Gympie council, staff union to battle over pay

Gympie Regional Council and its 500-strong workforce are about to head back to the negotiating table, with the agreement that secured staff a $35 per week pay rise per year about to expire.

Gympie council CEO Shane Gray and the Services Union are about head back to the negotating table with the staff’s latest bargaining agreement expiring at the end of the year.

Gympie Regional Council’s creeping $40 million staff bill is about to be dragged back into the spotlight as negotiations for a new bargaining agreement loom large.

The council’s staff are being asked to give their thoughts to the union ahead of pay negotiations with the existing Certified Agreement expiring at the end of the year.

The Services Union has asked council staff to complete an online survey about their pay and conditions.

The last agreement was negotiated in 2018 and signed in 2019.

In won for the Gympie council’s 487-strong workforce a pay rise of either $35 per week (an increase of 2.85 per cent in the first year, and 2.75 per cent in years two and three) or equal to the increase in Consumer Price Index, whichever was greater for the year.

The last pay deal between the council and its staff secured them a $35 per week pay increase in each of the three years of the agreement.

Staff also received an extra 1 per cent increase in superannuation, on top of the prescribed rates in the Local Government Act 2009, and other legislation.

This increase runs for the duration of the agreement.

The creeping staff bill has become a point of concern for the council, which has struggled to balance its budget for the past five years.

Between 2016-19 it jumped by $7 million despite staff numbers remaining unchanged at about 500.

The council has almost 500 employees. Craig Warhurst The Gympie Times

In the 2020-21 financial year staff costs, which included employee benefits and councillor remuneration, were expected to be $40.4 million.

Councillors’ pay packets are set by an independent State Government body.

The Services Union and the council have clashed multiple times in the past year over attempts to slash that bill.

Other benefits included in the last council certified agreement included 10 days Domestic and Family

Violence leave and a nine-day working fortnight.

The agreement expires December 19, 2021.

The Union has asked for the survey to be finished by Monday, August 2, “to give our bargaining team a chance to finalise your log of claims before the first meeting”.