UNSW and staff unions met yesterday to commence negotiations for new Enterprise Agreements for Professional and Academic staff.
Discussion at the initial meeting was focussed primarily on logistical issues, including regularity of meetings, joint or separate negotiations and resourcing support for staff bargaining representatives.
UNSW is proposing fortnightly meetings (from 30 March) and separate negotiations for Professional and Academic staff. The CPSU NSW supports this approach.
Disappointingly UNSW gave no commitment to support staff representatives beyond release arrangements to attend negotiations, but has indicated further consideration of additional time release to support preparation will be given.
For our part, we have requested a detailed financial briefing from UNSW before tabling our Log of Claims. Given the uncertainty many public universities continue to face around revenue and funding, we believe this approach is prudent. We anticipate a response to this request from UNSW in the next few days.
CPSU UNSWÂ members have overwhelmingly identified job security, organisational stability and workloads as key issues in this round of bargaining, and we plan to frame our claims accordingly.
Contact a member of our bargaining team for further information:
Ellie Williams
ellie.williams@unsw.edu.au