Three quarters of UWU staff display psychological distress, says damning internal report

United Workers Union national president Jo Schofield.

What would a union say about a workplace where a third of workers showed signs of severe psychological distress, and where only 22 per cent say it is a “mentally healthy” place to work?

And what should that same union say if the workplace were its own?

That’s the case with one of the most politically powerful unions in the count, the United Workers Union, according to the results of a damning staff survey which have just dropped into the inboxes of its workers.

Around 325 of the union’s 600 or so employees responded to the survey, conducted by workplace mental health not-for-profit SuperFriend.

The results make the UWU sound like the kind of workplace that unions were invented to prevent. You might find the odd sweatshop with unhappier staff, but the report’s findings would have most modern workplaces hanging their heads in shame – and probably looking for new management.

Three quarters of the union’s workforce shows signs of psychological distress, according to SuperFriend’s analysis of the survey. That includes the 33 per cent which show signs of severe psychological distress. Almost 65 per cent show signs of burnout.

Only 22 per cent agreed with the statement “my workplace is a mentally healthy place to work”. That’s against a national benchmark of 60 per cent, to be clear.

And among the union’s frontline organisers – the people who go into workplaces to help out the union’s members – the figures are even worse. Only 17 per cent were classified as “well”, from a mental health perspective, 43 per cent showed signs of severe psychological distress and 70 per cent were at risk of burnout.

When Margin Call asked UWU national president Jo Schofield whether the union’s leadership accepted responsibility for the distress evident in the report, the organisation was keen to let us know its staff are doing a tough job.

“United Workers Union organisers get up and work on behalf of some of the most vulnerable, low paid and insecure workers in Australia, often assisting members in hardship and distress,” said a spokesman.

Sure, but surely its leadership still has a responsibility to provide a safe workplace? Even soulless mining companies like Rio Tinto appear to understand that.

And the UWU results were benchmarked against an industry standard that includes some of its own area of coverage – public administration and safety, including the stress-free oases of jails, hospitals and emergency services.

Guess what? On every metric, the UWU came in well below those benchmarks.

“It’s really important for us as a union to ensure we are developing supports, tools and resources to support staff, in consultation with them,” the spokesman said.

“UWU is committed to providing safe, supportive workplaces, and addresses issues when they arise in a fair and considered manner.”

They’ve been doing a bang-up job, according to UWU’s own staff.

UWU’s mental health capability metric, which covers “skills, processes, policies to support mental health and its awareness”, came in 30 per cent below the industry benchmark, and SuperFriend’s assessment of its workplace safety was 38 per cent lower than the same bar.

None of this is really a surprise.

Margin Call has already documented allegations of bullying and sexual harassment levelled against the union’s WA branch and its secretary, Caroline Smith, currently playing out in the Perth District Court. Smith vehemently denies those allegations and will seek to have the matter thrown out of court in July.

But the survey results surely won’t do UWU any favours when it comes to the class action suit being prepared by Adero Law on behalf of former employees. That is still happening, although no claims have been filed in court yet. It includes not only bullying allegations, but claims of unpaid wages for staff directed to work for free on Labor’s state and federal election campaigns.

But still, the UWU spokesman assured us that the union is addressing its problems, saying the release of the survey’s results to staff was part of its “ongoing commitment to transparency, and to ensure issues can be raised by staff and addressed with their input”.

“The union is meeting with staff to share the findings of the survey and gather their ideas about next steps. Staff consulted to date have been positive about having a voice in this process,” he said.

Margin Call reckons they’ve already said plenty.

NE

Collins Club’s Goldstein call

Zoe Daniel, refusing to concede to Tim Wilson in the Melbourne seat of Goldstein, has been granted a partial recount by the Australian Electoral Commission of first-preference votes. She wanted a full recount, but that was denied.

In the meantime, Melbourne’s Collins Club seems to have already formed a view on the final result, if inadvertently. Wilson declared victory a week ago after edging in front of Daniel with a perilously slim 260 votes.

The punchline we’re building up to is that Daniel is listed to speak in a fortnight’s time at a Collins Club schmooze-fest about the role of “independents in modern Australian politics and community life”.

Stupidly, the brief bio published on the Collins Club website lists her as the “former member” for Goldstein, which is a little hasty and perhaps a little rude given she hasn’t quite lost the seat yet.

Do they know something we don’t? Or is this just a flub committed by a Collins Club schmoe who lacks adequate attention to detail?

Said schmoe has also apparently given Daniel the title of “honourable”, which one only receives in federal parliament after being appointed to the executive council, which hasn’t happened for Daniel and probably never will – not while she remains an independent.

A point she might want to raise in her speech, perhaps?

YB