SCU Staff to Stop Work and Protest Outside University Council
13 May 2004
Dispute with University escalates as staff vote to take industrial action.
General and Academic Staff at Southern Cross University will stop work for two hours next Friday, 21 May and hold a protestoutside the meeting of the University Council. At a mass meeting held on Tuesday staff, members of the National Tertiary Education Union (NTEU), unanimously voted to take the industrial and protest action in response to the University Council’s continued inaction over enterprise bargaining.
The Union claimed that the 3% pay rise, announced last week in response to the unions offer to settle the enterprise agreement last Wednesday, was insignificant compared to interim payments made at other universities. The increase from 1 July will be the first in 12 months, and is the only commitment made by management on pay after 13 months of negotiations.
“The leadership vacuum resulting from the VC’s resignation has brought the Enterprise Bargaining process at SCU, which was already faltering because of management inaction, to a complete stop” said Dr Paul Gannon, SCU Branch President of the NTEU, the Union representing both academic and general staff of the University. “The interim pay increase is merely another stalling tactic” he said.
“A staff petition to Council and a personal email to each Council member has produced no response from the University Council. The University Council has the ultimate responsibility for how the University is run. The staff are therefore calling upon the Council to meet their responsibility and ensure that the bargaining process is taken forward in a positive manner” said Dr Gannon.
In support of SCU’s students, Tuesday’s meeting alsoresolved to “oppose any HECS increases at SCU and requestthat the SCU Council take action to support properly indexed publicfunding at Public Universities”.
NTEU members at SCU are concerned that at the next Council meetingthe Council will raise HECS fees (the HECS premium) charged tostudents as some other Universities have done. “A more responsible action by the Council would be to pressfor the proper indexation of government funding to facilitateproper and fair staff increases” Dr Gannon said.
The stop work meeting and protest will be held outside the meeting of the University Council from 1pm on Friday 21 May, at Invercauld Conference Centre, 161 Invercauld Road, near SCU Lismore Campus. Branch President Paul Gannon and NTEU State Secretary Mike Donaldson will be available for media comment at the meeting.
Contact: Paul Gannon, NTEU Branch President, (02) 6620 3761 or 0408 240 579