University of Tasmania: Historic staff underpayment tops $15 million, union claims wage theft ongoing

A new report has shed light on the extent of wage theft at Australian universities, with the University of Tasmania confirming it has underpaid staff a massive amount over the past decade.

UTAS Sandy Bay campus signage. Picture: Nikki Davis-Jones

A review has identified that University of Tasmania staff were underpaid $15m over the past decade and the tertiary education union claims that wage theft is still occurring despite the university’s commitment to crack down on the issue.

A report released on Tuesday by the National Tertiary Education Union (NTEU) found that more than 97,000 university staff across Australia had been underpaid by 32 higher education institutions.

It noted that UTAS owed workers $11m, more than the total owed to staff at all universities in Queensland, Western Australia, South Australia and the Northern Territory combined.

However, it’s understood UTAS has revised this figure up to $15.2m (including superannuation and interest) as part of a sweeping review into the problem.

The review has covered the period of 2014–2023 and all current staff and most former staff have been paid back.

University of Tasmania building and signage, Hobart CBD. Picture: Richard Jupe

NTEU Tasmanian division secretary Dr Ruth Barton said while UTAS had “gone to a lot of effort” to address the historic underpayment issue, “the wage theft is still continuing”.

“That’s particularly in [the case of] casual staff who have been doing marking,” she said.

“In our [staff] agreement, it talks about the fact that people should be paid for the time it takes them to mark.

“What [UTAS is] saying is that for every assignment [marked], you get paid a set amount of time, so half-an-hour for an assignment or 15 minutes or 20 minutes or 40 minutes. So, in effect, payment by piece rates. And that’s ongoing.

“That’s a clear breach of the agreement.”

UTAS has established a dedicated project team to review underpayments, which have primarily affected casual staff. It self-reported the matter to the Fair Work Commission after launching an audit in 2020.

BRISBANE, AUSTRALIA – NewsWire Photos AUGUST 18, 2023: Education Minister Jason Clare. Picture: NCA NewsWire/Tertius Pickard

Dr Barton said she expected the amount of money owed to staff, both past and present, was likely to “go north of $15m”.

“The university sector should be model employers. They’re not corner milk bars,” she said.

“They’ve got significant resources and lots of HR people and they still seem to be not able to get it right.”

UTAS chief people officer Kristen Derbyshire said the university had “proactively” sought to investigate historic underpayment issues.

“We apologised to our people, and we have kept them informed as we have worked to identify everyone affected and repay them in full. The underpayments were the result of errors and we have fixed the structural and systems issues that allowed them to occur,” she said.

University of Tasmania building and signage, Hobart CBD. Picture: Richard Jupe

“We have been absolutely clear that our people must be paid fairly for the work they do. If the union is aware of instances where this is not happening, we want to know about it, and we will fix it.”

Federal Education Minister Jason Clare has commissioned a team to probe wage theft and casualisation in Australian universities.

The Albanese government proposed legislative changes this year to criminalise wage theft, imposing a maximum penalty of 10 years’ imprisonment and fines of up to $7.8m.