WORKPLACE HEALTH & SAFETY ◆
The PIN notice effectively got Monash to actually commencing consultation. Following the issue of the PIN, all-staff emails were sent out calling for views on return-to-work and the COVID Safe Plan; an extroadinary meeting of the top-level OHS Committee was to update the Plan and improve consultation was held; and a formal briefing from Senior Management on the response to the PIN was secured by the HSR and the Union. The PIN resulted in the University making genuine efforts to consult with staff on the return of face-to-face teaching and operations. It’s a shame that it took Union action for the University to properly talk to its staff about OHS issues in the middle of a pandemic.
Monash issued with PIN NTEU Monash University Health & Safety Representative (HSR) Michelle Giovas issued the University with a Provisional Improvement Notice (PIN) in relation to their failure to consult on the return to face-to-face and the University's COVID Safe Plan. Monash announced they were sending their whole workforce back to campus in January. No-one was asked about this decision. In mid-January, HR promised to consult about that decision before taking it. Four days later, they took it without consulting any staff at all. It took the courage of Michelle (who is also a Branch Committee member) to highlight the issue.
The genuine consultation has resulted in improvements in the University’s COVID Safe Plan to protect staff, includign the provision of RAT tests and N95 masks to frontline staff. The fact that it took a formal PIN notice to
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force Monash management to genuinely consult with staff about a critical safety issue is disappointing. While we’re happy they now have done so, it highlights that for many Monash managers, the word ‘consultation’ really means ‘announcing a decision’. This is a university full of intelligent and knowledgeable people. Genuine consultation is not informing staff about a decision that has been taken: it’s asking staff what they think beforehand, and then listening to and considering what they say. Consultation is not just a nice thing to have: it’s essential for staff health and safety. It also actually prevents major stuff-ups. No manager, no matter how skilled, can know every important detail, and no manager can adequately discharge workplace health and safety responsibilities without engaging with the people who need to be protected. ◆ Ben Eltham, NTEU Monash Branch President
Omicron
Becoming a Health & Safety Representative (HSR)
Know your rights & how to return safely to work Omicron continues to pose health and safety risks to workers across the country. Join us to hear NTEU’s plans for securing adequate protections for all staff and students, and our position on how employers can prioritise the health and safety of university workers.
Fri 11 Feb
Following last week’s highly successful session on Omicron and how to return safely to work, this session is for members who wish to learn more about the role of Health & Safety Representatives in the workplace. Join Gabe Gooding (NTEU National Assistant Secretary) who will step you through this very important role and why we need union members to become HSRs.
Fri 18 Feb
2pm AEDT via Zoom
2pm AEDT via Zoom
Dr Alison Barnes
Watch the full sessions
NTEU National President
Gabe Gooding National Assistant Secretary
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familiar to many members when thinking about your own university management. We don’t yet know the final results of the Regulator interventions but we are already seeing improvements. It all goes to show the importance of being informed and exercising your rights. It also demonstrates how effective good health and safety reps have been in ensuring that the people they represent are not exposed to risk.
Simple things you can do Look up your HSR. Make contact, offer your support. If you don’t have one, consider taking on this key role (which is done in work time). If your Designated Work Group is too large e.g. one for a whole campus, or it doesn’t reflect how your work is organised anymore, get together with workmates and colleagues, and request a new structure and an election for a HSR.
Gabe Gooding
Dom Rowe
National Assistant Secretary
Director, Campaigns & Organising)
Authorised by Matthew McGowan, General Secretary, NTEU, 120 Clarendon St, Sth Melbourne VIC 3205
If you need advice contact us on whs@ nteu.org.au, and either an NTEU staff member or I will answer your query. Remember also that we are available to talk to members and potential members about anything regarding health and safety. Including talking through how you can make changes to make work safer. Large or small groups, we don’t mind. Please also let us know if there are any additional fact sheets that you think would help. COVID will be with us for a while longer and will be front of mind when thinking about WHS. We shouldn’t forget, however, that many of our bargaining claims in 2022 have a WHS element or seek to lock improvements to our health and safety into our Enterprise Agreements. Some that come to mind are the right to disconnect from work, rights to work from home for professional staff, gender affirmation leave, workload clauses, and improvements in job security. All are
ADVOCATE VOL. 29 NO. 1 ◆ MARCH 2022
Authorised by Matthew McGowan, General Secretary, NTEU, 120 Clarendon St, Sth Melbourne VIC 3205
about making our working lives safer and healthier. Yes, we are bargaining for better workplaces and better universities, but underneath it all we are also bargaining for better and healthier lives. The past two years have shown us all how important and fragile our health can be. We know that we all have the right to return home at the end of the working day as healthy and safe as when we started it. By enforcing our rights to safe and healthy workplaces we can make that so. It has been wonderful to see so many members doing just that in the past few months, and I look forward to seeing and helping many more members to keep their employers honest about health and safety during the rest of 2022. ◆ Gabe Gooding, National Assistant Secretary Find out more at nteu.org.au/whs
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