Charles Darwin University will incorporate its staff’s new salaries by Christmas after negotiations end

About 1700 workers with a major NT employer will get more money in their bank accounts soon. Here’s who is scoring the pay increase and why.

Charles Darwin University Vice-Chancellor Professor Scott Bowman said the majority ‘yes’ vote is a good outcome for staff. Picture: (A)manda Parkinson

Charles Darwin University is set to incorporate its new enterprise bargaining agreement after a staff vote last week.

The EBA, which includes pay rises, sign-on bonuses and additional leave entitlements, received a 62 per cent majority ‘yes’ vote.

The university received votes from 59 per cent of its 1700 strong workforce.

CDU vice-chancellor Professor Scott Bowman said the university’s payroll team would be working to include the sign-on bonus and salary increase in staff’s pay before Christmas.

“Thank you to everyone who voted,” Professor Bowman said.

“I want to thank the unions who negotiated a very good outcome for their members.

“I also wanted to thank the CDU Bargaining team for their commitment to negotiating an agreement that works for all of CDU.”

The EBA was subject to strong opposition from the National Tertiary Education Union over the past few weeks.

Bargaining for the new agreement commenced in 2021.

The final agreement will be sent to Fair Work Australia for formal approval.

National Tertiary Education Union NT president Darius Pfitzner was concerned the pay offer would not meet cost of living standards. Picture: Supplied

The pay offer previously sparked cost of living concerns from the NTEU.

NTEU NT president Darisu Pfitzner said it was critical the university’s offer kept up with Darwin’s inflation to maintain staff’s living standards “at a bare minimum”.

“Under this offer, the average full-time CDU employee’s annual pay will decline by 5.17 per cent in real terms by mid-2025,” he said.

Professor Bowman said the pay rises were the best Charles Darwin University could offer.

“The Union’s negotiating with some very rich universities that are making billions of dollars of profit, and they want bigger pay rises at those, but they’re pay rises that we can’t afford,” he said.

“The pay increases we’re offering next year will cost us an extra $10 million, and this year, we only made a three million dollar surplus, so we’re going to have to work really hard to pay even what we’re offering.”

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