Industrial & Legal www.nteu.org.au/rights Director (Industrial & Legal): Wayne Cupido Senior Legal Officer: Kelly Thomas National Industrial Officer: Campbell Smith National Industrial Officer (Research and Projects): Ken McAlpine Industrial Support Officer: Renee Veal The Unit is under the direction of the General Secretary
The pandemic has delivered an industrial environment that we have never faced before. Stand downs, quarantine orders, campus closures, working from home, health and safety issues, JobKeeper (or lack thereof), agreement variations and job losses, are some of the issues that Union has had to respond to this year. The National Industrial and Legal Team (NILT) acknowledges and thanks all members, Branch, Division and National office staff who have supported us in responding to the challenges that the pandemic has thrown at us this year. Without this collective response, we would not have been able to perform the work outlined in this report. Bargaining Jobs Protection Framework & Enterprise Agreement Variations
In response to the impact of the pandemic on University budgets, and the failure of the Federal Government to provide any significant financial aid to the sector, the work of the National Industrial and Legal Team (NILT) has been focused on enforcing our members’ rights and negotiating variations to enterprise agreements that protect jobs. Members of the NILT also attended and assisted Branches and Divisions at member meetings to consider variations.
Image (this page): Nicole Downes, Chloe Gaul, Trevor Miller, Cassandra Prigg, Paul Drew and Carl Millard at the NTEU protest outside Dan Tehan’s office in Warrnambool, May 2020 (Mark Witte)
20
NTEU variations have been negotiated at eight Universities, one non-union variation (ANU) has been approved by the Fair Work Commission (FWC), another (JCU) is pending approval and subject to challenge by the Union. Four non-union variations were voted down by members at Melbourne, Murdoch, Griffith and Curtin University.
All union negotiated variations are temporary and contain job protection measures and improvements in rights for members. Job protection measures include stronger limits to forced redundancies, no stand downs without pay, new rights to work for casuals and fixed term staff, and no unnecessary external appointments for the life of the variation. Most importantly, Union endorsed variations will save more than 1500 jobs and increase management accountability. A critical part of the Union negotiated variation framework has been the establishment of the national Expert Assessment Panel (EAP). The EAP is a joint union-management auditing panel. The panel’s role is to forensically examine university accounts and to assess whether there is a genuine need for any proposed cost saving measures. Additionally, the Panel considers whether a University has implemented other cost saving measures including cuts to senior executive salaries and discretionary spending. For the remainder of 2020 and in 2021, the NILT will continue to work with Branches and Divisions to implement variations, and assist every Branch to enforce the industrial rights of our members through what we expect to be a tumultuous time. Review of Round 7 & prep for Round 8
Over the past year the NILT undertook a much more comprehensive and detailed analysis of bargaining outcomes in higher education than has been done before. Clauses dealing with key issues have been objectively assessed and compared to each other across the sector, and there has been a
NTEU ANNUAL REPORT 2020 ◆ Industrial & Legal
