Eight unis set to reject NTEU pay cut deal
At least eight universities are expected to opt out of the COVID-19 deal negotiated with the National Tertiary Education Union.
At least eight universities are expected to opt out of the COVID-19 deal negotiated with the National Tertiary Education Union, in which university staff would take pay cuts in exchange for limits on job losses.
The universities of Sydney, Melbourne and Newcastle, Flinders University, Edith Cowan University, the University of Technology Sydney and the Australian Catholic University have said they don’t plan to use the job protection framework that was agreed last week between the union and university employer group the Australian Higher Education Industrial Association.
The University of Queensland is still to publicly state its position but is understood to be ready to say no to the deal.
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Under the terms of the deal university staff (excluding casuals) would accept cuts of between 5 per cent and 15 per cent for a year. Universities would not involuntarily stand down staff without pay and would exhaust all options before making staff redundant.
But pay cuts would occur only if an independent panel judged that the university was suffering sufficient financial damage from the impact of COVID-19.
ACU vice-chancellor Greg Craven told his staff in an email that using the job protection framework “would mean surrendering control of our response to COVID-19 to an external body”.
“This is completely inconsistent with the legal and other responsibilities of the university senate,” he said.
NTEU president Alison Barnes said the framework could save 12,000 jobs and that some universities that were opting out of the deal were trying to avoid financial scrutiny.
“We know already that the universities of Sydney and Melbourne are grappling with a half-billion dollar a year exposure to the international student market,” Dr Barnes wrote in an article published on The Australian’s website. “After spending lavishly on building programs, these universities are now unwilling to open their books, presumably for fear it may reveal poor risk management.”
Two of the four vice-chancellors in the university negotiating team (made up of Andy Vann of Charles Sturt University, Margaret Gardner of Monash University, John Dewar of La Trobe University and Jane den Hollander of the University of Western Australia) have not committed to implement the framework.
La Trobe said on Tuesday it would consider which measures in the framework were “suitable for a vote by all La Trobe staff”.
Charles Sturt’s Professor Vann said his university was “working through the details very carefully”.
The deal still must be approved by the NTEU’s national council on Wednesday and must also be approved by a vote of staff at each participating university
Monash University said that it welcomed the framework. UWA said it intended to use it provided it passed the remaining hurdles.
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