QUT staff squeezed to help fill $100m COVID-19 blackhole
QUT has put a moratorium on forced redundancies, but staff pay rises will be on hold until Christmas next year as the university fights to fill a $100m budget hole.
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Senior QUT senior staff will be asked to cut their hours to a nine-day fortnight and a Christmas pay rise is not in Santa’s sack of presents this year as the university grapples with the impacts of coronavirus.
QUT Vice-Chancellor and President, Professor Margaret Sheil acknowledged the dedication and hard work of her staff and their willingness to accept some tough measures.
Professor Sheil said QUT estimated it faced an initial revenue hit of up to $100 million this year.
“We have already paused the majority of our building programs and consolidated our administrative divisions (from six to three),’’ she said.
“All of our senior staff have reduced their hours to a nine-day fortnight for the next 12 months, a move for which I am very grateful and one that marks the commitment of the 150 strong leadership team to QUT’s future.’’
The National Tertiary Education Union (NTEU) and the Together Union were involved in negotations on a variation to the current Enterprise Agreements, including postponement of a planned two per cent pay rise until December next year.
Professor Sheil said the negotiations with the two unions had been productive and were aimed at preserving as many jobs as possible.
Other belt tightening measures included: no leave loading accrued, or paid for the next 18 months; a moratorium on forced redundancies until June next year; maintenance of superannuation contributions.
Staff will vote on the EB variations later this month.
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Professor Sheil said the university would restructure to a more streamlined model of five faculties: Business and Law; Creative Industries; Education and Society; Engineering
Health and Biomedical Innovation; Science and Environment
A formal plan for those changes would be released for consultation in mid-September, with implementation from January 31.