but was felt to be out-of-date and in need of simplification.

The new design features three ‘number 7 boomerangs’ in the colours of the earth. Number 7 boomerangs, also known as fighting or killing boomerangs, were chosen not just because of their strong natural resemblance to the NTEU logo, but also because they are a strong image which reflects the struggle for workplace rights for Aboriginal and Torres Strait Islander staff in universities.

While the design featured has roots in the central desert region of Australia, fighting boomerangs and clubs are common across the country. Additionally, with the choice of earth-

NTEU ADVOCATE • vol. 22 no. 3 • November 2015 • www.nteu.org.au/advocate • page 17

Aboriginal & Torres Strait Islander News A&TSI bargaining

The shame of universities & the Union The 2015 National Council concentrated on Round 6 Enterprise Bargaining, implementation and a focus toward the next round of bargaining, a timely reminder to revisit the motion ‘Implementing Aboriginal and Torres Strait Islander Clauses’ that was passed unanimously at the 2014 National Council.

A major point of discussion at this years A&TSI Forum was the lack of outcomes achieved from A&TSI Employment Strategies. In Round 5, approximately 1000 positions were created yet the total number of people employed was reported as 122.

Round 6 has created approximately another 800 positions yet there is little evidence that any headway is being made in filling the former or current positions.

It is recognised that the loss of Aboriginal Education Centres is responsible for the loss of some ongoing positions, these are insignificant compared with those not filled at all.

Council recognised the need for ‘Divisions to direct and assist Branches to develop an appropriate implementation strategy….’

Indeed, it specifically directed Branches and Divisions, with the assistance of the A&TSI Unit and the Education and Training Unit to:

best, this decision shows a lack of understanding. But wait, it gets better…

The appointment of Mal Brough as a Minister in the Turnbull Government can be seen as a blessing to many in the Aboriginal & Torres Strait Islander community.

Why you may ask? Well the answer is simple – he will not be the Minister for Indigenous Affairs.

What an ambitious program HOIL was.

To explain clearly the purpose of this program I must reference New Matilda: ‘a government-funded scheme aimed at helping blackfellas buy a plot of land they already owned.’

Community Development Employment Projects (CDEP) For reasons that escape me; in 2006 the then Minister determined that CDEP was, as he termed it, a ‘destination rather than a path to real employment’. When you consider that CDEP was the only source of employment for many Aboriginal & Torres Strait Islander people in regional, rural and remote areas of the Territory; at

• Institute (if not already undertaken) that A&TSI business be the first agenda item after standing orders on all Division and Branch Council/Committee meetings.

It has not taken a detailed search of minutes to find that if A&TSI business is first on the agenda, there is often a note stating there is no business to report.

It is also noted that few Branches have fulfilled the intent of the 2014 motion.

This motion is clear in direction and is a national priority of the NTEU. Terry Mason, Chair, Aboriginal & Torres Strait Islander Caucus

• D evelop and initiate an A&TSI implementation plan at each site/institution.

The return of Mal Brough

The former Member for Longman initiated a number of devastating decisions in his time as Minister for Indigenous Affairs; decisions that continue to have impact upon many Aboriginal & Torres Strait Islander people today. Let me revisit just three of the profound determinations made by the previous Minister in the dying days of a failing Government.

• Schedule the inaugural meeting of the A&TSI employment monitoring committee (or so named) within three months of the Round 6 Agreement being approved by Fair Work Australia.

Home Ownership on Indigenous Lands

In ‘helping’ us purchase land we already owned, Minister Brough was successful in providing a total of 15 loans worth $2.7 million, while keeping administration costs to a miniscule $10 million – why is he not Treasurer now?

The NT Intervention – Little children are truly scared...

In all seriousness, the Northern Territory (Emergency Response) Intervention and its effect upon Aboriginal people in the Territory is not a laughing matter. The final days of a dying Government can produce a litany of policy-on-the-run and this is a prime example of it.

Minister Brough, with what appeared to be no thought at all, moved immediately to implement the Northern Territory Emergency Response. The Minister pulled out all stops - firstly adding extra responsibilities to the position description of one of his staff, to allow that staff member to take on acting roles on ABC Lateline – disappointingly the staff member did not get a Gold Logie nomination.

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While we are examining the achievements of the Intervention, let us not forget, without the leadership and direction of the former Member for Longman, the following simply could not have been accomplished: • School attendance – dropped and dropping.

• Suicide and rates of self-harm have increased five-fold.

• A doubling in reports of violent incidents.

• Incarceration rates have soared to almost 90 per cent of the prison population.

• Alienation of Aboriginal people in townships and communities. & • No additional accommodation (aside from that provided to soldiers and police).

In reality, the former Minister for Indigenous Affairs achieved much more than can be discussed in one meagre article.

Putting this to one-side, let us remember what is truly important; that Aboriginal & Torres Strait Islander people are celebrating the fact that Minister Brough nolonger has the ability to directly impact our lives. Thank you, Mr Turnbull.

Adam Frogley, National Aboriginal & Torres Strait Islander Coordinator

Aboriginal & Torres Strait Islander News Unaipon Centre to close The David Unaipon College of Indigenous Education and Research (DUCIER), the longstanding Aboriginal college at the University of South Australia (UniSA), is set to be disestablished under yet another mainstreaming agenda at an Australian university.

Over the past couple of years, a number of Indigenous centres on campuses have had their academic programs dissipated or moved entirely into faculties, severely reducing the capacity for autonomous Indigenous-focussed curriculum. Many specific Indigenous support programs have suffered a similar fate with the capacity for students to access programs intended to assist them through their studies in a culturally-cognisant environment severely reduced.

A review undertaken earlier this year of DUCIER, and initiated by the UniSA Vice-Chancellor identified five key issues and sought to investigate how to address these points. These were: 1. Declining enrolment, particularly in undergraduate degree programs.

2. Retention and completion in undergraduate degree programs.

3. Development of research.

4. Organisational culture.

5. Governance, structures and inter-relationships.

While all these are matters of critical importance, and the retention and success of Indigenous students and staff must first and foremost drive programs on campus, the NTEU questions the assertion that disestablishment of the David Unaipon Centre will assist UniSA to become a ‘university of choice’ for Aboriginal and Torres Strait Islander students.

Chair of the NTEU Aboriginal and Torres Strait Islander Policy Committee, Terry

Different White People

Mason states, ‘while it is correct to note that the Behrendt Review carried a recommendation that universities adopt a whole-of-university approach to Indigenous education, support and retention, and that this point has framed a number of recommendations contained within this review, it is clearly stated in this review that Aboriginal and Torres Strait Islander centres be retained and indeed, strengthened.

A place on campus is considered integral to the growing of capacity and success for A&TSI students. Yet almost every university which has sought to implement the recommendations of Behrendt has chosen to mainstream both academic and general programs while dissolving or weakening the Indigenous Education Centres.

While UniSA is to be congratulated for their plan to appoint a senior management level position in charge of Indigenous programs - a position the NTEU itself has held at the bargaining table for many rounds now - the appointment of a PVC-Indigenous does not negate the need to maintain an Indigenous college.

This type of appointment enhances the centre and should not, in essence, replace it. This appointment does, however, note the need for Aboriginal and Torres Strait Islander education to be central and visible in the operations of the university.

The NTEU remains staunchly opposed to the reduction of Aboriginal and Torres Strait Islander Centres nationally, and notes that any moves on campus to mainstream centres runs contrary to the spirit of the motion passed unanimously at 2015 National Council regarding forced closures, as well as the Ten Point Plan to a Post-treaty Union.

Different White People by NTEU Tasmanian Organiser Deborah Wilson presents a trilogy of remarkable stories about campaigns for Aboriginal rights. But the most curious thing about this book is that the central characters in this book are not Aboriginal.

Some of these ‘different white people’ are well-known Australians, but many are not. But they all had one crucial common characteristic: a singleminded determination to support and protect the rights of Aboriginal people.

The book begins in 1946, as Aboriginal pastoral workers walk away from oppressive conditions to make their famous stand in the Pilbara, in WA. The second, lesser known story unfolds in Central Australia, when Britain and Australia collaborate to conduct their missile and nuclear weapons programs in Aboriginal country. The final section features a landmark action in the NT when Aboriginal workers and their families walked away from white bosses in the now-famous ‘Gurindji walk-off’ in 1966.

Amidst these fascinating episodes in Australia’s history was an eclectic group of people working tirelessly to protect and support Aboriginal people and Aboriginal rights. They were the different white people.

NTEU members receive 15% off at online checkout when you use the discount code: NTEU15 uwap.uwa.edu.au/products/ different-white-people-radicalactivism-for-aboriginalrights-1946-1972

Celeste Liddle, National Aboriginal & Torres Strait Islander Organiser www.nteu.org/atsi

NTEU ADVOCATE • vol. 22 no. 3 • November 2015 • www.nteu.org.au/advocate • page 19

University deregulation

Delayed, not ditched

Photo: Still from the NTEU’s ‘Busking for a Bachelor’s Degree’ video

It was 3.30pm on Monday 14 September 2015 when Jeannie Rea, Rachael Bahl and Paul Kniest, representing NTEU, sat down for a meeting with Senator Glenn Lazarus in his Parliament office to discuss higher education policy. Reflecting on what were generally considered little more than rumours we jokingly asked whether Tony Abbott was still Prime Minister and were assured by a jocular response that nothing was likely to happen on that front anytime soon.

Paul Kniest Policy & Research Coordinator

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Reassured by Senator Lazarus’s abiding contempt for Christopher Pyne and his unfair plans to deregulate university fees, we three intrepid NTEU lobbyists headed down to ‘Aussies’ for a well-earned cuppa.

Anyone who has ever been in Parliament during a sitting week would have shared our shock to find that the queue of thirsty patrons had been abandoned only to find them eagerly watching the nearest television sets watching Malcolm Turnbull’s, ‘I will be challenging for the Liberal Party leadership’ speech.

There are a number of unassailable truths in this world, one of which is, if you want to know what’s going on in Parliament House, the worst place to be is Parliament House. Therefore, it was no surprise that the first we heard that the Liberal Party meeting to determine the leadership would be held later that Monday night came in a phone call from Matt McGowan back in Melbourne.

At about 10pm that same Monday it was announced that Malcolm Turnbull had defeated Tony Abbott 54 to 44 in a ballot for the leadership of the Liberal Party. He was sworn in as Australia’s 29th Prime Minister the next day. Following the deposition and replacement of Tony Abbott, the NTEU was very anxious to know whether Christopher Pyne would continue on as Higher Education Minister.

Just as Tony Abbott was seen as being the ALP’s strongest re-election asset, Christopher Pyne was becoming one the strongest assets the opponents to university deregulation had. Our greatest fear was that Pyne might be replaced by someone who was competent. That is, a Minister who was more than just an ideological warrior, one who might actually engage in genuine consultation and discussion with the sector and be prepared to negotiate with cross bench Senators to get an, albeit considerably watered down, version of deregulation through the Parliament.

Given his complete and utter failure to get his higher education policies through the Senate, twice, (what exactly was it that you fixed again, Christopher?) it was no surprise to find out on Sunday 20 September that Malcolm Turnbull sacked Pyne as Education Minister. Senator Simon Birmingham was promoted from his Assistant Minister’s role to sit at the big desk to become the Minister for Education and Training.

Delayed, not ditched So does the appointment of Senator Birmingham as the new Minister for Education and Training signal a new approach to higher education policy?

Is the new Minister prepared to tear up the failed policies of his predecessor and start again or will he simply try to cobble together something that is acceptable to crossbench Senators? That is, will Senator Birmingham be a new broom that sweeps clean or will it be a case of the more things change the more they stay the same?

Unfortunately, based on the Minister’s comment’s to date, the chances are we are in for more of the same rather than a new start.

It seems the new Minister is determined to please his Prime Minister, who has indicated that he fully supports the deregulation of higher education and therefore the prospect of $100,000 degrees.

On Sky News’ To the Point program on 14 October 2015, Senator Birmingham responded to interviewer Peter van Onselen’s assertion that deregulation has ‘been ruled out’ by saying that: I don’t think that fee flexibility fee flexibility or other reforms have been completely ruled out, and the Government

has only made a decision at present to defer the start date of reforms from 2016 to 2017.

Therefore, the Minister’s statement to the Times Higher Education World Academic Summit in Melbourne in October that ‘today I am announcing that higher education arrangements for 2016 will not change’ was in reality nothing more than a pragmatic administrative announcement.

The Minister was doing no more than acknowledging the logistical and political reality that it would be impossible to even try to introduce new legislation into Parliament, have it passed through both houses and have the new funding and pricing arrangements up and running by 1 January next year.

The Minister could not have made the Government’s position any clearer when he said in an interview on Adelaide radio 5AA on 2 October 2015: ‘it is important to understand that the policies remain the same aside from a one year deferral.’

Public funding for private providers While the Minister is trying to shape the public debate about fee deregulations (or $100,000 degrees) into one about the need for ‘flexibility’ we should not overlook another major part of the Government’s agenda, which is to make higher education more competitive by opening public funding to private for-profit providers.

Here the Minister is trying to couch the debate in terms of unfairness to students who elect to study with private providers.

In this respect the Minister needs to explain what is fair about the thousands of vocational education and training (VET) students incurring massive debts for worthless qualifications from dodgy for-profit providers (see report, p. 28).

Invitation for a chat Some people have taken the Government’s decision to defer the introduction of its deregulation plans by a year to mean that any change is off the agenda until after the next federal election. This is clearly not the case, because as the Minister also said in his 5AA radio interview, he wants to see ‘what is achievable through the Senate’

and also that he is ‘keen to do as much as is possible in the life of this Parliament.’

What we have is clearly a case of deregulation delayed and not ditched. This having being said, however, we were at least optimistic that the Minister genuinely meant that he would take the additional time to consult with the sector to find a ‘sustainable basis for students, universities and taxpayers to fund an adaptive and world-class higher education system, with fair, equitable access for students’.

A comprehensive and transparent process informed by evidence and credible modelling of various options, would be in stark contrast to his predecessor, Christopher Pyne, who through the 2014 Budget introduced his unprincipled, unfair and unsustainable higher education policies without consulting anyone in the sector.

Readers will no doubt share our disappointment when Andrew Trounson reported in The Australian on 14 October (Minister favours informal approach) that rather than undertaking a formal consultative process, the Minister ‘is just inviting people to talk to him about their ideas’. Therefore, while he is adopting what is ostensibly an open door policy anyone wanting to ‘raise their ideas’ with him will soon find out that there are many doors to pass through before you get to the Minister’s. We are however, confident that if we knock long enough and loud enough, Senator Birmingham, unlike Mr Pyne, will at least show the respect due to the people who work at our universities and agree to meet with the NTEU.

VCs ‘blowin’ in the wind’ It is well known that the NTEU has been highly critical of the stance the Vice-Chancellors have taken in support of fee deregulation and funding cuts in our universities.

Despite expressing reservations about some aspects of the Government’s policies, it is a fact that on more than one occasion the leaders of our public universities urged Senators to pass legislation that would have allowed them to charge whatever they like for an undergraduate degree.

The question remains as to why our Vice-Chancellors ever supported the Coalition Government’s higher education continued overpage...

NTEU ADVOCATE • vol. 22 no. 3 • November 2015 • www.nteu.org.au/advocate • page 21

University deregulation polices, given that these policies never had the support of university staff, students or the communities they serve.

The NTEU was bitterly disappointed that on the launch at the National Press Club of Universities Australia’s new policy statement ‘Keep Australia Clever’ on 7 October 2015, UA Chair Professor Barney Glover did not take the opportunity of a change in both Prime Minister and Education Minister to proclaim their opposition to fee deregulation whereby entry into an Australian university would be determined, at least in part, by how much a student was prepared to pay as opposed to academic merit.

of their policies. It is yet to be seen what compromises the Government might seek to get these highly unpopular polices fixed before the next election.

Postscript The Government’s very strong preference to favour the interests of providers, including private for-profit providers, over the interests of students or reputation of the sector has been confirmed with the passage of the Education Services for Overseas Students (ESOS) Amendment (Streamlining Regulation) Bill 2015 through the House of Representatives on Monday 19 October.

While the policy statement provides a very strong case for increased public investment in universities as well as research and innovation, Professor Glover, failed to rule out the Vice-Chancellors’ support for fee deregulation. When David Speers asked ‘As a starting point, does Universities Australia believe fees should be deregulated or not?’ , Professor Glover (after some awkward posturing) responded that the policy statement ‘… is not promoting fee deregulation as a necessary requirement for the future funding of the sector….’

Significant changes were made to the ESOS Act in 2012 following the failure of over 50 private tertiary education providers, which left more than 13,000 international students either unable to complete their courses, and/or out of pocket due to inadequate tuition assurance arrangements. The Amendment Bill reverses a number of very important safety net provisions included in the ESOS Act in 2012 specifically to strengthen the tuition assurance arrangements for international students.

So let’s be clear, it seems that the Vice-Chancellors preferred position is fee deregulation, but this is no longer a necessary requirement for their support. As the NTEU media release said:

The most important protections that the Bill removes are firstly, the requirements that providers keep prepaid fees in a ‘designated account’ until students commence their studies and secondly, that providers not charge more than 50% of tuition fees in advance for longer courses. The justification for removing these protections is reducing ‘red tape’ and lowering compliance costs (an average of about $73 per student) and unintelligibly giving students greater choice.

Today vice-chancellors exposed their unwillingness to take a principled stand and show strong leadership in opposing undergraduate fee deregulation.

Instead they were found fluttering in the breeze waiting to see which way the new Minister’s approach to higher education heads over coming months.

The more things change the more they stay the same So what are we to make of the change in Prime Minister and Education Minister in relation to how it might impact on higher education policy?

Other than the Government realising that Christopher Pyne was incapable of fixing anything, there is nothing that the new Minister has said or done to indicate that he isn’t fully supportive of the general tenure of his predecessor’s policies. While the Minister will try to change the rhetoric about $100,000 degrees to ‘fee flexibility’ and the rhetoric about the privatisation of the sector to one about ‘fairness’ for all students, the intent of the Government’s policies haven’t changed.

Pollies speak out against $100K degrees NTEU has released a series of short videos featuring some of Australia’s most prominent politicians voicing their opposition to the Coalition Government’s higher education agenda.

Featuring Labor Senators Penny Wong, Kim Carr, Sue Lines, Chris Ketter, Deborah O’Neill and Anne McEwen; Greens Senators Richard Di Natale, Lee Rhiannon, Janet Rice and Robert Simms; Independent Senator Nick Xenophon; and Labor MPs Amanda Rishworth, Sharon Bird and Andrew Giles.

View all the videos at the NTEU YouTube site: www.youtube.com/user/nteu Or share from our Facebook page: www.facebook.com/ NationalTertiaryEducationUnion

Removing the designated account provision gives unethical providers an invitation to ‘take the money and run’ before students even arrive in Australia. Arguing that the 50% rule somehow restricts student choice defies logic and is not supported by any credible evidence.

The Bill has been referred to the Senate Education and Employment Legislation Committee to report by 30 November 2015. no100kdegrees.org.au

Unfortunately for the Government, however, the change in the rhetoric is unlikely to be enough to convince the Australian public or Senate to support core elements page 22 • NTEU ADVOCATE • vol. 22 no. 3 • November 2015 • www.nteu.org.au/advocate

Check out the NTEU and UnionsNSW ‘Busking for a Bachelor’s Degree’ video: www.youtube.com/user/nteu www.youtube.com/watch?v=1lUb52PAfCY Or share from NTEU NSW Facebook page: www.facebook.com/nteunsw

No $100K Degrees

Defending our unis Prior to September 15, when Tony Abbott was dumped as leader of the Opposition… sorry…

Government, there was much speculation about when the next election was going to be held. And it seemed highly likely that higher education funding was going to be one of the key election issues. This latter point may still be the case, but an election seems unlikely in 2015.

When an early election seemed more likely, the Union was preparing to play a significant role in defending our universities at the ballot box. Christopher Pyne had flagged that he would present his proposals back to the Senate in August or September and it was time to bring our ‘$100,000 degree’ campaign back into the public eye.

September was marked in everyone’s diaries as a key month to highlight $100,000 degrees and to keep the issue in the public eye, to remind Senators of the importance of higher education to the electorate, and to test the Union’s preparedness to campaign when an election is called.

Each Division prepared their own campaign plans supported by the National Office. Television, billboard, and online advertising was rolled out in selected marginal seats in New South Wales, Queensland, South Australia, Tasmania and the Northern Territory to support our campaign activities on the ground. The ACTU also lent their support by directing all their election campaigners to focus on $100,000 degrees during the week commencing September 21 across all their campaign groups.

bane, Herbert (Qld), Solomon (NT), Bass (Tas), Corangamite (Victoria) and Sturt (SA), the electorate of the then Minister for higher education, Christopher Pyne.

Throughout the month hundreds of union members, including around 150 NTEU members, knocked on doors, staffed shopping centre stalls, handed out leaflets at train stations, and generally had a good time making a serious point. Including through our social media campaigning, well over a million Australians were contacted in some way about the campaign.

Over 10,000 direct face to face conversations took place, around 1,600 people watched screenings of Ivory Tower.

And we had others talking about our issues: GetUp, ACTU, State Trades & Labour Councils, ALP, Greens, crossbench politicians, student bodies and others.

A standout event was held in the seat of Sturt where over 210 people turned out to watch the film Ivory Tower and hear from Senator Nick Xenophon. He reminded those present that privatising education is a one way street. Once it’s done, it is almost impossible to go back. Senator Xenophon, along with Senators Lambie, Lazarus, Muir and Wang, the Greens and the ALP voted to reject the Government’s

legislation that was intended to start the process of privatising our universities.

The campaign also tested our capacity to mobilise when an election is called, giving everyone some experience and an idea of the work that is required.

Members can be proud of the work done by the Union in defending our higher education sector so far, the fight is not over yet. The new Minister, Simon Birmingham, has delayed the progress of the Government’s agenda but he has not abandoned it.

However, we can take some comfort in the knowledge that the work of the Union and our members in standing against $100,000 degrees has prevented implementation of the reforms to date. What we have shown over September is that we are ready for the fight, if and when they bring it on.

Matthew McGowan, National Assistant Secretary

Top: UnionsWA Secretary Meredith Hammat and NTEU WA Division Secretary Gabe Gooding (in centre) campaigning for univeristies at the Canning (WA) by-election in September. Below: Our ‘$100,000 Degrees’ billboard at Waurn Ponds in the marginal seat of Corangamite (Vic).

The NTEU focused the majority of its work in the seats of Page, Banks (NSW), Bris-

NTEU ADVOCATE • vol. 22 no. 3 • November 2015 • www.nteu.org.au/advocate • page 23

No $100K Degrees

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No $100K Degrees

Above and opposite: NTEU members, university staff and students, and people from communities around the country tell the Government what they think of $100K degrees.

Below: Federal politicians showing support for our campaign (L–R): Senators Penny Wong, Kim Carr, Richard Di Natale, Janet Rice and Lee Rhiannon, and MPs Sharon Bird, Andrew Giles and Amanda Rishworth.

NTEU ADVOCATE • vol. 22 no. 3 • November 2015 • www.nteu.org.au/advocate • page 25

No $100K degrees

ALP higher ed policy The ALP’s higher education policy stands in stark contrast to the Coalition’s deregulatory agenda.

The ALP has promised to reverse the Government’s intended 20 per cent cut to public funding per student, not allow universities to charge students whatever they like for a degree and not repeat the policy and market failure in vocational education and training (see report on VET deregulation, p. 28) by opening up Commonwealth supported student funding to private for-profit providers.

While the ALP has outlined its approach to higher education funding, it has importantly also committed to engage in genuine consultation with the sector through a Green Paper to White Paper process in the further development of policies. This framework builds on the ALP’s commitments announced in May this year where it promised it would offer 20,000 STEM Award Degrees a year for five years, which upon graduation would write off the HECS debts of these students.

Keeping the cap on the fees that universities can charge undergraduate students does more than simply stopping the very real possibility that some students might end up paying $100,000 or more for a degree. From the NTEU’s perspective, it preserves one of the essential characteristics of Australia’s world class public university system and that is, that entry into an Australian public university will continue to be based on merit. One of the less well understood aspects of the Coalition’s plans to deregulate university fees, is that some students would miss out on a place in popular courses because other students, with lower entry credentials, could effectively outbid them for a place by being prepared to pay a higher price. It is important to understand that this would not be an unintended consequence of the Government’s policy framework. This is a belief that price is equated to value and therefore the more you are prepared to pay the more you value something.

Labor is also promising that its policies will result in an additional 20,000 students

graduating from our universities by placing as much emphasis on students being able to successfully complete their degrees as opposed to current policies which are making it easier for more students to enrol. One of the particular issues the ALP seems determined to address is the issue of increasing drop-out rates amongst students, which is seen as not only being a waste of public funding but also bad public policy because it leaves students indebted without any qualifications.

It is clear that the ALP wants to move towards a funding and regulatory framework which will make universities more accountable not only for the quality of education they deliver to students but also to ensure that graduates have the appropriate knowledge, skills and adaptability to meet the needs of an Australian economy which will increasingly be reliant on a well-educated and innovative workforce.

To overcome the high level of political and policy uncertainty around higher education funding and regulation in recent years, the ALP is promising to enact a Student Funding Guarantee (SFG) as well as establish an independent Higher Education Productivity and Performance Commission (HEPPC).

The ALP claims that SFG will boost the level of public investment by $2,500 per student per year from 2018 which is equivalent to a 27 per cent increase compared to the Coalition’s policies. When considering the actual extent of any increased public investment we must keep in mind that the Coalition’s plans include implementing Labor’s 2013 efficiency dividend. Therefore, the level of increased funding would

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appear to largely be reinstating past funding cuts. The ALP plans also include several savings measures that would see a number of student scholarships converted to income contingent loans and using the Consumer Price Index (CPI) rather the current more generous Higher Education Grants Index (HEGI) for the indexation of university grants.

We understand that the role of HEPPC will not only be to negotiate funding agreements between universities and the Commonwealth but also ensure that universities remain accountable for achieving their own goals and objectives as well meeting broader performance benchmarks. While the NTEU has major reservations about calling such a body a ‘productivity and performance’ commission, we support the establishment of an independent body to better plan and manage the regulation and funding of higher education in Australia.

We also support the idea that our public universities should act for the public good and therefore must be able to demonstrate that they are acting in the public interest. To the extent to which the HEPPC is able to fulfil these roles we welcome its establishment.

Paul Kniest, Policy & Research Coordinator NTEU’s proposed framework for the funding and regulation of higher education was outlined in our 2015 Federal Budget submission: www.nteu.org.au/library/view/id/6021

Environment

Divestment as a powerful tactic Our universities are under attack not just from successive governments led by the major parties, but from the powerful corporate interests pulling their strings. But divestment can be used as a tool to benefit both the environment and our sector.

We saw the power of corporate interests when Kevin Rudd tried to introduce a reasonable tax on the mining of non-renewable resources, similar to the tax on oil extraction by the Norwegian Government which has resulted in a massive ‘sovereign wealth fund’ for that country’s future.

In Australia, however, the mining industry outspent the Government tenfold, funding a $22 million advertising campaign against the tax, which dwarfed the Government’s spending on promoting the tax.

The tax was watered down considerably to appease the mining interests, and Rudd was deposed not long afterwards.

Another example of ‘democracy deficit’ was the NSW Government permitting unconventional gas exploration in the Lismore local government area despite a 2011 finding that 87 per cent of the population opposes it.

Yet our universities, our superannuation fund UniSuper, and many of us as individuals continue to invest in those very corporations driving the neo-liberal and neo-conservative agendas, corporations which influence politics through lobbying and funding political parties, as well as supporting conservative think-tanks and mass media.

We have money in the ‘Big Four’ banks – Westpac, ANZ, Commonwealth and NAB,

who financially support the major political parties directly and are highly unethical, funding numerous nefarious activities in the third world, such as land grabs, illegal logging and child labour. Most Australian banks have provided loans to nuclear weapons companies at some stage since 2008, with some universities also implicated.

UniSuper contributes to climate change by investing directly in the divisive, polluting coal seam gas industry through Origin Energy, and through its investments in the big four banks who heavily support fossil fuels.

As a union we need to think strategically about divestment. It is a powerful tool: it was one of the major tactics, for example, in the successful international campaign against apartheid.

Divestment and UniSuper We can engage in divestment individually, by getting our money out of the major banks. We are obliged to use UniSuper, one of Australia’s largest super funds, with more than 388,000 member accounts and $49.7 billion in net funds under management. However, we can roll over our super into funds such as FutureSuper (which has no investment in fossil fuels), and ensure that our remaining UniSuper account is set to Sustainable Balanced, Sustainable High Growth or Global Environmental Opportunities.

At the national level, we can use the NTEU’s position on the UniSuper Board to pressure for divestment, and stronger ethical and green options (which are showing a tendency to do better financially anyway, whereas many fossil fuel investments have stalled or are going backwards and may become ‘stranded assets’ ).

At a Branch level, we can encourage our members to divest.

University divestment Also at Branch level, but coordinated nationally by the National Office, we can pressure our universities to divest.

This divestment also aids other movements, leaving them more able and inclined to support our struggles. Some universities, such as ANU and, to a lesser extent, Sydney University, are already going down the divestment from fossil fuels path, despite ANU copping a great deal of flak (which actually publicised the issue).

However, as Tom Swann argued in the last edition of the Advocate, our universities are lagging well behind rather than leading this fast-growing movement and ‘the biggest debate of our time’.

If one person divests and re-invests ethically and for environmental sustainability, it’s a positive change. But if all the above actions were to occur in a strategic way, we could shift billions of dollars – and therefore a great deal of power – away from neo-liberal and neo-conservative vested interests, and towards businesses that value and support the tertiary sector.

Marty Branagan, Convenor of Peace Studies, University of New England You can join university staff calling for university leadership on fossil fuels at www.tai.org.au/unilead At 2015 NTEU National Council, a resolution was passed a calling on university and UniSuper divestment from fossil fuels (see report p. 52).

NTEU ADVOCATE • vol. 22 no. 3 • November 2015 • www.nteu.org.au/advocate • page 27

The case against the deregulation of tertiary education The ability of deregulated markets to efficiently and equitably allocate vocational education and training (VET) places in Australia has been on trial since the Brumby Labor Government in Victoria introduced its Securing Jobs for the Future policy in 2008. The policy entitled most students to government support (entitlement or demand driven system) and made all registered VET providers (public and private) eligible for government subsidies (fully contestable funding model).

The policy was encouraged and facilitated by the Commonwealth agreeing to extend student access to the income contingent loan scheme (VET FEE-HELP) which operates in similar way to the Higher Education Contribution Scheme (HECS) in higher education and means that students are not required to pay for their training upfront. The Victorian framework has been the basis of similar policies in most other States and Territories.

Failed Victorian experiment As reported in Advocate in June 2014 the NTEU showed that there was sufficient evidence to conclude that the deregulation of Victorian vocational education was a case study in policy and market failure.

Other subsequent reports and inquiries, the latest being the Victorian VET Funding Review being undertaken by Bruce McKenzie and Neil Coulson, confirm this view and show that Victoria’s experiment has not only undermined the viability of many of Victoria’s public TAFE institutes, but failed students, industry, communities and the government.

The reforms led to a rapid growth in enrolments, predominately amongst private Research Training Organisations (RTOs) who increased their share of enrolments from 14 per cent in 2018 to 48 per cent in 2013. As a consequence the massive blow-outs in Victoria’s training budget for all this increased activity and expenditure has done little to address skills shortages in Victoria. It has left tens of thousands of students with large debts and thousands of students with absolutely worthless qualifications of which about 8,000 have been recalled.

While some in the tertiary education sector continue to argue that the Victorian experiment demonstrates a failure of ‘regulation’, the NTEU would argue that the problem goes much deeper than that.

There is a fundamental mismatch between the motives of for-profit providers and the broader public good underpinning our

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public education systems. In short, the NTEU will continue to argue education is far too important to be left to the market, as is shown by the ever growing mountain of evidence against deregulation in VET.

Another day, another revelation It seems that barely a day goes by without a new report, revelation or government policy response which highlights the inherent incompatibility between the provision of education in the public interest and for the public good and operation of demand driven fully contestable markets in the allocation and delivery of education.

On 14 October 2015, trading in shares of Australian Careers Network (ACN) were halted after it notified the Australian Stock Exchange that it had been notified that the Australian Skills Quality Authority (ASQA) was about to cancel the registration of its subsidiaries, the Phoenix Institute . This was not the first instance of a trading suspension for a large private for-profit provider of vocational education and training. Trading in Vocation shares was suspended in January after the dramatic decline in share value after it was revealed that public funding for some of its Victorian subsidiaries was under threat.

Ashely Services suffered a similar fate after the suspension of its participation in the Tools for Trade program.

The following day, 15 October 2015, the federal Minister for Vocational Education and Skills, Luke Hartsuyker, introduced the Higher Education Amendment (VET FEEHELP Reform) Bill 2015, which amongst other things increased the penalties for breaches of VET FEE regulations. This followed rafts of changes to regulations and guidelines introduced earlier in the year in relation to the eligibility and operation of VET FEE-HELP introduced by his predecessor, Senator Simon Birmingham. Amongst other things, these changes made illegal the offering of inducements such as the promise of free iPads.

Later on the afternoon of 15 October 2015, the Senate Education and Employment References Committee released its report Getting your money’s worth: the operation and funding of VET providers in Australia, which chronicles how catastrophic policy and market failure has allowed dodgy private providers to exploit the VET FEE-HELP arrangements and students.

The VET FEE-HELP Statistical Report, published without any formal announcement in October 2015, shows that the number of students receiving assistance under this program increased more than fivefold between 2011 and 2014 increasing from 40,764 to 212,270. Over the same period the value of VET FEE-HELP assistance increased more than eightfold increasing from $205 million to $1,757 million. Of the $1,552 million increase in financial assistance 93 per cent went on full fee paying as opposed to State subsidised courses.

As if these reports in themselves didn’t represent enough damning evidence, the Australian Skills Quality Authority (ASQA) on 20 October 2015 released the findings of its audit into the compliance of providers with VET FEE-HELP regulations which it began in April this year following an increase in complaints. In summary, the report found that only one in three (7 out of 21) providers audited were fully compliant with the regulations, a further eight providers had certain conditions and undertakings imposed upon them and another six were still undergoing ‘regulatory scrutiny’.

The evidence The Senate’s Getting our money’s worth report reads like a brief of evidence against deregulation. It identifies some for-profit private providers as the main perpetrators of serious ethical breaches against the public interest and students.

These breaches include the delivery of substandard qualifications as well the use of unscrupulous marketing and sales tactics. The report also makes it clear that governments are complicit in the commission of this wrong doing against the Australian public. Some of the blame must be attributed to poor policy design and implementation coupled with under-resourced regulators, who have inadequate enforcement capabilities.

Quantity vs quality One of the consequences associated with deregulation of VET has been a rapid increase in the number of students, especially amongst private RTOs as noted in VET FEE HELP Statistical Report 2014 mentioned above. The Senate report includes examples of courses being offered in extremely short time frames. In addition to the length and quality of instruction, the report also raises serious concerns about the nature and rigour of assessment.

However, perhaps the most damming evidence in relation to poor quality provisions is that highlighted in a recent Issues Paper released by Bruce McKenzie and Neil Coulson as part of their Victorian VET Funding Review. The paper notes that in 2014 and 2105 approximately 8,000 VET qualifications offered by just four private providers were recalled by the regulator because they were found to be inadequate.

Therefore, there seems little if any doubt that while deregulation has seen an impressive rise in the quantity of VET enrolments it has undoubtedly undermined the quality of education and training being offered. As the Senate report noted, deregulation has resulted in a provider-led feeding frenzy.

The feeding frenzy The sales and marketing behaviour of some for-profit providers chronicled in the Senate report is nothing short of

reprehensible. Evidence of unscrupulous marketing techniques include promoting courses as being ‘free’ or ‘government funded’, promises of free equipment, cash or shopping vouchers, and the use of high pressure selling tactics including targeting of disadvantaged people outside Centrelink offices or in public housing estates.

These tactics continue to be used despite being ruled out under the new regulations (Standards) introduced on 1 July 2015.

One particularly pernicious form of aggressive marketing is what might be called predatory harvesting. This is where providers or their agents using the guise of ‘no upfront fees’ or ‘this is a government supported course’ or the promise of a job on completion to sign up unsuspecting and often disadvantaged students to contracts which they do not fully understand.

This has come about because of the low documentary (name, date of birth and Tax File Number) and disclosure requirements related to VET FEE-HELP loans. It may also have been allowed to flourish because the new tougher marketing standards introduced in July this year only apply to providers and do not cover to brokers or third party marketing agents

Responsive regulation The McKenzie and Coulson Issues paper also highlights another important issue associated with deregulated VET markets, and that is what they refer to as ‘policy chaos’. The report highlights a misunderstood aspect of the operation of competitive markets, namely their inherent instability. The mounting body of evidence clearly shows that deregulation will result in some providers ‘chasing the easy money’ by exploiting gaps in regulation or funding.

The evidence also shows that governments at both state and national level then respond by changing the rules.

McKenzie and Coulson describe this as ‘a counter-productive cycle of provider behaviour and government response leading to an unstable system’. This is not only costly, but it also severely undermines the public confidence in the system and Australia’s international reputation.

The verdict The sheer volume and weight of evidence about the adverse impacts that deregulation has had on provision of VET in Australia makes it very difficult not to conclude that it has been anything but a complete and utter failure to students, public providers, industry, the community and government. An important lesson that everyone should take from this inexcusable experiment is, as the Senate report notes, that giving private providers access to public subsidies ‘entails unacceptable risk to the reputation of Australian tertiary education.’

Paul Kniest, Policy & Research Coordinator

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Education for sale Privatisation and commercialisation in and of education is undermining the expansion of educational opportunities for children and adults around the world.

Access of children to primary and secondary school and onto tertiary education has increased across all regions. However, the incursion of private, specifically for-profit, businesses into all levels of education exploits individuals, families and communities seeking the best education they can afford. Poor and less educated people are shamelessly exploited by these education profiteers.

Privatisation and commercialisation go hand in hand with government withdrawal of funding to public education.

Even more cynical and shameful is the handover of public money to private education companies in the form of subsidies, vouchers or student loans.

The 7th Congress of Education International (EI) agreed in July 2015 that commercialisation and privatisation will be at the heart of EI’s agenda for the next four years. Consequently a highlight of the annual meeting of NTEU National Council on 8 October was a panel of education union leaders from Argentina, The Philippines and South Africa and the director of EI’s Global Response Project, former AEU President, Angelo Gavrielatos.

Argentina Political philosopher, Yamile Socolovsky, is the Director of Research and Training at the National Federation of University Teachers (CONADU) in Argentina, where 80 per cent of higher education students are in the free and open access, autonomous public university system.

Jeannie Rea National President

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However, Yamile explained privatisation is changing who is accessing higher education and where they are studying. The groundwork was laid during the dictatorship (1976-1983), and despite the hiatus of the years of democratic transition, the neo-liberal agenda was accelerated from

A dystopian imagining of privatised education

Yamile Socolovsky, Argentina

Francisca Castro, The Philippines

1989 with privatisation of state assets, loss of job security and labour rights.

contractors for building and maintenance of private schools. Francisca reported that under the public-private partnership schemes, classroom reconstruction in disaster hit areas is done by private companies. International development assistance is going to these private companies when donors think that they are directly supporting communities.

Universities were encouraged to find private sources of funding and to compete with one another, while answering to invasive evaluation and accreditation regimes.

The consequences included divisions amongst teaching and research academics, the erosion of internal democracy and overloading of early career academics with teaching, while devaluing teaching.

So whilst the more progressive government from 2003 has sustained increases in education budgets and reinstated annual collective bargaining, created new national universities and financial aid for students, the private sector has been encouraged to flourish with public money.

University participation is increasing, but public universities are becoming more elite and increasingly cater for students from higher income backgrounds. The private institutions are for the poor and are for-profit.

Yamile warned that this process is going on throughout Latin America and with higher education designated a tradable good; free trade treaties are the means by which education corporates are neo-colonising higher education across the region.

Increasingly companies are locking up all aspects of the education process by monopolising supply of the learning materials, software, technical support, testing, facilities and the list goes on. She named Pearson, Thompson and McGraw Hill as most active in Latin America.

The Philippines Secretary-General of the Alliance for Concerned Teachers’ (ACT) in The Philippines, Francisca Castro described the full blown privatisation roadmap of President B S Aquino and his cronies. ‘Education service contracting’ was first legislated in 1986 to facilitate the movement of public school students into private schools to deal with overcrowding.

Students are given vouchers by the Government to pay for private schools and private school teachers are subsidised by the Government to augment their otherwise meagre wages.

Rather than fixing up the Government schools, Government grants go to private

Families are increasingly forced to send their children to private schools especially to complete secondary education. In the tertiary sector universities and colleges are required to be self-reliant as the ‘university is the marketplace of ideas’ and ‘students are the consumers of knowledge’.

By 2015 Government higher education funding had been cut by 50 per cent, which means higher tuition fees. More than half of students are in private colleges, and the prestigious University of The Philippines, with full fee deregulation, is becoming available only to the elite.

Pearson and subsidiary companies are very active in The Philippines

South Africa Mugwena Maluleke, the General Secretary of the South African Democratic Teachers Union (SADTU) noted the recent comment in The Economist: ‘Private schools are booming in poor countries. Governments should either help them or get out of their way’. He reported that the South African Government was doing just this as earlier commitments to growth and redistribution of wealth has given way to privatisation and marketisation.

The big education corporates have moved in, dominated by Pearson-Spark, who are setting up schools and gaining control of publishing, standardised testing, and even the education department’s ICT. They are operating in early childhood through to higher education, and Pearson has even bought teacher training colleges.

The Government has stood aside or collaborated while the education corporates have attacked working conditions and unions, professionalism and professional development, academic freedom, and promoted managerialism over collegiality.

The government is undermining collective bargaining agreements in favour of

Just imagine: like so many parents, you want your children to get the best education they can, so when the local government school is rundown, overcrowded and understaffed, a new low fee paying school in your neighbourhood looks attractive and you decide to send your son.

Sure the staff are not qualified teachers, but there are lots of them and they have a tablet loaded up with the propriety product teaching modules from the same parent company that has franchised the school. But the costs keep mounting as you have to buy the uniform and the books and even pay to sit the exam and to get the results.

These seem to all be sold by the same company. Then you realise that your son is only qualified to go onto another school run by the company – and on it goes.

What if you then find that at the government school where your daughters are still enrolled, the same teaching materials have appeared and that company now seems to run the national curriculum and university entrance system? The school is then given to the company to run, while still government funded, but you still have to buy the company products. You start to worry about what is on that tablet and what your children are learning.

This would be a nightmare of privatisation of public education; or a brilliant story of leveraging dominance in the education ‘marketplace’.

Mugwena Maluleke, South Africa

continued overpage...

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Privatisation & commercialisation decrees and endorsing the proliferation of small unions to undermine the organised trade union movement.

ratisation of education and the dominant role of Pearson and unanimously carried a motion reiterating ‘support for publicly funded free education as a fundamental human right and a key foundation for social equity and social justice in Australia and internationally.’

Like in The Philippines and Argentina, it is the poor in South Africa who are being sold private education, sanctioned by government.

EI campaign Providing a local to global context, Angelo Gavrielatos told NTEU Council that there was great interest from the transnational education corporates back in May 2014, when the Coalition Government announced their higher education policy in the Budget. This confirmed NTEU suspicions that deregulation and the handover of government funded places to for-profit providers is core to the Coalition’s agenda.

No wonder the education corporates have moved into all levels of education with the global education market currently worth $4.5- 5 trillion and expected to expand rapidly to $6-7 trillion. Angelo explained that it is even more lucrative than the health market. Governments just lack the political will to fill the funding gap, as is their responsibility. It is estimated that clamping down on tax avoidance and evasion would generate five times what is needed to send every child in the world to school.

Angelo Gavrielatos, Education International UK’s National Union of Teachers (NUT) and the Association of Teachers and Lecturers (ATL), with the development NGO ‘Global Justice Now’, declared ‘Pearson’s brand has become synonymous with profiteering and the destruction of public education’ as they protested at Pearson’s AGM in London.

Council delegates were shocked and outraged at the acceleration of the corpo-

The moves by Pearson and others into marketising school education is fairly recent and is clearly an organised campaign, which started with exploiting/creating a ‘crisis’ in government investment in public education and the running down of government schools in the United States.

The strategy was to set up comparatively low fee private schools or no fee but government funded (charter) schools to undermine the public system.

In Australia we recognise these patterns of behaviour in VET contestability/competition policies, and also in the license to private operators in further and higher education to exploit international students.

Just recently there have been murmurings about taking the next step from public private partnerships to privately run public schools.

The EI Global Response Project, in the first stage, is undertaking research to inform coordinated actions in a group of countries, while also providing coordination of initiatives and activities of other EI affiliates. Organising against profiteering from education has to be a global campaign, but with local focus and action. Angelo explained that Pearson is targeted because it is by far the biggest company.

Campaigns against Pearson’s efforts to commodify public education are emerging across the world. In April 2014 the page 32 • NTEU ADVOCATE • vol. 22 no. 3 • November 2015 • www.nteu.org.au/advocate

Council pledged NTEU to join with the international campaign to expose, challenge and delegitimise the strategies of education corporates, in particular Pearson; and to establish a national campaign group targeting education corporates to develop an information pack for campus-based actions focused on corporate education providers including developing a ‘Boycott Pearson’ strategy.

Sources www.huffingtonpost.com/alan-singer/international-movement-to_b_7750594.html?ir=Australia www.ei-ie.org/en/news/news_details/3596 www.educationincrisis.net/resources/ei-publications

Governance

Time to strengthen University Acts?

Few will be surprised that the tenor of legislative changes foreshadowed by the Western Australian Government for WA University Acts is to replace elected staff representatives on governing bodies with appointed ones, and to allow universities to act increasingly as profitdriven commercial corporations. But as well as these dangers, change presents an opportunity to broaden the debate and strengthen the role and characteristics of universities.

Unlike many other OECD nations, Australia has little overarching legislation that defines universities or their characteristics. Beyond the description of the distinctive purposes of universities in the Higher Education Support Act, it is largely left to each university to define itself and its role. If the University of Western Australia (UWA) is anything to go by, this can be hopelessly vague.

Beyond a long-winded and out-dated statement that its Senate may grant degrees and other academic qualifications in any branch of knowledge in which the same degrees and other academic qualifications are granted in the UK, UWA’s Act is alarmingly short on guiding principles.

While it bestows on the University the

right to borrow and lend money, research does not rate a mention nor does the public good nor the need for community engagement.

On governance, none of the WA University Acts provide for the inclusion of Aboriginal representation nor do they require universities to consult with the traditional land owners in any manner whatsoever. That universities may do so, or have Aboriginal people involved in governance, is a matter of patronage and not as of right.

Instead, governing bodies comprise a Chancellor, Vice-Chancellor and a mix of members appointed by the Governor, co-opted by the governing body, appointed by the Minister, elected by convocation, elected by staff and elected by students.

Almost without exception those appointed or co-opted are accountants, lawyers, consultants and CEOs. They are not remotely representative of the public or communities they should serve.

Replacing elected staff representatives with appointed ones will compound that lack of balance. And it needs looking no further than academic decision-making bodies to understand that this once collegial feature of university life has been commandeered by university bureaucrats and Deans, generally hand-picked by corporatist Vice-Chancellors. The removal of students and alumni altogether from Councils and Senates, as signalled, will remove the last semblances of balance.

sufficient to seek just to maintain the status quo.

Retaining elected staff, student and alumni representatives goes only some way to making Councils and Senates more representative. Neither will stopping the slide further into corporatism alter the behaviour of those Vice-Chancellors who are appear drawn to commercial imperatives more than academic ones.

We need to go further and legislatively protect those features that characterise universities. Such things as ensuring that they are primarily concerned with advanced learning, developing the intellectual rigor and independence of staff and students, ensuring that research and teaching are interdependent and that most teaching done by people who are active in advancing knowledge, and having a diversity of teaching and research that maintains, advances, disseminates, and assists the application of, knowledge and promotes community learning.

Changes to legislation should be progressive, enshrining an enforceable right to academic freedom, the responsibility of universities to act as a critic and conscience of society and the right of staff and students to test conventional wisdom and express controversial ideas without reprisal. This includes engaging in cutting-edge research free from commercial and political pressure, a rare commodity on the current academic landscape.

It seems unnecessary to legislate to further allow universities to act as commercial corporations. Setting aside that they can already commercialise research and borrow and lend money, the history of institutions such as Murdoch foraying into the commercial arena has not been successful.

And there is none among the current crop of Vice-Chancellors that suggests they will be more commercially canny in the future, particularly if unrestrained.

To facilitate debate and work towards an enlightened legislative framework, NTEU representatives in WA are working with members of parliament to protect and strengthen universities. It not only includes maintaining the democratic involvement of staff and students but establishing a regulatory and legislative framework which supports and enhances the traditional functions and characteristics of universities.

Nevertheless, while it is easy to describe the consequences of foreshadowed legislative changes in WA, the more difficult question is how to respond. And it is not

Marty Braithwaite, WA Senior State Organiser

NTEU ADVOCATE • vol. 22 no. 3 • November 2015 • www.nteu.org.au/advocate • page 33

Singing the Innovation Revolution blues At a Geelong product launch on 7 October, Christopher Pyne professed that the new Prime Minister had asked him to release his ‘inner-revolutionary’. Turnbull had said, ‘Let me worry about the money, you get on with the ideas.’ This insight signals that the new PM wants a shift on national innovation policy, something Labor has sought to own since Bill Shorten’s Budget reply speech in May.

National innovation has come into sharp relief in 2015, with competing reviews looking for new thinking on national innovation policy and the regulation of public research. In the Government’s attempt to seize the policy agenda, there may be some big implications for universities.

The Science Minister is dead, long live the Science Minister!

When Pyne was announced as replacing the out-of-favour Ian Macfarlane as the new Minister for Industry, Innovation and Science, many assumed this was a reduction in portfolio responsibility. But Macfarlane’s relatively steady hand sat in stark comparison to the chaos of Pyne’s higher education deregulation debate. At the time, it appeared Pyne’s role was to keep the good ship of industry sailing on Macfarlane’s commercialisation platform.

However, at a speech in Canberra on 20 September on the composition of his new Ministry, Turnbull said, ‘It is really important for leaders, for prime ministers, for ministers, for people in the media to talk about the importance of change, to talk about the importance of science, to talk about the importance of technology.’

Jen Tsen Kwok Policy & Research Officer M@NTEUNational

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Now that Pyne’s inner revolutionary has been released, it appears this is more than just big-picture rhetoric. Amidst a national political climate in which Turnbull is both seeking to display continuity (in policy) and difference (in presentation), national innovation policy is now an exception.

The major parties want a piece of this space. As do the Greens, with Richard Di Natale calling for Research and Development (R&D) spending on climate science and the lifting of Australia’s R&D spend to 3 per cent of GDP in his National Press Club address on 30 September. But let’s not kid ourselves why, when so many issues containing such intense risks in relation to budget repair or public opinion.

To the common punter, innovation policy represents a sensible response to a more globalised, technologically-disruptive future.

Convergence or catch-up on national innovation policy?

Bill Shorten’s post-Budget reply was an unambiguous indication that higher education and science champion Senator Kim Carr had convinced his party colleagues that Labor could win on both higher education and innovation. Shorten announced that Labor would devote 3 per cent of GDP to research, introduce a Smart Investment Fund worth $500 million, plan to teach schoolchildren computer coding, and write off the HECS debt of 100,000 STEM students.

The fact that Labor’s new higher education policy was announced the same day the Turnbull Government was sworn in was interpreted in some quarters as a way of slipping the policy in under the radar. To others it was bad timing for an attempt to mount a counter-narrative about Labor’s emerging policy bravery.

Looking from higher education to innovation policy, it may well be about the latter.

Labor had been planning an offensive in these portfolios for some time. Shorten and Carr have had a drip feed of new ideas on innovation, including changes to visa arrangements for international student entrepreneurs and the introduction of a Start Up year at universities. These follow-on from the long lead in time to the Labor-supported Senate Economics References Committee report on Australia’s innovation system, originally announced in March.

So let’s keep in perspective that Pyne’s recent statements on innovation have little to do with higher education. He’s announced practical, cost-neutral changes, such as amendments to the Corporations Act which currently prohibit crowd-fund-

ing capital for corporate equity, and tax breaks for ‘angel investors’ in new tech companies younger than two years and earning less than a $1 million a year.

(Labor’s Ed Husic had called for regulatory changes to equity-based crowd-funding in October 2014.)

Will Pyne’s inner-revolutionary even be commensurable with the views of his new Ministerial colleagues? Others in the Government have a clear hunger for innovation, notably Wyatt Roy who recently announced the first government ‘Hackathon’ with venture capitalists Blue Chilli.

Universities in the innovation ecosystem There is more in the way of competing visions of innovation that university staff can anticipate. Considering the potential outcomes of the Watt Review of Research Policy and Funding Arrangements, as well as the Australian Council of Learned Academies (ACOLA) Review of the Research Training System, this may yet be the case, particularly if the Coalition continue to run hard on a commercialisation agenda that effectively translates into more public subsidies for big business.

As is evident in the Watt discussion paper, this might involve changing conditions of public funding to subsidise business R&D, facilitating corporate access and exploitation of academic IP, and even adding a role for business on the assessment bodies that allocate peer-reviewed competitive research grants.

In relation to the role of universities there appears to be a fundamental philosophical disagreement. Labor sees systemic connectivity as the key to building innovation systems, and continues to endorse the role of policy making as a way of addressing market failure.

This view would suggest that universities and public research institutions have a responsibility to national innovation by building upon their natural institutional capacities, rather than a Coalition position which appears to want greater efficiencies by hiving off funding or fundamentally altering incentives to what publicly-funded research institutions do.

and Development, asserted to President Franklin D Roosevelt back in 1945: Basic research leads to new knowledge.

It provides scientific capital… A nation which depends upon others for its new basic scientific knowledge will be slow in its industrial progress and weak in its competitive position in world trade, regardless of its mechanical skill.

Decades later, at the height of the global financial crisis, President Obama addressed the National Academies of Science, stating: That’s why the private sector under-invests in basic science – and why the public sector must invest in this kind of research. Because while the risks may be large, so are the rewards for our economy and our society.

Will the Coalition play true to form? Will they continue to slash and burn public funding? Will they implement more aggressive subsidies to big business beyond the defunct Labor R&D tax concessions?

Or will they ignore universities altogether?

Unlike his predecessor, Turnbull does not believe public goods are fairies that sit at the bottom of the pond, most clearly displayed in his dalliances with the ABC. But his innovation evangelism may not extend to recognising university independence and blue-sky research as the ground zero for innovation. Let alone the need to increase public spending in this area.

With the Senate Economics Committee report due on 25 November, the Watt Committee also due in late November, and BRW suggesting an innovation statement is planned before Christmas to maintain Turnbull’s momentum, we will know soon enough.

NTEU has made submissions to both the ACOLA and Watt reviews and have been involved in further consultations. These submissions and more can be found at: www.nteu.org.au/policy/legislation_ submissions/nteu_submissions

To what extent is this policy making on the ideological run? The literature on the management of public research systems suggests a consensus about the importance of public investment and independence in research. Vannevar Bush, the first director of the US Office of Scientific Research

NTEU ADVOCATE • vol. 22 no. 3 • November 2015 • www.nteu.org.au/advocate • page 35

Students

Tackling university attrition rates Opposition Leader Bill Shorten has revealed Labor’s policy platform for higher education, saying the focus would be on retaining students in higher education and curbing the numbers dropping out.

The students most at risk of not graduating are those from equity backgrounds including low socioeconomic and Indigenous students. So how do we make sure these students complete their degrees?

Labor has been light on detail, but we know of some things that would help.

Getting students into university Australian universities have done an excellent job of attracting more students from a greater diversity of backgrounds.

From 2007-2013, the rate of undergraduate enrolment increased by over 25 per cent. The growth was spurred by both policy directed at increasing participation rates and the more recent demand-driven system that uncapped university places.

Since 2007, student numbers from designated equity groups have significantly increased. The exceptions have been women in non-traditional areas of study and students from rural and remote areas.

While increased access and participation are cause for celebration, getting students into university is only the beginning of this journey. The successful retention of learners remains elusive. Student dropout rates in Australian universities consistently hover around 18 per cent, with some institutions indicating that an average of 25 per cent of students leave before gaining a degree.

Rates of early departure from university remain particularly high among students

from low socioeconomic backgrounds, rural and remote areas, and Indigenous students. Obviously for students who fall into multiple equity groups, the possibility of leaving university without a degree increases dramatically.

Entering university has similar characteristics to entering a foreign or unfamiliar country. New students have to master a new and somewhat alien language; all the time adjusting to an unfamiliar environment where accepted etiquettes may be unclear or simply invisible. Expectations, presumed both prior to arrival at university and during the initial stages of study, may remain hidden or unexplained for certain groups.

Students who do not traditionally attend university or have a family history of graduates may feel like imposters who don’t belong or deserve study. Such feelings can quickly lead to thoughts of departure.

How do we ensure the ‘open door’ doesn’t become a ‘revolving door’?

There is one key resource for retaining and engaging beginning students that all institutions have access to – the existing university population. A key component of effective retention strategies is including existing students in the transition of new students into the university environment.

One strategy is peer mentoring, where new students and current students can meet informally to discuss university practices and expectations. This provides a ‘safe space’ for students, particularly those from equity backgrounds, to get insider knowledge that is important for academic success.

Mentors often share similar life experiences and stories to their mentees, and so can provide practical solutions and strategies for managing the rigours of tertiary study.

They can explain university timetabling, university terminology and highlight critical stages in the semester. There is a substantial amount of assumed knowledge within universities and mentors can be critical in explaining these assumptions.

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Mentoring can assist in reducing student isolation in university and increase engagement with the campus, faculty and staff. Importantly, this is the case for both the student being mentored and also the mentor. This mutuality has been clearly indicated in our research with the Australian Indigenous Mentoring Program (AIME).

In interviews, AIME mentors said their involvement in the program personally evoked a greater sense of belonging with the campus community, encouraging some to continue with their own studies.

This educational mentoring program has improved the high school completion rates of Australian Indigenous students, transitioning 100 per cent of their Year 12 students into university, further education, or employment.

The potential of mentoring programs is not limited to getting students into university. It should be offered as an ongoing aspect of university life. Engaging with existing students more advanced in their degrees is particularly important for those students who may not have a trusted person available to answer questions or provide advice.

Nurturing mentoring relationships over time, with continued opportunities for conversations and meetings throughout the first and even second year of study, can assist in retention, particularly among students most at risk of dropping out.

Sarah O’Shea, Senior Lecturer in Adult, Vocational and Higher Education, University of Wollongong.

Paul Chandler, Pro Vice-Chancellor, University of Wollongong Valerie Harwood, Professor, University of Wollongong This article first appeared in The Conversation, 25 September 2015. Reprinted with permission. theconversation.com/getting-studentsinto-uni-is-one-thing-but-how-to-keepthem-there-47933

Postgraduates

What is the value of postgrad students?

Students are important stakeholders in their education, not simply consuming but contributing towards their university. Yet when the activity of a university is reviewed this contribution is often overlooked or undervalued.

This is the case with current approaches to higher education policy, and the issue faced by postgraduate students is highlighted by a review of research funding and policy arrangements commissioned by the federal Minister for Education and Training in 2015.

In the context of the review it has been suggested that frameworks such as the Excellence in Research for Australia (ERA) or the new (currently under development) Research Engagement for Australia (REA) framework could be used in determining the allocation of performance based block grant funding. However, the use of these frameworks would likely undermine rather than improve the allocation of block grant funding, particularly where postgraduates are concerned.

In 2015 the Research Training Scheme (RTS) and Australian Postgraduate Award (APA) funding made up 54 per cent of total block grant funding available to universities, an amount well over $958 million. The RTS and APA are the primary source of funding for research training at Australian universities. The problem is that while these frameworks may be excellent at measuring research quality or engagement the ERA and REA pay no attention to quality of research training and rely on high level research and income data that are not sensitive to the micro level contributions of postgraduate students.

We know that postgraduates are involved in research activity at a university, they write publications and their projects often engage end-users. They also teach, volunteer or contribute to the business of a university in other capacities.

But the value of these contributions is currently difficult to quantify. For example, postgraduate research publications are counted by a university for the ERA framework and for in block grant funding formula. Yet there is no statistic for postgraduate publications, and this data is not easily accessible at an institutional level. We do not know the proportion of ERA counted publications attributable to postgraduate students.

Further, a statistic by the Australian Bureau of Statistics (ABS) for research and experimental development in the higher education sector highlighted that in 2012 postgraduate students made up 57 per cent of the human resources dedicated to R&D in the higher education sector, a total of 42,467 person years of effort (PYE).

But the extent of their contribution to R&D or what role they play is unclear. We don’t know how the 57 per cent translates into publications, or other outputs like IP generation, engagement or commercial returns.

#Valuepostgrads This gap in national higher education statistics and lack of recognition has led to an initiative by the Council of Australian Postgraduate Associations (CAPA) to Value Postgraduate Students #Valuepostgrads.

The campaign aims to raise awareness about the contribution of postgraduate students.

It will work towards both quantifying and qualifying the value of this contribution in order to establish the full value of a postgraduate to their university and the higher education sector in Australia.

As a starting point, #Valuepostgrads is asking postgraduate students to think about their personal contribution, and to tell us what they believe their research degree will contribute.

These personal anecdotes are collected as photographs, where a postgraduate holds up a sign with a short statement which they have written in response to the question ‘My research degree will…’? By collecting these anecdotes we can put faces to aspirations and capture the motivations of postgraduate students in a format which can be shared and discussed. #Valuepostgrads current objective is to start a national conversation about the value of postgraduate students, facilitated by collecting and sharing 1000 photographed anecdotes throughout 2015–16.

If you are a postgraduate student you can participate by taking a moment to tell us about your research degree, or you can promote the #Valuepostgrads campaign by sharing this information with your friends and colleagues.

In an environment where resources are limited and funding for the sector is inconsistent it is more important than ever that we hear the voices of stakeholders like postgraduate students and ensure that their valuable contributions both tangible and intangible are not overlooked.

Harry Rolf is President of CAPA. #Valuepostgrads is online at www.capa.edu.au/valuepostgrads www.facebook.com/valuepostgrads Your chance to benefit from

free Union membership TODAY!

NTEU POSTGRAD MEMBERSHIP

WHAT IS IT?

BENEFITS?

The NTEU represents staff who work in higher education. We are central to many campaigns and issues affecting the university sector.

Now postgraduate students can have access to some of the benefits enjoyed by NTEU members who work within the sector, all at no cost!

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Union publications Computers and electronic discounts Movie tickets Bookshop and magazine discounts Travel insurance and travel services

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NTEU.ORG.AU/POSTGRAD Please note: This is not a full membership of the NTEU. Postgrad members will receive electronic copies of union publications, and have access to some member benefits. Those with casual or other work in a university should join as full members.

Authorised by G McCulloch, 120 Clarendon St, Sth Melbourne VIC 3205

NTEU ADVOCATE • vol. 22 no. 3 • November 2015 • www.nteu.org.au/advocate • page 37

The misuse of metrics Australian universities are increasingly resorting to the use of journal metrics such as impact factors and ranking lists in appraisal and promotion processes, and are starting to set quantitative ‘performance expectations’ which make use of such journal-based metrics. The widespread use and misuse of research metrics is leading to increased concern in scientific and broader academic communities worldwide.

Important recent responses to the socalled ‘metric tide’ include the report of that name recently issued by the UK’s Higher Education Funding Council for England (HEFCE), by Wilsdon et al. (2015), and other important statements such as the San Francisco Declaration on Research Assessment and the Leiden Manifesto.

While there is a spectrum of views on the value of research metrics in general, there is widespread agreement from authoritative sources that it is not appropriate to rely on journal-level metrics such as journal ranking lists for assessing the merit of individual scholars.

The Australian Research Council (ARC) has been unequivocal in recommending that, since it withdrew its attempted journal ranking lists in 2012, these should not be used by institutions for performance appraisal or similar purposes. To quote a recent statement by ARC CEO Aidan Byrne: ‘ERA hasn’t made use of journal rankings since 2010, and while some universities have continued to use them internally, it is the ARC’s firm view that this should stop.’

(Trounson, 2015)

Associate Professor Andrew Bonnell NTEU National Vice President (Academic)

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The National Health and Medical Research Council (NHMRC) issued a statement in April 2010 discouraging the use of Journal Impact Factors in applications or peer review of applications, stating: ‘Journal Impact Factor is not a sound basis upon which to judge the impact of individual

papers’ (NHMRC, 2010). The NHMRC in 2015 has broadened this statement to read: It is not appropriate to use publication and citation metrics such as Journal Impact Factors, the previous Excellence in Research for Australia (ERA) Ranked Journal List or h-index when assessing applications as these can potentially be misleading when applied to the peer review of publication outputs of individuals, and may also not be relevant to the project under consideration. (NHMRC, 2015) In July 2015, the UK’s Higher Education Funding Council for England (HEFCE) released a major report on the use and misuse of research metrics, entitled The Metric Tide, by Wilsdon et al. (2015).

While the report calls for more refined and sophisticated use of metrics rather than for the abolition of mass assessment exercises such as the UK’s REF (Research Excellence Framework), it does make some pointed comments on the misuse of metrics for performance appraisal, for example, ‘Too often, managers and evaluators continue to rely on metrics that are recognised as unsuitable as measures of individual performance, such as journal-level indicators’ (Wilsdon et al., 2015, p.48).

The report’s conclusions include: Recommendation 4: HR managers and recruitment or promotion panels in HEIs should be explicit about the criteria used for academic appointment and promotion decisions.

These criteria should be founded in expert judgement and may reflect both the academic quality of outputs and wider contributions to policy, industry or society. Judgements may sometimes usefully be guided by metrics, if they are relevant to the criteria in question and used responsibly; article-level citation metrics, for instance, might be useful indicators of academic impact, as long as they are interpreted in the light of disciplinary norms and with due regard to their limitations. Journal-level metrics, such as the JIF, should not be used (author’s emphasis).

The inappropriate use of research metrics has also been addressed in recent statements which have gained wide support and currency in the scientific community internationally. The 2013 San Francisco Declaration on Research Assessment (DORA), prompted by deep concerns at the effects of the misuse of research metrics aired at the previous year’s American cell biologists’ conference, made the primary general recommendation: 1. Do not use journal-based metrics, such as Journal Impact Factors, as a

surrogate measure of the quality of individual research articles, to assess an individual scientist’s contributions, or in hiring, promotion, or funding decisions.

More specifically, institutions are recommended to: 4. Be explicit about the criteria used to reach hiring, tenure, and promotion decisions, clearly highlighting, especially for early-stage investigators, that the scientific content of a paper is much more important than publication metrics or the identity of the journal in which it was published.

5. For the purposes of research assessment, consider the value and impact of all research outputs (including datasets and software) in addition to research publications, and consider a broad range of impact measures including qualitative indicators of research impact, such as influence on policy and practice.

As of August 2015, the DORA had over 12,500 individual signatories and 588 institutional signatories. Australian signatories include the Australian Academy of Science, the Association of Australian Medical Research Institutes, Neuroscience Research Australia, the Association of Australian Cotton Scientists and the National Health and Medical Research Council, as well as Murdoch University (apparently the only Australian university to sign up so far) and the University of Queensland’s Institute for Molecular Bioscience.

The Leiden Manifesto was composed by Diana Hicks (Professor in Public Policy, Georgia Institute of Technology), Paul Wouters (Leiden University), and three of their colleagues, proposing ten principles for the responsible measurement of research performance, and was published in Nature (News) as a comment (2015).

The Leiden Manifesto states:

In Scandinavia and China, some universities allocate research funding or bonuses on the basis of a number: for example, by calculating individual impact scores to allocate ‘performance resources’ or by giving researchers a bonus for a publication in a journal with an impact factor higher than 15.

In many cases, researchers and evaluators still exert balanced judgement.

Yet the abuse of research metrics has become too widespread to ignore.

The recommendations of the Leiden Manifesto include: ‘7) Base assessment of individual researchers on a qualitative judgement of their portfolio’ (Hicks et al., 2015).

To sum up, while the field of current practice in research metrics is very broad and complex, and bibliometricians and scientometricians differ on a range of topics, there are now clear statements from sources that command respect, drawing on a review of the latest extant research, that clearly condemn the use of journal-level metrics and journal ranking lists for purposes of individual appointment, promotion and performance appraisal processes.

The bodies that have come out against such practices include Australia’s peak research funding bodies, the ARC and NHMRC. Universities that continue to use journal-level metrics and ranking lists for performance management to do so in contravention of an increasingly strong scholarly and policy consensus that warns against such practices.

References Declaration on Research Assessment (2013). http://www.ascb.org/dora/.

Hicks, D. et al. (2015). Bibliometrics: The Leiden Manifesto for Research Metrics, Nature News, Vol.520, Issue 7548, http://www.nature.com/ news/bibliometrics-the-leiden-manifesto-for-research-metrics-1.17351.

As scientometricians, social scientists and research administrators, we have watched with increasing alarm the pervasive misapplication of indicators to the evaluation of scientific performance.

NHMRC. (2010). NHMRC removes Journal Impact Factors from Peer Review of Individual Research Grant and Fellowship Applications. https://www.nhmrc.gov.au/_files_nhmrc/file/ grants/peer/impact per cent20factors per cent20in per cent20peer per cent20review.pdf.

[…]

NHMRC. (2015). Guide to Peer Review. https:// www.nhmrc.gov.au/book/guide-nhmrc-peerreview-2015.

Some recruiters request h-index values for candidates. Several universities base promotion decisions on threshold h-index values and on the number of articles in ‘high-impact’ journals. Researchers’ CVs have become opportunities to boast about these scores, notably in biomedicine. Everywhere, supervisors ask PhD students to publish in high-impact journals and acquire external funding before they are ready.

Trounson, A. (2015) Swinburne accused of research ratings ploy. The Australian, 1 April.

Wilsdon, J., et al. (2015). The Metric Tide: Report of the Independent Review of the Role of Metrics in Research Assessment and Management. DOI: 10.13140/RG.2.1.4929.1363.

NTEU ADVOCATE • vol. 22 no. 3 • November 2015 • www.nteu.org.au/advocate • page 39

Expert Seminar Series

Not waving, drowning

Academic workloads & autonomy On 22 September, NTEU held the second in our 2015 Expert Seminar series on academic workloads. The live streamed seminar examined the problems and possibilities of fairly regulating academic workloads.

The panel comprised John Kenny, academic in the Faculty of Education at the University of Tasmania, Colin Long, Victorian Secretary of the NTEU and former senior lecturer at Deakin University, and Sarah Roberts, NTEU National Industrial Coordinator, with NTEU National President, Jeannie Rea in the chair.

Tasmania, showing that the proportion of staff reported as not meeting their minimum performance expectations varies from 17–50 per cent, with 4 out of 10 schools/cost centres above 33 per cent and 6 out of 10 above 20 per cent. This goes to show just how unrealistic academic ‘expectations’ frameworks can be.

John Kenny focussed on what the research tells us about the long hours academic staff work, increasingly as a result of management demands and performance expectations rather than professional autonomy. He identified increasing performance expectations in research, teaching and engagement, driven by ERA and institutional benchmarking.

Colin Long then spoke about the contemporary challenges in the regulation of academic work as well as industrial issues, focusing on how we should, as a sector, regulate academic workload. Colin explained the historical context and existing legal framework and went through the possible options for regulating academic workloads, with their pros and cons.

Importantly, John disclosed some of his own research findings at the University of

Finally, Sarah Roberts talked about possible strategies NTEU might employ through

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bargaining to empower academics to reassert some control over workload allocation and volume. She concentrated on NTEU’s current Award claim that ‘required work’ for an academic be such that employees at the relevant academic level and discipline could with confidence be expected to perform that work in a competent and professional manner within an average 38 hours per week. www.nteu.org.au/seminars Extensive discussion followed the presentations, and continued into the Twitterverse with the hashtag: #NTEUExpert

Above, L–R: Sarah Roberts, Colin Long, John Kenny and Jeannie Rea at the Seminar.

Trans Pacific Partnership

TPP, copyright law and education There is much concern across the Pacific rim about the impact of the Trans-Pacific Partnership (TPP) upon public education.

A number of other TPP members, including Canada, Japan, New Zealand, and Malaysia, currently have a copyright term of life of the author plus 50 years. The NZ Government has estimated that the copyright term extension will cost New Zealand $55 million per year. Michael Geist of the University of Ottawa has suggested that the copyright term extension will cost Canada in excess of $100 million per year.

The secretive trade agreement involves a dozen nations across the Pacific, including Australia, New Zealand, Canada and the United States, and Indonesia may soon join.

The TPP would also limit the policy flexibilities available to address the problem of orphan works,where the author cannot be identified because they are lost or missing.

That will only further compound problems in respect of copyright term extension.

Although the text was finalised at the Atlanta talks in October 2015, the Agreement has not yet been made public. (The NTEU has joined with other unions and civil society organisations in calling for the agreement to be revealed to facilitate public debate before any decisions are made by Parliament.)

So whilst we cannot examine all the text that may impact on public educations, WikiLeaks has published the final version of the Intellectual Property Chapter of the TPP. The Intellectual Property Chapter of the TPP alone, with its copyright term extension, limits on copyright exceptions, and enforcement measures, will have a significant impact for educators and public education.

Copyright term extension After lobbying from Hollywood and the American music industry, the United States Trade Representative demanded that all TPP members provide copyright protection for the life of the author plus 70 years. Australia surrendered to such demands with the Australia-United States Free Trade Agreement in 2004. Moreover, Australia is in the anomalous position of providing perpetual copyright protection for unpublished copyright works. Australian librarians, curators, and archivists have protested against such laws with the ‘Cooking for Copyright’ event, ‘Baking Bad’, where librarians baked unpublished recipes and posted them on social media.

Fair use There has been a long discussion about the impact of the TPP on copyright exceptions. Notably, the United States enjoys a broad and flexible defence of fair use.

In the recent litigation over the Google Books Project, the Second Circuit of Appeals rejected the claim of the Authors Guild that Google had infringed the copyright of authors and publishers. The court held that ‘Google’s unauthorised digitising of copyright-protected works, creation of a search functionality, and display of snippets from those works are non-infringing fair uses.’

In comparison, Australia lacks a broad defence of fair use or even a dynamic defence of fair dealing like Canada.

Australia only has a narrow, limited, and purpose-specific defence of fair dealing.

The Australian Law Reform Commission reviewed Australia’s copyright exceptions in light of the digital economy and recommended that Australia should follow the example of the United States to protect the ‘transformative’ uses of copyrighted materials through technological advancement, stating that the principle is ‘a powerful and flexible feature of fair use’.

The Coalition Government under Tony Abbott refused to implement the recommendations. It remains to be seen how the Turnbull Government will respond. The concern is that Australia is adopting the

tougher copyright measures under the TPP, without the flexibilities of a fair use defence, which in part encourages civil society through parody and critique, as well as technological innovation.

Copyright enforcement The TPP also prescribes a draconian regime in respect of copyright enforcement. For instance, it contains prescriptive provisions preventing the circumvention of digital locks. There is also a heavy regulation of intermediaries in respect of matters of copyright infringement. The TPP provides for an arsenal of intellectual property enforcement measures in respect of copyright law – including civil remedies, criminal offences, and border measures.

Moreover, there will be criminal penalties and procedures for disclosure of trade secrets. For instance, Jamie Love of Knowledge Ecology International commented, ‘In many sections of the text, the TPP would change global norms, restrict access to knowledge, create significant financial risks for persons using and sharing information, and, in some cases, impose new costs on persons producing new knowledge goods.’

Conclusion The TPP will lock Australia into second rate international standards, as well as impose significant costs upon public education, with its push for stronger, longer copyright protection and with the poor state of Australia’s current copyright laws.

Furthermore, until the full release of the TPP text, we will not be able to properly unravel the larger implications for higher education.

Matthew Rimmer is Professor in Intellectual Property and Innovation Law at QUT, a leader of the QUT Intellectual Property and Innovation Law research program and has published widely on the relationship between copyright law, intellectual property, and the impact of multilateral trade agreements such as the TPP.

NTEU ADVOCATE • vol. 22 no. 3 • November 2015 • www.nteu.org.au/advocate • page 41

Hong Kong

Protests in support of academic freedom When an academic accused of plagiarism makes front page headlines for three to four days, there has to be more it.

The academic in question Professor Joseph Cheng Yu-shek was a chair professor of political science at the City University of Hong Kong when these accusations were made just over a year ago.

The university found him not guilty of plagiarism, but decided that his work was ‘not up to the highest standards’, and demoted him to a regular professor just ahead of his retirement. This is the second time Cheng has been accused of plagiarism and while the claims were not proven either time, he was demoted from the position of Dean.

Academic freedom and university autonomy is guaranteed by law in Hong Kong, but academics who are not politically correct – meaning too critical of the Chinese government – claim they are increasingly discriminated against within their university in terms of promotion and management positions and they are vilified in the pro-Beijing media.

Professor Cheng is also the convenor of the Alliance for True Democracy. Another pro-democracy activist Johannes Chan Man-mum former Dean of the law faculty of the Hong Kong University (HKU) was denounced in the media as a poor academic leader following revelations about the faculty’s performance in a research quality assessment review. How the University even got hold of this information, which was confidential to the University has not been explained.

Robert Chung Ting-Yui, a public opinion pollster based at HKU has had his methodology attacked in the media, as his findings have been critical of the chief executive of the Hong Kong Special Administrative Unit. Dixon Ming Sing, an associate professor of political science at HKU attracted more than 20 critical articles

calling for his dismissal when he criticised the repression of the banned religious movement Falun Gong.

While it is not surprising that critics of the Government may come under criticism particularly in pro-government media, and this could be argued to be part of a developing rambunctious democracy, local commentators see the attacks as more acrimonious and even sinister, some likening them to the days of the infamous Cultural Revolution. It is not just the views, but the person that is coming under attack in what seem to be coordinated campaigns to silence dissident voices.

Unsubstantiated allegations and threats to academic jobs are a pretty obvious warning to others to be silent.

Some brave concerned scholars wrote a public letter in early 2015 urging the pro-Beijing media to rein in their attacks and ‘exercise caution in guarding their reputation as self-respecting public media’.

Academics are also increasingly concerned about mounting evidence of the Government interfering with university autonomy through appointments to university councils. Leung Chun-ying, Hong Kong’s Chief Executive is automatically Chancellor of all the universities in the city. For example, at UHK he appoints the Chair and six Council members, while at City University, Leung appoints 15 of the 23 Council members.

Leung was the target of the Occupy Central ‘umbrella’ protesters in 2014 because he is believed to be putting the interests

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of the central government ahead of those of the people of Hong Kong.

Leung’s power to interfere in universities goes further as he also appoints members to the Hong Kong University Grants Committee, which advises government on funding and university policy.

Fear and suspicion is mounting amongst academics and self-censorship seems to also be taking hold. One academic reported, for example, that people think carefully before organising a conference around a controversial issue. However, others, including some who have been the brunt of attacks like Cheng still believes that Hong Kong is very safe for academics engaged in pure research, however the pressure is there to not be seen as politically critical and this impacts upon young academics seeking tenure.

As more mainland students apply to study in Hong Kong there is no doubt concern about these students returning home with too critical a perspective. It does not bode well for the development of a lively role for academics as public intellectuals and for universities to fearlessly act for the public good.

Jeannie Rea, National President Source: ‘Unsafe Harbour? Academic freedom in Hong Kong’, David Matthews, Times Higher Education Supplement, 10 September 2015.

Above: Silent protest of academics in Hong Kong, 6 October 2015. Credit: Reuters

Zimbabwe

A tough road for unionist lecturers Life in Zimbabwe is much harder for working people than in Australia, notwithstanding the attacks we currently face.

A recent Supreme Court ruling in Zimbabwe has significantly undermined employment protections resulting in tens of thousands of workers facing termination as a result.

iates looking for help to get themselves back on their feet. The NTEU contributed A$5000 to assist this determined group of unionists to re-establish their internal governance, adding to the assistance from the Canadian Association of University Teachers (CAUT), the Danish Association of Masters and PhDs, and the Irish Federation of University Teachers, to name a few.

The Government has been known to ignore Court rulings when they don’t suit them. Public sector wages are about a quarter of that required for a family to live on, and as a result corruption is endemic.

The President, Robert Mugabe, is now 91 and has ruled uninterrupted for 27 years.

The goal of this Congress was to assist the Union to regroup after years of attacks from the Zimbabwe Government, and facilitate the conduct of elections and the reestablishment of the internal governance of the organisation.

In this environment, a small union covering lecturers in polytechnics, teachers’ training colleges and vocational training centres, the College Lecturers Association of Zimbabwe (COLAZ), was determined to recommit to their democratic processes and engage delegates from around the country in their first General Congress in four years.

Along with David Robinson, CAUT Executive Director, I attended the 2015 COLAZ Congress providing information about the role of EI and our own unions, as well as giving direct assistance with meeting process and the conduct of elections. This included taking on the role of Returning Officers for the conduct of the elections and drafting motions to give effect to the subject of the debates. This assistance was important to the successful conclusion of the business of the meeting.

The issues at stake were very similar to those our own Union’s discussions and debates. The wages and conditions of members, the most effective ways to

achieve our objectives with government, internal priorities and participation by key sections of membership including women and people with disabilities. And of course, the issue that taxes every union – how to increase membership (currently at 800 members).

The NTEU has agreed to provide follow up assistance with the drafting of a new constitution. We have also committed to engage in further development work in cooperation with other higher education unions affiliated to EI. Despite severe difficulties, COLAZ is a small but impressive union, committed to working against corruption, and to improving the conditions of its members. It stands as a reminder of the things we have achieved in Australia, that we must work to ensure that the protections we hold dear are not eroded, and that we have a responsibility to extend our hand to those who need our help to improve their rights at work. Education, justice, and rights.

Matthew McGowan, National Assistant Secretary

Below: Matt McGowan and David Robinson at the COLAZ Congress. Credit: COLAZ

Since their last Congress in October 2011, COLAZ faced struggles which nearly destroyed the Union. In 2011 a strike in support of a campaign to improve wages was held which resulted in the Government shifting the employment of key union activists to regional areas, in some cases as far as 400km from their homes.

Their small membership base lived in fear and many left the Union fearing reprisals against themselves.

COLAZ reached out to Education International (EI) and its higher education affil-

NTEU ADVOCATE • vol. 22 no. 3 • November 2015 • www.nteu.org.au/advocate • page 43

News from the Net Pat Wright

iPhone, uPay The prices charged by telcos and smartphone retailers for their products and services make them very profitable companies.

Part of this profitability is due to the fact that their users pay for more than they use – as the French say, l’user pays.

Telcos sell us their services on a Plan, which includes landline calls, mobile calls, mobile SMS text messages, internet data downloads, and other services. They tell us that the Plan (contracting us for 24 or more months) gives us a great number of ‘free’ calls, messages and data each month, and scare us into paying for more than we need, in order to avoid the exorbitant price-gouging they impose for exceeding one of our quotas. Thus do most users get trained to pay for more than they use, particularly text messages and internet data, month after month.

To add insult to injury, the telcos offer to include the price of a smartphone, with interest, in the 24 month Plan – and the price of the smartphone often includes services for which we pay but seldom, if ever, use. This is especially the case with iPhones, where the relatively high price is justified not so much by the slick device as by the admission to the Apple ecosystem of free services for members of the club. However, the number of iPhone users who are ignorant of these services, or too proud to learn how to use them, is staggeringly large.

The most amazing oversight is the free iMessage service, which needs to be activated in one’s Apple account in iCloud – a procedure which seems to be beyond the capabilities of far too many iPhone ‘users’.

Most iPhone owners just use the device as a telephone handset – rather like using an AK47 to club fish.

When activated, iMessage allows you to send text messages (and photos and videos and voice recordings) from Apple devices to Apple devices for free across the Apple network of servers on the internet, ie, you don’t use the telcos’ networks

for mobile calls and SMS data, and therefore do not incur telco charges.

Of course, if you send a message from an Apple device to an ordinary smartphone, it will need to use a telco network, and you will therefore incur telco charges. No matter, tho’, because you have probably already paid for far more use of the telco network than you will ever use.

Because Apple’s iMessage service works on iPads as well as iPhones, it is possible to send and receive text (and other) messages on your iPad as well as your iPhone, without using telco networks, provided your iPad is connected through wifi to the internet and iMessage is activated. If your Apple device is using a telco network (and

The most amazing oversight is the free iMessage service, which needs to be activated in one’s Apple account in iCloud – a procedure which seems to be beyond the capabilities of far too many iPhone ‘users’.

Most iPhone owners just use the device as a telephone handset – rather like using an AK47 to club fish.

thus incurring charges), the text message will be green; if it is using the Apple service on the internet, the text message will be blue. If the receiver of your messages somehow de-activates iMessage, future texts will revert (as the French would say) to green.

As well as cost, iMessage has other advantages over the telco’s SMS – it has a very much higher word-limit for each message, it will transmit photos and videos without incurring high MMS charges, and it is easy to send a message to multiple recipients (when calling a group meeting, for example). These advantages are maximised when using the Apple network of servers on the internet (which you have paid for in

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the price of the device), but most will work also on a telco network, but at a price.

Other apps which use the Apple network of servers on the internet include the Photos app, which allows you to share automatically the last thousand photos you have taken with fellow Apple-holics, or share the one iCloud account with up to five ‘family’ members. In addition, the FaceTime app allows you to make audio and video calls to fellow Apple-holics anywhere in the internet world, without incurring telco network charges. Anyone who has been stung by the telcos’ international Roaming charges (present company included) would be quick to take advantage of this free service. The only drawback is that it must be Apple-to-Apple, but why would you want to call a non-Apple person?

This drawback can be overcome by the Skype app, which uses Voice Over Internet Protocol (VOIP) to make audio and video calls across Apple and Microsoft platforms.

Skype also allows you to make audio calls to regular telco numbers at reasonable rates. The sound quality is not always great, depending on how busy the internet is, but hey, you get what you pay for.

Other popular phone apps which use VOIP for audio calls include Viber and WhatsApp, which, like Skype, can be downloaded onto Apple, Android and Windows devices.

All of these services are made possible by seamlessly accessing the internet, though many people do not realize that they are using the internet, which they think is too nerdy for them.

Pat Wright is an NTEU Life Member. pat.wright@adelaide.edu.au

Lowering the Boom Ian Lowe

A chat with the Beloved Supreme Leader As the jacaranda blossoms fell, this year I used Skype for my annual catch-up with the everoptimistic Cal D’Aria. As regular readers know, Cal has risen seamlessly from temporary head of Tamworth Hairdressing College through its recreation as Tamworth University of the Tonsorial Arts and its rebadging simply as Tam U. He is now Vice-Chancellor, President, Academic Provost and Beloved Supreme Leader of this feisty little institution, which every year sets new benchmarks for private higher education.

Its rise has been driven by skilful recruitment: Dr Ongo from the Commonwealth government lends insights into the policy process, Dr Sabe de Todo from a sandstone university gives a veneer of academic respectability, while US import Prof. Ateer has driven the marketing strategy.

This year Cal was beside himself with excitement as he introduced me to his new head of human resources, Cassandra Yule.

‘Her ideas have taken the university world by storm’, Cal enthused. ‘Wherever I went, I heard people praising the benefits of the Cass Yule approach to teaching. Her name is now the gold standard throughout the entire university system.’

Cal was enthusiastic about the new Prime Minister. ‘Our boy Tony just didn’t understand education’, he said. ‘When I heard he was a former Rhodes Scholar, I asked him about the Oxford college system. He said ‘We have stopped the boats!’. At least Malcolm speaks in 300-word slogans! And

as a multi-millionaire himself he understands you have to pay vice-chancellors telephone-number salaries to get good men in the job.’ The idea of gender equity hasn’t reached Tam U, but Cal assured me the men on his Equity Committee have been chosen purely on merit and they all have the best interests of women at heart.

grade inflation, and every graduate is given the title of Doctor to avoid invidious comparisons with those professions that traditionally award themselves that title.

Cal estimates it will be possible for Tam U students to earn their doctorate in a year under the new system. ‘That will be the basis of our new recruitment strategy’, Cal said. ‘Tam U will cram you! Get your sneer in just a year!’

‘Wherever I went, I heard people praising the benefits of the Cass Yule approach to teaching. Her name is now the gold standard throughout the entire university system.’

I was curious to find out how Tam U handled the question of higher degrees, if every graduate gets the title of Doctor.

Cal explained that the main difference is what they can write after their name. ‘If Fred Jones does a first degree he can call himself Dr Fred Jones B.A. (Tam) or B.Sc (Tam). If he goes on to a higher degree, he could be Dr Fred Jones D.Sc. (Tam) if he were a scientist’.

He was disappointed that the new education minister has delayed the proposed handouts to private providers of higher education, but relieved that the promised deregulation of public universities had been shelved. ‘They got spooked by that ridiculous union campaign about $100,000 degrees’, Cal said. ‘They would have a pink fit if they knew what Tam U charges!’

Cal kindly shared Prof. Ateer’s marketing strategy. ‘We found that if we charge more, overseas students think we must be offering a better product’, Cal said. ‘Enrolments have gone through the roof since we jacked up our fees. I know a couple of the sandstones were going to follow our lead, but thankfully the Government has stopped them in their tracks. We have the field to ourselves now’, he grinned.

Cal was desperate to tell me about his latest innovation: the deci-mester. ‘I heard one of the newer universities was moving to a three-semester model to squeeze more work out of its staff and students’, Cal said. ‘I thought, that’s a great idea, but it is only a timid step in the right direction!

Tam U can do much better.’

From 2016, the Tam U teaching year will be broken up into ten deci-mesters of five weeks, with a two-week break at the end of the year. ‘All that time we’ve wasted between teaching periods will go’, Cal gushed. ‘Welcome to the brave new world of Cass Yule rules! E365!

Tam U automatically grades every assessment item as a High Distinction to avoid

When I looked surprised, he went on to detail their innovation at the doctoral level. ‘The old universities make post-graduates do a PhD or professional doctorates like an Ed.D, but most people really want a fancy higher doctorate: Doctor of Science, Doctor of Laws, or Doctor of Letters. So that is what we offer.’

Cal told me he was aiming to be able to provide a higher doctorate after six months of full-time study or a year parttime. ‘There’s no supervision, just a quick assessment. That’s what the punters want, and they are willing to pay very handsomely for it’, he concluded.

He urged me to keep this development under my hat. ‘Where Tam U leads, Ian, others quickly follow.´ Some older universities had already copied Tam U’s innovations, dispensing with nineteenth century ideas like supervising research students, academic tenure, staff offices and reasonable salaries. ‘Arthur O’Neill wrote about it in AUR. We know young academics are desperate to get a foot in the door of a prestigious institution like Tam U’, Cal told me. ‘So we don’t have to offer good salaries or secure employment.

The only people here with high salaries and guaranteed career prospects are managers’, he said. ‘It keeps everyone on their toes.’ Thanks again, Cal, and a happy silly season to all.

Ian Lowe is Emeritus Professor of Science, Technology and Society at Griffith University.

M@AusConservation

NTEU ADVOCATE • vol. 22 no. 3 • November 2015 • www.nteu.org.au/advocate • page 45

The Thesis Whisperer Inger Mewburn

Dear Mr Turnbull What an interesting month you have had.

Congratulations on beating Tony Abbott. Like many other Australians I took great pleasure in his demise because – frankly – it was getting embarrassing.

where the work is – often at great cost to their relationships and mental health.

A lot of people in Australia have high expectations of you right now - and there are other people who, of course, expect the worst. Still more people probably don’t give a toss either way. Me? I’m an interested spectator.

Even getting a three-year contract is sort of like hitting the higher education jackpot. Many in the humanities and the arts have to make do with three month contracts. Many do years and years – even decades – of casual lecturing. It’s such a bad word to use isn’t it? ‘Casual’. Most of the academics I know doing this kind of work are anything but casual about it. They do most of the undergraduate teaching on our campuses. This is the work

Politics is the only sport I follow. I enjoyed the endless play-by-play in the media. I loved the whole spill drama, right down to the broken marble table. I even watched TV news live for about the first time in 15 years (ok, I bounced it to the TV from my iPad). It was such fun watching all your colleagues walking down that corridor to the party room with their game faces on. It’s nice you are having a honeymoon period after all that rukus Mr Turnbull. I wish that people had been as supportive of Julia Gillard when she took over from Kevin Rudd, but I guess those double standards die hard.

Now the dust seems to be settling a bit I thought it might be time to write to you about higher education. You see Mr Turnbull, it’s kind of in a mess right now.

You can see the rot most clearly from where I work – out amongst the PhD students. They used to say that only the best PhD graduates stayed on to become professors, but if that was ever true it’s certainly not any more. PhD students are the future of academia, but they are leaving in droves – and who can blame them? Our best and brightest are rightly depressed and anxious about their prospects. The most they can hope for it seems is a three-year contract. In the sciences one three-year contract leads to another, then another - and another. We have started calling this ‘the post post post doc’ because it’s basically entry level employment conditions that never seem to end. These people are expected to work hard and pump out the publications. They move

I know some scientists who have worked like this until they are well into their 40s – then the grant money suddenly runs out and are left wondering what to do with the rest of their lives. They lie awake at night, wondering how they are going to pay off their house and have money for retirement. That’s if they are lucky enough to have a mortgage, of course. It’s only the lucky ones, like me, who have a spouse with one of those ‘uncertain’ private sector jobs who are more likely to have this privilege.

You’re an economically savvy man, Mr Turnbull. I’m sure you’d say these casual lecturers should just make the rational decision to leave.

But they love their work.

that is bringing in those student fees and holding our universities together. Some of these people are drawing benefits at the same time, just to stay afloat and pay the rent.

You’re an economically savvy man, Mr Turnbull. I’m sure you’d say these casual lecturers should just make the rational decision to leave. But they love their work.

They are good at it and frankly – our universities need them. If every casual on the books just woke up and decided that next

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semester they would make a rational decision… well, the universities would literally grind to a halt. You really don’t want to tell them to be rational believe me.

So what should you do about it Mr Turnbull? Invest more. All the Asian nations around us are doing it because they know there will be a return on investment and they can wait more than three years to see it. I know, I know – it’s so very boring that we keep asking for money. Us academics always have our hands out don’t we?

But you need to understand that we’ve become as ‘efficient’ as we are ever likely to be. Cutting more isn’t going to make us more competitive – it’s just going to make more good people leave.

It’s now nearly 10pm at night and I have only just decided to turn off the email. I haven’t finished answering it. That would take another 9 hours. Here’s the scary thing – almost every email I send gets answered. All my colleagues are still working at 10pm as well. How very efficient they are. How dedicated. But, I suspect, like me, they are tired. We are just all so very, very tired Mr Turnbull.

Dr Inger Mewburn does research on research and blogs about it. www.thesiswhisperer.com

M@thesiswhisperer

Letter from Aotearoa/NZ Sandra Grey

We can’t and shouldn’t teach people into a job Last month, New Zealand’s tertiary education minister Steven Joyce announced that, from 2017, all universities, polytechnics wānanga, and funded private training establishments that meet certain thresholds will be required to publish information about the employment status and earnings of their graduates broken down by specific degrees and diplomas. This is a dangerous path.

There are two reasons that detailed reporting on employment outcomes and the inevitable bureaucratic rewards and punishments that the government will impose on institutions based on this reporting should not go ahead.

Let us say for instance that New Zealand has a government that is creating an economy where there are fewer jobs and opportunities for young people in rural communities.

Yes, students should learn important job skills that will help them with a lifetime of work.

Perhaps for instance it has created an economy that favours big city corporate bankers over farmers and plumbers.

In such a circumstance, there is nothing much that plumbing and farming tutors in our regions can do to improve employment prospects for their young students.

But the trades and careers they are teaching their young students are more important than ever in such circumstances – even if the students are not walking straight out into well-paid jobs.

Ironically, Joyce is also the minister for both economic development and employment. Thus, he is creating circumstances that made it difficult for him, as the minister for tertiary education, to ensure the students he or she oversees can get jobs.

It is astonishing, given he holds all three ministerial portfolios, that he chooses to pass the blame for his or her mismanagement on to lecturers and tutors through a regime of reporting and (probably) subsequent funding cuts.

The first is a philosophical one. Education is not about employment – especially short-term employment.

It is important that graduates leave with employment skills that will serve them well for their whole life, not just the shortterm after they leave into the uncertain circumstance that face many young people looking for their first job.

However, hopefully, they will also learn the other skills. They will discover new ideas and they will grow into contributing members of their communities – participate in our democracies, engage with our volunteer sector, support their friends and families and pass on their knowledge to future generations.

Universities, polytechnics and wānanga do not report on any of those things and they should not have to. But those attributes are all equally, or more important than whether graduates walk out of their courses into jobs.

It is important that graduates leave with employment skills that will serve them well for their whole life, not just the shortterm after they leave into the uncertain circumstance that face many young people looking for their first job.

Many factors affect a young person’s ability to get a job – where they live and the industries that are based in that region, their gender, ethnicity and family situation, even who they know.

A good education gives students the skills and knowledge to face those circumstances. But it doesn’t guarantee people a job, just a pathway that other circumstances can block or obscure.

Furthermore, while some young people might know what they want to do with the rest of their life, it is not reasonable to expect that of all our young people.

It is not reasonable to expect the one course the government now affords students to study should be the one that takes them straight into the well-paid, satisfying job that will be theirs for the rest of their working life.

The role of education should be about opening up multiple opportunities for students, not closing them down and limiting them to a single job.

There should be people who help young people into employment. But that’s not the job of lecturers and tutors. It is a different job that requires a different set of skills.

The result of such reporting is that it will end up distorting the way educators do their job.

It risks favouring people who teach short-term skills to get their students into immediate but temporary jobs over those who teach the less immediate but more enduring trades, skills and knowledge that will help students and their newly adopted communities for a lifetime.

Sandra Grey is National President/Te Tumu Whakarae, New Zealand Tertiary Education Union/Te Hautū Kahurangi o Aotearoa www.teu.ac.nz

M@nzteu

But the problem is only what we measure is what gets attention.

The second problem with Joyce’s plan is a practical one; quality of education is not related to employment outcomes.

NTEU ADVOCATE • vol. 22 no. 3 • November 2015 • www.nteu.org.au/advocate • page 47

My Union National Council 2015 determines secure jobs critical for quality In a departure from the usual format, the 2015 National Council Meeting, held on 8–10 October, spent the second day reviewing the last round of university enterprise bargaining and determining the strategy for the next round, which will commence next year in some universities.

Job security Council determined that job security had to be the priority in bargaining as it impacts upon everything else including decent salaries and conditions, as well as workloads and workload intensification.

Supporting this position was a comprehensive policy motion on job security, moved by WA Division Secretary Gabe Gooding, that brought together issues of casualised teaching, fixed term research contracts, the rise of insecure work across higher education and the continual decline of once secure jobs.

Despite rapid growth in the sector, job growth is not keeping up, and four out of five new FTE jobs are insecure. Staff continue to be made redundant or forced out of positions where there is still work to be done, increasing the workload of colleagues. Replacements are casual or fixed term. All this has to impact upon the quality of higher education and research.

With VCs scrambling to distance themselves from wholehearted support for the Coalition Government’s funding cuts, fee deregulation, privatisation policies and twice rejected legislation, it was anticipated that UA would draw a line under deregulation. However, there was no unequivocal statement from Glover, despite the efforts of journalists to push him (see report, p. 22).

Meanwhile, the new Minister for Higher Education Simon Birmingham had already lost any glow with NTEU Councillors. From the jubilation at the ousting of Christopher Pyne and some hopes raised by Birmingham’s first comments, with his subsequent announcement that the higher education ‘reforms’ would be delayed by a year, reality sank in. The policies are all still there in the 2015-16 Budget forward estimates, just pushed on one year.

While there had been talk of the policy being shelved and of nothing happening until after the next election, Birmingham has made it clear he is working on a plan to get ‘stakeholder’ support. As pointed out in my President’s Report, this is actually code for what he can get past the Senate crossbenchers, and not about fulsome consultations with the likes of us. However, the oppositional crossbenchers are awake

Defending our universities Deregulation and privatisation of the Australian higher education system was again the focus as the conditions within which staff work and students study continue to be eroded by government underfunding and poor decisions of university managements.

The day before National Council the Chair of Universities Australia (UA), Professor Barney Glover launched UA’s latest policy, Keep It Clever, at the National Press Club. page 48 • NTEU ADVOCATE • vol. 22 no. 3 • November 2015 • www.nteu.org.au/advocate

Above: National Council in action.

Below: Michael Thomson and Jeannie Rea briefing new Councillors. Opposite: International panel on privatisation and commercialisation. to any version of ‘deregulation lite’, so this will be difficult. Council delegates enjoyed Paul Kniest’s superb slide show chronicling the ‘Derailment of Deregulation’ (download from www.nteu.org.au/defendourunis/ derailment_of_deregulation).

Councillors agreed with National Assistant Secretary, Matt McGowan, that we have to keep on campaigning against $100,000 degrees until they are off the table altogether. While the VCs continue to stumble around, the politicians must keep hearing the message from staff and students that our university system is not broken, but needs strengthening and that is a responsibility of government.

Council was warned that the Government’s ideological agenda is increasingly blatantly exposed as they focus upon the expansion of the CSPs to sub degree and non-university, including for-profit, providers. Key to this neo-liberal plan is the public subsidisation of private companies by handing tax payers’ money over to assist private competitors in running down public assets.

My Union National Council vox pops We interviewed a handful of new and returning delegates at National Council, asking their thoughts on the meeting and why it’s important for the Union.

View videos of the interviews on our YouTube and Facebook pages.

Corinna Worth Proxy National Councillor, Curtin University

International take on privatisation and commercialisation Education union leaders, Yamile Socolovsky, Francisca Castro and Mugwena Maluleke, from Argentina, The Philippines and South Africa respectively, told Council of the impact of neo-liberalism on access and quality public education in their countries. The proliferation of edubusinesses into education is taking the wreckage we have seen to our public TAFE system to extreme heights. For example, businesses are now establishing primary schools in The Philippines (amongst other countries) just to make profits. As the massification of education is developing from primary, into secondary and tertiary education across the world, edubusinesses have jumped onto this limitless market.

Angelo Gavrielatos, the former AEU President who led the campaign for needs based school funding (known as the Gonski reforms) also addressed Council.

Angelo is currently director of Education International’s (EI) Global Response Project which is researching, exposing and campaigning against the adverse impacts of the growing commercialisation and privatisation of education. Noting the seriousness and urgency of this attack on the rights to publicly funded public education, James Goodman from UTS moved that NTEU establish a national campaign group targeting education corporates and develop an information pack for campus-based actions (see report on p. 30 for more on the panel discussion).

Sandra Grey, President of the New Zealand Tertiary Education Union, spoke of the ongoing erosion of government funding of NZ’s universities and tertiary colleges.

More than Australia, NZ politicians have picked up the European language of ‘austerity’ to justify privatising public assets.

Much of what she said sounded familiar or portent of what we can expect.

Online learning is enthusiastically adopted to save money; student allowances are no longer available for people over forty; research has to be ‘industrially relevant’; and ‘zero hour’ contracts are spreading in the tertiary sector. Sandra also spoke of the efforts to change the discourse, including campaigning on workloads. ‘If there is too much work, just say no’ is the TEU message on posters reminding staff to take tea breaks and to go home.

Union priorities 2015-16 A comprehensive motion outlining the political and industrial realities that informed the NTEU’s priorities in the coming year was moved on behalf of the National Executive, by Queensland Division President Carolyn Cope. Seconding rights were given to new Monash delegate, Nic Kimberley, who proposed a specific clause highlighting the importance of attracting younger staff to active union membership.

In summary, the NTEU 2016 priorities are: • A renewed emphasis on recruitment, membership retention and follow-up, including attracting staff under 35; • I mplementation and enforcement of Round 6 Bargaining Agreements with a particular focus on job security (including full achievement of relevant Scholarly Teaching Fellow and Aboriginal employment targets), and the development and initial prosecution of Round 7 claims including those for contract research and casual staff.

• A n ongoing national campaign to defeat deregulation and privatisation of tertiary education and to contribute to the wider campaign to defeat the Coalition Government, coupled with increased Union involvement in the policy development processes of Labor and the Greens to secure short and long term commitments to increase public investment in tertiary education.

What are your impressions of your first National Council?

It has been very interesting. It has been quite eye opening. It has been good to see all the discussion amongst all the different groups and the different areas being represented and just hearing all of the in depth things about the Union and how it operates has been really good.

Why do you think events like this are important?

I think it gives everyone the chance to voice opinions or to see if things need to be changed or added to.

I think it also gives strength to everyone as a big group, that you are all in it together and that there is unity in it. It’s about getting together and actually meeting each other, and knowing who is from where and what you are doing and that you are all doing it together.

Why do you think it is important that people get involved in their union?

Without people’s involvement, we wouldn’t have unions. The more people get involved, the more chance we have of making workplaces better for them. The support of the Union means that we have the strength behind us to stand up to people like the VCs of the universities or the Government to make things better.

continued overpage...

NTEU ADVOCATE • vol. 22 no. 3 • November 2015 • www.nteu.org.au/advocate • page 49

My Union Nikola Balnave Proxy National Councillor, Macquarie University

What are your impressions of your first National Council?

It has been really interesting and eye opening actually. It has been great to get to know everyone from other Branches but it has been really great to see democracy in action as well. I think a lot of the things that we speak about at the Branch level make a lot more sense to me now, and how decisions are made, such as mandatory clauses and the like, now I will understand how they are determined in the future. I think I will take this back to the way I operate at the Branch level.

Why do you think events like this are important?

As I said, it’s democracy in action. I think it’s very important that we hear a lot of different ideas and that has been very clear over the last three days. There isn’t group-think in the room. People do have different ideas.

Everyone’s ideas are given equal importance. There’s discussion and then there’s a democratic vote on it. It’s great to see that this is the way such important things are determined within the Union.

Aboriginal and Torres Strait Islander report Aboriginal & Torres Strait Islander (A&TSI) Policy Committee Chair and National Executive member, Terry Mason urged the Union to get on with implementing the commitment to cultural competency education. He welcomed the success in getting the mandatory numerical employment targets in many agreements, but noted others fell short. The next task is to make sure that these positions are filled, which Terry emphasised is a job for all Union officers, staff and representatives.

He noted that with the ongoing attacks upon A&TSI centres rationalised as mainstreaming (or as NZTEU calls it ‘whitestreaming’), things were going backwards (see Unaipon Centre report, p. 19) However, the NTEU’s strong stance of demanding debate on Aboriginal constitutional recognition rather than accepting it as endorsed by A&TSI peoples has been vindicated, as now the voices calling for more are getting louder. Treaty is being talked of more amongst more people than for many years.

Why do you think it is important that people get involved in their union?

It’s part of civil society. We need to group together and band together to balance out the imbalance within the employment relationship. Also for the mateship aspect. There are just so many reasons! It’s about having a voice and being an agent in your own life as opposed to just letting the bosses dictate to you what is happening in your own working life, which is such an important aspect of your entire life.

page 50 • NTEU ADVOCATE • vol. 22 no. 3 • November 2015 • www.nteu.org.au/advocate

Above: A&TSI Caucus unveils their new logo.

Below left: A&TSI Caucus Chair, Terry Mason.

Below right: National President, Jeannie Rea.

Women’s Action Committee Before National Executive and Women’s Action Committee (WAC) member Virginia Mansel Lees moved a consolidated women’s policy motion, I, as WAC Chair, delivered the report departing from the usual format to address the issue of male violence against women and how that impacts even in the university sector in mitigating against gender equity and women’s rights (read full report online at www.nteu.org.au/women/wac/reports).

NTEU Policy Manual Delegates faced some very substantial motions at this year’s Council as the first stage of revamping the Union’s policy got underway. Up until now all the motions carried over two decades of National Council meetings have been gathered in a volume named the Policy Manual, but in reality a massive 600+ page archive.

My Union Nic Kimberley National Councillor, Monash University

What are your impressions of your first National Council?

National Executive is overseeing the project of turning this into a coherent ‘policy manual’ that in future can be updated annually by National Council. This year delegates endorsed a substantive, consolidated industrial policy, as well as revised higher education policy and research, union education and women’s policies.

These consolidated policies will be readily accessible through the website, while the total collection will continue to be our policy archive.

NTEU finances and ethical investment General Secretary Grahame McCulloch delivered the financial report and presented the 2015-16 operating budget, which is summarised in the NTEU Annual Report (www.nteu.org.au/annualreport), noting that the Union has a manageable deficit. However, Grahame emphasised that increased recruitment and retention of members is essential if the Union is to implement our ambitious and necessary ongoing program.

Delegates were most interested in the General Secretary’s briefing note outlining

Above: Councillors voting on a motion.

Below left: General Secretary, Grahame McCulloch.

Below right: NZ TEU President, Sandra Grey. the Union’s commitment to pursuing ethical and sustainable investment, with a particular focus on environmental standards, labour standards and human rights.

National Executive has endorsed an ethical Investment policy based on a mix of negative screening (e.g. companies which invest in tobacco, armaments, alcohol, uranium, animal testing, gambling and fossil fuels, or which breach human rights, labour or environmental standards) and positive investment measures (e.g. renewable energy, energy efficiency, mass public transport, sustainable agriculture and public housing).

NTEU’s policy positions carried in the final session backed up the sentiments of the ethical investment policy with delegates making commitments to • Mobilise for the People’s Climate marches being held across the world on 27–29 November to coincide with the Paris UN continued overpage...

It’s been really interesting. It has been really good to actually start talking about the next round of enterprise agreements already, to make sure we have a good plan in place. It has been a really good process and each Branch has been given a really good platform to share their viewpoints.

So it doesn’t feel like our voices aren’t being heard. Everyone is getting equal time to give their views across.

Why do you think events like this are important?

Events like this are an important component of ensuring that the membership controls what happens in the Union. This union should be run by members, it should be held to account by members and National Council ensures that is the case and it ensures that the issues that are being raised and considered and prioritised by the Union are representative of what people in the higher education sector are actually experiencing as issues. If we didn’t have things like this, the voice of higher education staff would cease to exist so it is important to ensure that doesn’t occur.

Why do you think it is important that people get involved in their union?

It’s the only way to ensure that management is held to account. It’s the only way to ensure that staff are treated with respect. It’s the only way to ensure that staff are not overworked, that when an issue happens, it is properly addressed, and that management are not constantly trying to focus on making a profit and instead they are focussing on providing quality education that is not about profit. It’s about ensuring we create the next generation of educated students.

NTEU ADVOCATE • vol. 22 no. 3 • November 2015 • www.nteu.org.au/advocate • page 51

My Union Peter Sheldon Proxy National Councillor, University of New South Wales

What are your impressions of your first National Council?

I am finding it very interesting. It’s a learning experience for me because I had no idea what actually happened at Council. If you read the minutes or the reports it’s never quite the same as actually being here. I’m enjoying the fact that I’m hearing from fellow councillors, fellow members from around Australia, from big campuses and small, from isolated campuses as well as universities from big cities, hearing things that are different but also hearing things that we share and trying to work out policies that work for all the things that we share but also trying to help local Branches that are perhaps having a much harder time of it because they are either remote, smaller or less well-resourced.

Climate Change conference (see reports, pp. 12 & 13).

• Condemn the recent ALP Conference decision to back the Coalition’s ‘Turn back the boats’ policy against asylum seekers.

A lunchtime APHEDA and 350.org climate justice workshop with Vanuatuan activist Isso Nihmai attracted many delegates, illustrative of NTEU members’ concerns with the impacts of climate change.

Jeannie Rea, National President

• Support fair trade rather than free trade agreements.

www.nteu.org.au/myunion/about_us/ national_council/2015

• Call on the Government to legislate for marriage equality immediately.

Above: Tasmanian Councillors and staff.

Below: Rose Steele, NUS President and Harry Rolf, CAPA President; Proud Councillor in NTEU t-shirt.

• Direct the National Executive to undertake a sector-wide and Branch-based campaign for universities to divest from fossil fuels, and seek full divestment by UniSuper.

Why do you think it is important that people are involved in their union?

Unions are really the only mechanism by which employees have a voice in the workplace. Increasingly management talk about employees as factors of production, as assets that can be bought or sold or traded, that can be used. We’re actually human beings and I think one of the things that marks unions, particularly good unions like the NTEU is that there is an emphasis on the human side of what we do, that we are human beings, that we represent human beings. As human beings we should have dignity at work, we should be able to expect fair remuneration and terms of employment that allow us to work well, that allow us to have a life outside work. It’s (about work that is) healthy and safe, in every sense, free from bullying, free from stress. We don’t always get that but really the organisation that is going to fight for that and put that on the agenda as a first talking point is a union.

page 52 • NTEU ADVOCATE • vol. 22 no. 3 • November 2015 • www.nteu.org.au/advocate

Opposite page, from top: Vanuatuan activist Isso Nihmai; Aunty Carolyn Briggs performing the Welcome to Country; Vince Caughley (UTS); Merchandise table.

All images: Paul Clifton

My Union Rebecca Hurst

Clark Holloway

Proxy National Councillor, University of Queensland

National Councillor and University of Wollongong Branch President

What are your impressions of this year’s National Council?

What are your impressions of your first National Council?

Last year was my first year and I am even more impressed than I was last year, just about the way the Union goes about conducting its own business.

Can I say that it has really opened my eyes? I feel like I am backing in to what is important about our union.

The first eye-opener I had was when I participated in bargaining and saw what really goes on between management and the NTEU in order to create a fair agreement.

Why do you think events like this are important?

It’s important because it gives us the solidarity that we need to keep doing what we do. A few people have alluded over the last couple of days to how tiring activism is and this, while it is tiring as well, it gives you energy hearing what other people are doing, and how they’re going about it and why it is so important to them.

Why do you think it is important for people to get involved in their union?

I am actually a believer in compulsory unionism. I think if there is a body representing you then you should be a part of that union. I look at the way workers’ rights have been eroded over the last 20 years or so and if unionism was compulsory, or more widespread, then it wouldn’t be that way.

National Council vox pops We interviewed a handful of new and returning delegates at National Council, asking their thoughts on the meeting and why it’s important for the Union.

View the short composite video at the NTEU YouTube site: www.youtube.com/user/nteu Or share from our Facebook page:

The National Council really gives me a fair idea of how the national structure interacts with the Division structures, and then our local Branches.

Why do think events like this are important?

I think there’s the agenda that’s published that is basically work that needs to be gone through but the, I guess, non-agenda items I feel are more important, which are a chance to meet our colleagues from different Branches and different States and Divisions and trade a few war stories.

It’s really heartening to know that we’re not the only ones that went through such a painful bargaining session.

Why do you think it is important that people get involved in their union?

Well there’s an apathy that we’ve got to fight against that employers, even in the university sector which is a fairly good sector compared to some others, are going to give us fair treatment without us fighting for it.

Particularly with bargaining, every single condition that we rely on is hard fought, they didn’t just give it to us.

So, activism in a union is basically not going on the coattails of your colleagues but rather participating yourself for a better workplace

www.facebook.com/ NationalTertiaryEducationUnion

NTEU ADVOCATE • vol. 22 no. 3 • November 2015 • www.nteu.org.au/advocate • page 53

My Union 2015 Life Members Six exceptional NTEU members received Life Membership at the 2015 National Council.

Evan Jones QUT Our colleague, Evan Jones should be recognised with this honour in recognition of his many years of service to the QUT Branch as Branch President, Branch Vice President, National Councillor, Enterprise Bargaining Negotiator and Delegate.

Evan Jones has provided long and distinguished service to the NTEU through his many years of work at the Branch level at QUT as well as his work at Divisional and National level. Evan has been a long-standing member of the Branch Executive and has been steadfast in efforts on behalf of the Union in his work as a member of enterprise bargaining teams.

Evan has served as a delegate, Branch Secretary, as Branch President (twice) as well as Branch Vice-President. In performing all of these roles Evan undertook them with conviction and enthusiasm. When Evan was Branch President he started the re-building of the membership base at QUT and his role on the BranchExecutive was invaluable in providing the guidance and wisdom that was needed as new members joined in. Evan was able to build a cohesive and dedicated executive group at the Branch level through his leadership.

Whilst all active members make sacrifices to contribute to Union activities, Evan has gone beyond what many of us have contributed. Evan has played a very active role in the negotiation of Enterprise Agreements at QUT. During the lengthy period over which they have been bargained Evan was placed in a position where because of the nature of his discipline, he faced antagonism within his work area.

Evan was however resolute in his commitment to the work he was undertaking on behalf of the Union at Branch level.

Evan continued with his work on behalf of the Union even though he knew it was costing him dearly in terms of his own career within his area. Evan’s persistent efforts on behalf of his fellow employees did result in excellent Agreements but this came at the expense of his own career.

As a result of this dedicated service, Evan has possibly retired sooner than he might

Mary Ann Gibson Melbourne Mary Ann was a foundation member of the NTEU and had been at Melbourne University for over 20 years. Throughout her decades at the Branch, Mary Ann has always been an active member and delegate. If there were an award for the number of posters put up and leaflets handed out, Mary Ann would have won it hands down! But her contribution was far more than that.

Since she started at the University, Mary Ann was involved in every campaign or rank and file group established in the library, of which there were many. She was also a staunch and consistent advocate for her workmates, helping many with problems as they arose. She was a dedicated and talented librarian and for all of these reasons was well liked and respected by her colleagues. Mary Ann left during the recent restructure at the University and will be sorely missed by the branch committee and other dedicated union activists.

Advocate spoke to Mary Ann at Council and began by asking how she first become involved in the Union.

‘The NTEU appeared a couple of years after I started at Melbourne Uni. I was in another union and then the NTEU

have planned as the ultimate outcome of this dedication to his NTEU work. Despite the efforts that he has made over the years and the very considerable contribution he has made, Evan remains a humble person who has never used his service to the NTEU to promote himself in any way.

The current members of the Branch Executive at QUT unanimously support this motion.

Dave Kinder RMIT Dave Kinder’s union credentials are as solid as any member in the union movement, and his service and commitment to working people has shown a true commitment over a life time of effort. Dave is the sort of person who typifies the best of the union movement over the years. He devoted and donated his time to unions and the welfare of working people throughout that time.

page 54 • NTEU ADVOCATE • vol. 22 no. 3 • November 2015 • www.nteu.org.au/advocate

came along and there was a general decision of the membership to move from the other union in to this one, which was really dealing with our sector rather than the public service one which we had been in.

‘I was working with a woman called Melanie Lazarow, who eventually went up the ranks in the Branch and we were very close friends in the library. She was a very good recruiter and we had a massive membership in the library, so I just got involved at that stage. We worked on different campaigns – big things, small things, everything that was union-related which was great because it was a good way to build strength against the bosses who were always trying to push things their way.’

This was Mary Ann’s first time at National Council, saying ‘I have come along tonight because I have been invited but really I have never taken any official role, other than as a workplace delegate.’

On the subject of being nominated for Honorary Life Membership, Mary Ann said ‘I guess what’s important is that it is a recognition. I was pretty touched. I felt somewhat embarrassed because I could think of many people who would be deserving. At the same time, I acknowledge that other people see things in me that I perhaps don’t wish to acknowledge in myself, so it is nice.’

A union member for all of his working life, Dave started as an electrician and as an ETU member in 1961 when he became a shop steward. In 1972, he got a job at the Royal Melbourne Institute of Technology (RMIT) and promptly joined the General staff Association (GSA). This resulted in him become a member of the Victorian Colleges Staff Association, the Victorian Colleges and Universities Staff Association, and the Australian Colleges and Universities Staff Association before the formation of the NTEU in 1993.

He has maintained membership of the NTEU throughout its life until his retirement at the end of 2014. Over that time, Dave has been involved in union work throughout his career with a particular emphasis on Health and Safety. His key achievements include: RMIT Safety Committee; involved in the campaign which established RDOs for all RMIT General Staff members; helped in the establishment of the RMIT Asbestos Working Party and responsible for the ‘Asbestos Code of Practice’ at RMIT that Victorian Trades Hall Council later adopted for

My Union broader application; Foundation Member Trades Hall Asbestos Working Party; Chair of the Staff Evaluation Committee; NTEU Delegate, Property Services, RMIT; NTEU RMIT Branch Committee member; NTEU Representative on the General Staff Classification Committee; OHS Committee member; RMIT Safety Committee chair; Representing members on grievance and workload committees; National Councillor; Victorian Division Executive Member; RMIT Branch Vice-President (General Staff ).

His work in job evaluations when he was involved saw 90 per cent of applicants and 100 per cent of appeals succeed. His role at RMIT in the OHS sphere was central to the Union’s efforts in this area.

By way of example, Dave assisted CFMEU lawyers develop evidence for the Magistrates Court during the trail of construction company, Grocon, over safety violations associated with the deaths of 3 people when a wall collapsed in 2013 at the Carlton Brewery Site in Swanston Street in Melbourne’s CBD. His assistance was crucial to the prosecution of the company.

Rodney Noble Newcastle Rod’s involvement with unionism and union membership pre-dates the NTEU by some decades. His involvement with university unionism pre-dates the formation of the NTEU, via the Lecturers Association.

Rod’s membership of the NTEU was at the beginning of that organisation and he was on the Branch Committee from at least 1994 until 2012. In the latter part of that committee membership he was Vice-President (Academic) for a number of years and Acting President for periods of time as well.

During this long period he was involved in every campaign for improved wages and conditions and served on many picket lines and organised and attended many rallies and marches. He also fought other campaigns as well, for example, the campaign against the privatisation of higher education. In Newcastle this involved campaigning against the private Newcastle International College. He also served on the Branch personal cases committee dealing with in part, the effects of the stress created by higher student numbers and the associated pressures of teaching.

His numerous stories about workers’ struggles and the role of the Union encouraged many colleagues to join the NTEU and support the cause for the rights of workers and improved conditions.

Rod has represented the NTEU on the Newcastle Trades Hall Council for two long periods between 2006 and 2015.

Along with some other NTEU members Rod was instrumental in forming the Newcastle Peoples Chorus (a Union Choir) that sings at May Day events; picket lines; folk festivals; International Women’s Day; and many other union functions. Taking the positive message of unionism far and wide, he became an elected organiser of the Choir and organised tours to many parts of Australia as well as England, Ireland and New Zealand.

Rod is now a Conjoint Academic and still has an interest in Union activities and continues to be involved in higher education and industrial issues that are affecting the general working population.

contributed to issues not only relating to the University, but to the wider community. Bert was often present at May Day marches and dinners where he promoted the NTEU within the wider community.

Bert was also instrumental in setting up ‘Happy Hour’ at the Callaghan campus to provide an informal venue for members to come and discuss any concerns regarding their workplace, but also afforded the opportunity to socialise and interact with other members. This initiative cannot be underestimated, as in the busy lives and under significant work pressures, members had a safe haven to come to in order to debrief and was an opportunity to share information about NTEU matters.

Bert’s contribution to the UoN NTEU has been extensive and often a grass roots approach it was taken to encourage members to feel secure and supported by the Union.

Bert Groen Newcastle Bert’s membership of the NTEU commenced in 1999. When working at the Ourimbah campus he had involvement with the sub Branch before being transferred back to the Callaghan campus. Due to his knowledge of industrial relations regulations, Bert was encouraged to join the Newcastle Branch Committee where he was soon approached to become Branch President.

During that time Bert was active in setting up the delegate structure which required a significant amount of face to face negotiation with members to ensure that Union visibility and coverage across faculties and schools was extensive.

For several rounds of Enterprise Agreement negotiations, Bert was the lead Bargainer and he put a great amount of time and effort into securing the very best outcomes for all members of the NTEU at Newcastle.

In 2005 when the University was devastated by the loss of a significant number of staff, Bert was at the forefront of negotiating redundancy provisions to ensure that all those people who lost their jobs were fairly treated and provided for adequately.

This was a very difficult set of negotiations, and Bert’s skills and sensitivity to the impact on people’s lives resulted in no compulsory job losses.

For many years Bert was also the State and National Division delegate and represented the University of Newcastle’s Branch Committee at state and national conferences. He was also a delegate on the Newcastle Trades Hall Council where he served on the Executive Committee on several occasions over the years. This meant he

Neville Knight Deakin Neville Knight joined the Union of Australian College Academics 28 years ago, in 1987. On ceasing full time employment Neville worked sessionally until 2014. As a casual academic Neville was acutely aware of issues that impacted on individuals employed sessionally. He worked collaboratively with his colleagues to represent these issues and was elected to the Deakin Branch Executive in 2010 and the National Academics Casual Committee.

In both roles Neville undertook diligent, rigorous and thorough work representing issues that impact on the work of casual academics. At Deakin he developed a member survey that the Branch used to identify local casual claims for the last round of bargaining. He participated actively in local area member meetings to help build understanding of these claims and collaborated with Branch Executive members to ensure the claims were represented.

His work captured some of the main issues for casual academics at Deakin University including developing guidelines for calculating marking time, payment for other academic duties, establishing a casual staff voice on Faculty committees and access of casual staff to university resources including IT and the library. The bargaining team secured some of these claims in the last round of bargaining and the remainder have the commitment of members to address both in local campaigns, including our Supercasuals campaign, and the next round of bargaining.

NTEU ADVOCATE • vol. 22 no. 3 • November 2015 • www.nteu.org.au/advocate • page 55

My Union Round 7 bargaining in universities As part of 2015 NTEU National Council, a one-day conference was held to discuss and determine claims and strategy for Round 7 bargaining in Australian higher education institutions.

going into Round 7, focussing on striking a balance between building on wins from Round 6 and tackling new challenges.

Workshops were then held, looking at the process of Branch implementation of bargaining outcomes. Discussion about forensically looking through Agreements and determining each Branch’s strategy for implementing the good provisions we have achieved, led naturally to discussion about preparing for Round 7 and the necessary campaign lead-up.

Participants were asked to tweet up to a 140-character report on their workshop, the standout being this haiku from Craig Johnson (UNSW): Our time is precious

The conference commenced with an overview of achievements from Round 6 university bargaining, including excellent salary outcomes given the prevailing economic conditions (see chart), enforceable targets for Aboriginal and Torres Strait Islander employment, more secure employment for casual employees, further regulation of academic workloads and enforceable rights to appropriate classification for general/professional staff.

There is no point wasting it

Robust and lively discussion followed about the strategy the Union should adopt

It was noted that all an employer now really has to do is to declare the ‘fact’ that the ‘job’ (not the work) no longer exists, and then the employer can proceed to dismiss the employees it does not like, usually through a ‘voluntary’ process.

It was raised that between one-in-50 and one-in-30 continuing employees are made redundant each year in an industry with stable workforce needs, a growing workforce, and a huge buffer of precarious staff.

Members realise that redundancy is a process of purging ‘troublemakers’ (e.g. active unionists) or those staff whose performance (e.g. willingness to work excessive hours or comply with directions) is questioned.

On self-centered pricks When you are in doubt Tarnish the boss on TV Then watch them scramble Know your enemy

Further mandatory and recommended claims were also agreed, relating to the following:

Their weaknesses are your strengths

• A 15% salary increase by October 2020.

Perhaps they’re drunk

• Improvements in research-only staff conditions.

• Improved paid domestic violence leave provisions.

35.0 Definite increases

30.0

Forecast increases

10.0

25.0

6.3

32.2

8.5 20.3

19.9

• Improved work-life balance.

• Improved union resources.

5.4

10.0

• Improved parental leave standards.

• Clearer general/professional staff hours of work.

3.4

20.0

15.0

Ultimately, after much discussion, it was agreed that Round 7 bargaining should be particularly focussed on job security. It was generally acknowledged that the system of ‘redundancy’ has become a sham, with very few real redundancies.

20.9 15.7 10.9

5.0

Round 7 bargaining is about to commence in WA, and bargaining training will be rolled out around the country prior to each institution’s commencement.

Sarah Roberts, National Industrial Coordinator

0.0 University Salaries

Federal Agreements

Wage Price Index

Teachers

CPI

CSIRO

Cumulative salary increases by sector, 2009 to 2017 (index points)

Cumulative salary increases by sector, 2009 to 2017 (index points) vol. 56,

AUR is published twice a year by the NTEU.

no. 1, 201 4 ISSN 0818–80

Publishe d by NTEU

68

Since 1958, the Australian Universities’ Review has been encouraging debate and discussion about issues in higher education and its contribution to Australian public life.

AUR

Australia n Univer

NTEU members are entitled to receive a free subscription on an opt-in basis .

If you are an NTEU member and would like to receive AUR, please email aur@nteu.org.au

sities’Re view

AUR is listed on the DEEWR register of refereed journals.

page 56 • NTEU ADVOCATE • vol. 22 no. 3 • November 2015 • www.nteu.org.au/advocate

www.aur.org.au

My Union A most unlikely union: launch of NTEU history Professor Raewyn Connell launched John O’Brien’s book National Tertiary Education Union: A Most Unlikely Union (UNSW Press, 2015) at the NTEU National Council on 9 October 2015.

NTEU Life Member Raewyn Connell opened with the declaration, ‘I’ve read a lot of union official histories, and most of them have all the colour, verve and drama of a municipal water supply report. John O’Brien’s history of our surprising Union is definitely not one of those.’

Connell remarked that it is a thoughtful book, and is a narrative of the past that engages with issues that remain important.

‘The history of the NTEU is a story that needs to be told. What happens in higher education is vital for Australian culture.

It is also vital for the Australian economy, as we lurch towards a post-mining-boom economic strategy. The NTEU is making a profoundly important contribution to Australian life, as the main support for the people who actually make higher education work.

‘It’s not the managers who actually do the work of creating, circulating or teaching knowledge. That’s a much larger societal project. The academic, professional and general staff whom the NTEU represents are the people who collectively form our intellectual workforce, who make it all happen. Creating decent, sustainable conditions for them and their work is precisely the business of the NTEU. ‘A lot of this business, as everyone in this room knows, is low-profile, slogging work in defence of individual staff members, in cases and disputes that never get into the public domain. Doing such work, Union activists get to know a great deal about the institutions in the sector – and that know-how feeds into the visible policy and bargaining.

‘On those foundations, the NTEU has revived an old union tradition of taking responsibility for the future of their industry and workforce - thinking forward, not just thinking reactively.

Above: Author John O’Brien with Professor Raewyn Connell at the launch of National Tertiary Education Union: An Unlikely Union.

‘John O’Brien’s history tells how this ‘most unlikely union’ emerged and grew. In my reading, the book tells two big stories’, argued Connell.

‘One is about the amalgamation of a disorderly bunch of staff associations and regional unions, of different shapes and sizes, into a combined national union.

John bluntly narrates the conflicts that occurred and the bargains that were struck.

He is also clear about the continuing work the Union has had to do, to create a practical unity across occupational and regional differences that could become divisions.

‘The second big story is about the times themselves. The Union’s whole life has been spent in the era when corporate neo-liberalism was deepening its grip on Australian life. The market agenda has dominated policy thinking in the ALP as well as the Coalition.

University administrations, as they used to be called, have mutated into corporate managements, and VCs into CEOs. The consequences for higher education workers – their security, their careers, their daily experience – have been immense. The NTEU has consequently lived in the eye of a storm that has been spreading across the whole economy. And that’s another reason why this story needs to be told.

NTEU: A Most Unlikely Union is available online in the NTEU Shop for the special members’ price of $45 shop.nteu.org.au/product/ a-most-unlikely-union/

‘True history is an organizing tool, in a corporate and political environment where there is so much spin, manipulation and outright lying. The history of the NTEU needs to be taken to our members generally; and beyond our members too,’ concluded Connell.

NTEU ADVOCATE • vol. 22 no. 3 • November 2015 • www.nteu.org.au/advocate • page 57

My Union New NTEU staff Welcome to new NTEU staff in the Divisions and Branches.

Andrew MacDonald National Media & Communications Officer Andrew MacDonald started working at the NTEU as the National Media and Communications Officer in September 2015.

Having spent most of his professional life working as a newspaper and online journalist in southeast Queensland, he relocated to Melbourne two years ago.

Prior to joining the NTEU, Andrew managed communications and publications for the national body representing the interests of Australian vegetable and potato growers. Andrew looks forward to furthering the interests of NTEU members across the country.

Brigitte Garozzo Branch Organiser ACU Brigitte Garozzo has recently started work as Branch Organiser for the Australian Catholic University (ACU). She is excited to work with the Branch to build Union strength and engage members in decision making at the University.

Before coming to the NTEU, Brigitte worked at the Sydney University Postgraduate Representative Association and at The Greens as an Organiser. Over the years, she has been involved in a number of activist campaigns, including: the fight for abortion rights, for free education and for an end to mandatory detentionbut nothing gets her more fired up than workers’ rights. She completed an Arts/ Science (Gender Studies) degree at Sydney University, but has hopes to continue her

postgraduate study in Industrial Relations in the future. Her favourite past times include: cooking, watching TV series, spending time with her partner Chris and playing with cute animals.

Gabe Kavanagh Industrial Organiser NSW Gabe Kavanagh has joined the NSW Division as an Industrial Organiser for private and small sites. Gabe joins the NTEU from UnitingCare NSW/ACT, where she was the campaigns coordinator for social justice campaigns across UnitingCare and the Uniting Church.

Gabe is a dedicated trade unionist, feminist and human rights campaigner.

She sits on the executive of the Women’s Electoral Lobby and the board of Amnesty Australia.

Melanie Hood Branch Organiser CSU Melanie comes to the NTEU after being employed at Charles Sturt University (CSU) in a number of different administrative and project based roles. She was an active member of the Branch Executive as a professional/general staff member and is passionate about increasing the activist base of professional/general staff within the Union. She has a very diverse professional history and has worked as an English teacher in community based adult education, research assistant, project officer, in a range of administrative roles and can also make a fine coffee and pour a killer beer.

Melanie is a strong believer in the power of collective action and community organising and played a key role in organising the March Australia in Bathurst last year, which successfully turned out 4000 people protesting against the backward policies of the Coalition Government.

She first joined the NTEU in the early 90s when employed as Education Research Officer for the UTS Students’ Association, and is very happy to be able to make a contribution to the Union in her role as Branch Organiser. She feels as if she has finally come in from the regional political wilderness and is excited to be able to advocate for the protection and extension of worker’s rights. Melanie has a degree in Adult Education from UTS, an English Teaching Certificate and is currently undertaking postgraduate Masters studies in Mental Health Practice at the University of New England.

Alex Cousner Industrial Officer WA Alex recently joined the WA Division as an Industrial Officer with responsibilities at the Murdoch and Curtin Branches.

A qualified lawyer, Alex comes to NTEU after stints with the FSU and CFMEU in Queensland and brings with him a determination to make a positive difference to the lives of NTEU members in WA. Alex says he cannot stand injustice and will not tolerate employers preying on the lack of industrial knowledge of many workers. He also believes unions are an important vehicle for social change in our communities.

Outside work, Alex is a keen rugby union player and supporter and has travelled extensively pursuing his other passion, that of Brazilian Jiu Jitsu.

Staff movements Industrial Officer Simon Kempton has moved back to NSW Division from WA Division. NSW Industrial Officers Tamara Talmacs and Kobie Howe have each returned from maternity leave.

Sam Maynard has recently left the Union after more than a decade employed as a Branch Organiser in the Victorian Division and an Industrial Resource Officer in the National Office. We wish her all the best in her new working life!

Stay connected with NTEU Like us on Facebook Follow us on Twitter facebook.com/NationalTertiaryEducationUnion

page 58 • NTEU ADVOCATE • vol. 22 no. 3 • November 2015 • www.nteu.org.au/advocate

@NTEUNational

My Union Obituary: Maarten Rothengatter News of the passing of Dr Maarten Rothengatter, Academic extraordinaire and NTEU representative at Southern Cross University (SCU), has been met with great sadness by former colleagues, comrades and students.

Maarten was not only a highly gifted and committed educator in the School of Arts and Social Sciences, he was also a strong advocate for social justice in the workplace. He was an active NTEU member and the primary case handler at the Gold Coast campus for some years.

He assisted with the formation of numerous clauses in SCU’s Enterprise Bargaining Agreement. Maarten’s outstanding contribution to the work of the Bargaining Team will be long remembered, especially by members and colleagues

who benefited from his efforts and those of other union representatives.

In addition, Maarten represented the SCU Branch at the national level, most recently attending the 2013 Special National Council in Canberra in place of the Branch President.

Throughout his academic career (which included several years teaching Sociology at Deakin University in Geelong) Maarten was strongly committed to the maintenance of quality university education, and argued passionately for secure employment and improved workplace conditions.

Maarten was particularly critical of what he considered the precarious employment conditions of many casual employees in Australian universities.

Maarten’s contribution to teaching in the Social Science and Social Welfare programs at SCU was exceptional, and the attendance at his memorial by many staff, comrades and students stands testament to the wonderful rapport he had with his students and colleagues.

Maarten’s role as the former President of the Geelong Taxi Drivers Association, enabled him to complete an outstand-

ing PhD on tax avoidance among taxi drivers. His thesis has been accessed by hundreds of academics and students.

Maarten will be remembered both for his strong and lasting commitment to social justice and as someone with a lively sense of humour and a wry way of looking at the world. He was at his best when regaling his listeners with stories of the more amusing sides of everyday life. His laughter, joy and steadfast commitment to a better workplace and world will linger long in the collective memory.

get edXpress NTEU’s monthly free e-news service with the latest higher education news, information & gossip

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Your NTEU membership details When and how to update them Have your workplace address details (office, building, campus) changed?

Have you moved house?

Required if your home address is your nominated contact address.

Has your Department/ School changed its name or merged?

Update online:

Has your name changed?

Go to ‘My Home’

Go to www.nteu.org.au Click on ‘Member Login’ ID = Your NTEU membership number Password = Your surname in CAPITALS Select ‘Your Profile’ then ‘View Details’

Have you moved to a different institution?

Have your employment details changed?

Please contact:

Have your credit card or direct debit account details changed?

Are you leaving university employment?

Please contact:

Transfer of membership between institutions is not automatic.

Please notify us to ensure you are paying the correct fees.

Deductions will continue until the National Office is notified.

Have your payroll deductions stopped without your authority?

Melinda Valsorda, Membership Officer (03) 9254 1910 mvalsorda@nteu.org.au

Tamara Labadze, Finance Officer (03) 9254 1910 tlabadze@nteu.org.au

Contact your institution’s Payroll Department urgently

NTEU ADVOCATE • vol. 22 no. 3 • November 2015 • www.nteu.org.au/advocate • page 59

NATIONAL TERTIARY EDUCATION UNION

MEMBERSHIP FORM

 I want to join NTEU  I am currently a member and wish to update my details The information on this form is needed for aspects of NTEU’s work and will be treated as confidential.

YOUR PERSONAL DETAILS

|SURNAME

TITLE

|GIVEN NAMES

HOME ADDRESS CITY/SUBURB PHONE |WORK INCL AREA CODE

HOME PHONE INCL AREA CODE

|DATE OF BIRTH

EMAIL HAVE YOU PREVIOUSLY BEEN AN NTEU MEMBER?

 YES: AT WHICH INSTITUTION?

YOUR CURRENT EMPLOYMENT DETAILS

|DEPT/SCHOOL |CLASSIFICATION LEVEL LECTB, HEW4

POSITION

|POSTCODE | MALE  FEMALE  OTHER _______

|ARE YOU AUSTRALIAN ABORIGINAL/TORRES STRAIT ISLANDER?  YES

 PLEASE USE MY HOME ADDRESS FOR ALL MAILING

|CAMPUS

INSTITUTION/EMPLOYER FACULTY

|STATE |MOBILE

STEP/ |INCREMENT

|ANNUAL SALARY IF KNOWN

YOUR EMPLOYMENT GROUP

 ACADEMIC STAFF

 TEACHING & RESEARCH  RESEARCH ONLY  TEACHING INTENSIVE

 GENERAL/PROFESSIONAL STAFF

I HEREBY APPLY FOR MEMBERSHIP OF NTEU, ANY BRANCH AND ANY ASSOCIATED BODY‡ ESTABLISHED AT MY WORKPLACE.

 RESEARCH ONLY

SIGNATURE

DATE

OTHER:

YOUR EMPLOYMENT CATEGORY & TERM

 FULL TIME

 PART TIME

 CONTINUING/  FIXED TERM PERMANENT

CONTRACT

HOURS PER WK

DATE OF EXPIRY

 SESSIONAL ACADEMIC  GENERAL/PROFESSIONAL STAFF CASUAL

You may resign by written notice to the Division or Branch Secretary. Where you cease to be eligible to become a member, resignation shall take effect on the date the notice is received or on the day specified in your notice, whichever is later. In any other case, you must give at least two weeks notice. Members are required to pay dues and levies as set by the Union from time to time in accordance with NTEU rules. Further information on financial obligations, including a copy Office use only: Membership no. of the rules, is available from your Branch.

IF YOU ARE CASUAL/SESSIONAL, COMPLETE PAYMENT OPTION 4 ONLY

IF YOU ARE FULL TIME OR PART TIME, PLEASE COMPLETE EITHER PAYMENT OPTION 1, 2 OR 3

Membership fees = 1% of gross annual salary

OPTION 1: PAYROLL DEDUCTION AUTHORITY

Office use only: % of salary deducted

| STAFF PAYROLL NO.

I INSERT YOUR NAME

IF KNOWN

OF YOUR ADDRESS HEREBY AUTHORISE INSTITUTION

|DATE

SIGNATURE

OPTION 2: CREDIT CARD

— — — — — — — — — — — — — — — —

EXPIRY

OPTION 3: DIRECT DEBIT

 QUARTERLY  HALF-YEARLY  ANNUALLY

|DATE

Choose your salary range.

Select 6 month or 1 year membership.

Tick the appropriate box.

Pay by cheque, money order or credit card.

Salary range

6 months

12 months

$10,000 & under: $10,001–$20,000: Over $20,000:

 $27.50  $38.50  $55

 $55  $77  $110

 PLEASE ACCEPT MY CHEQUE/MONEY ORDER OR CREDIT CARD:  MASTERCARD  VISA

Processed on the 15th of the month or following working day

FINANCIAL INSTITUTION

|ACCOUNT NO.

CARD NUMBER — — — — — — — — — — — — — — — —

EXPIRY

|$

SIGNATURE

I hereby authorise the National Tertiary Education Union (NTEU) APCA User ID No.062604 to arrange for funds to be debited from my/our account at the financial institution identified and in accordance with the terms described in the Direct Debit Request (DDR) Service Agreement

I INSERT YOUR NAME

Full text of DDR available at www.nteu.org.au/ddr

REGULARITY OF PAYMENT:

BRANCH NAME & ADDRESS

 MONTHLY  QUARTERLY  HALF-YEARLY  ANNUALLY

ACCOUNT NAME

5% DISCOUNT FOR ANNUAL DIRECT DEBIT

SIGNATURE

1.

2.

3.

4.

NAME ON CARD

I hereby authorise the Merchant to debit my Card account with the amount and at intervals specified above and in the event of any change in the charges for these goods/ services to alter the amount from the appropriate date in accordance with such change.

This authority shall stand, in respect of the above specified Card and in respect of any Card issued to me in renewal or replacement thereof, until I notify the Merchant in writing of its cancellation. Standing Authority for Recurrent Periodic Payment by Credit Card.

|  MASTERCARD  VISA |PAYMENT:  MONTHLY

SIGNATURE

BSB

I hereby authorise the Institution or its duly authorised servants and agents to deduct from my salary by regular instalments, dues and levies (as determined from time to time by the Union), to NTEU or its authorised agents. All payments on my behalf and in accordance with this authority shall be deemed to be payments by me personally. This authority shall remain in force until revoked by me in writing. I also consent to my employer supplying NTEU with updated information relating to my employment status.

OPTION 4: CASUAL/SESSIONAL

Processed on the 16th of the month or following working day

NAME ON CARD CARD NO.

|MAIL/ BLDG CODE MONTH NEXT | INCREMENT DUE

|DATE

page 60 • NTEU ADVOCATE • vol. 22 no. 3 • November 2015 • www.nteu.org.au/advocate

DATE

Description of goods/services: NTEU Membership Dues. To: NTEU, PO Box 1323, Sth Melbourne VIC 3205

‡Associated bodies: NTEU (NSW); Union of Australian College Academics (WA Branch) Industrial Union of Workers at Edith Cowan University & Curtin University; Curtin University Staff Association (Inc.) at Curtin University; Staff Association of Edith Cowan University (Inc.) at ECU

MAIL TO: NTEU National Office PO Box 1323, South Melbourne VIC 3205 T (03) 9254 1910 F (03) 9254 1915 E national@nteu.org.au

Take advantage of your member benefits...

these summer holidays

OzForex offers fee free transfers on all transactions above AUD $1000 or equivalent (normally AUD $15).

Petals Florist Network offer 10% off an extensive range of individually hand-arranged flowers, gifts and baskets.

ACE Travel Insurance offer 20% off travel insurance premiums.

Avis and Europcar offer reduced excess car hire liability of AUD $1000 in Australia, or 10% off best rate of the day (Europcar only).

Private Fleet offers you savings of up to 20% off your next car purchase. Free access to the service (normally $178), 12 months road side assistance and more is included.

For more information visit www.memberadvantage.com.au/nteu or call 1300 853 352.

UniSuper recognised as best of the best

2015 Chant West

2015 Chant West

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Best Fund: Investments

In an industry first, UniSuper has proudly been awarded two of the most prestigious honours by leading ratings agency, Chant West.* Our focus every day is on achieving greater retirement outcomes for our members in the higher education and research sector.

See for yourself why we’ve been recognised as the best of the best!

CONTACT US

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enquiry@unisuper.com.au

1800 331 685

Issued by UniSuper Management Pty Ltd (ABN 91 006 961 799, AFSL 235907) on behalf of UniSuper Limited, ABN 54 006 027 121 the trustee of UniSuper (ABN 91 385 943 850).

Level 35, 385 Bourke Street, Melbourne VIC 3000. * For further information about the methodology used by Chant West, see www.chantwest.com.au This information doesn’t take your objectives, financial situation or needs into account. Before taking action, consider whether it is appropriate to your personal circumstances.

You should obtain the relevant PDS at unisuper.com.au.