Knowing the status quo won’t do, NTEU members vote for strikes 

In 2023, the University of Melbourne is in crisis, as a Labour Law Professor Joo-Cheong Tham has argued.

Hundreds of staff lost jobs in the pandemic. The University’s business model of insecure work and wage theft has been exposed in all its ugliness. 

Workloads have become unmanageable, unhealthy, unsustainable -- driving people away from the higher education sector, implicitly discriminating against primary caregivers. 

Meanwhile, the University pays its executives millions, hoards billions in assets, and spends billions on buildings -- for what? 

Management, listen to the voice of staff 

The University has lost its way. 

UniMelb management owes a huge debt of gratitude to staff. Despite poor management, UniMelb continues to run. This debt must be repaid not just by thanking staff for the work and apologising for the wage theft, but by granting NTEU claims.

The University of Melbourne urgently needs change. This change requires better treatment of staff — a university is the people within, both staff and students. When management realises that, the campus flourishes. 

NTEU claims, if won, will help the university community to flourish. 

Securitisation, not ‘de-casualisation’

The only way to fix a broken business model of insecure work and wage theft is securitisation.

NTEU claims on secure work are practical and necessary. 

• 80% secure work by 2024

• 40% minimum research allocation as the default for academic staff with teaching responsibilities

• Abolishing phony “secure” work categories like “research contingent” and “periodic”

• Limiting use of casual employment to genuinely ad hoc work

• Limiting fixed-term employment to genuine ‘project’ work, with a fixed start and end date 

• Automatic fixed term conversion after two contracts or three years, before the contract expires 

Workable workloads or we won’t work 

Insecure work, constant restructures, ‘carte blanche’ forced redundancy measures, and ever increasing workload pressures are all linked. 

These workloads are not just unmanageable, they lead to psychological injury, discrimination, and disruption to a healthy life.  

Pay that addresses the cost of living crisis

Like all workers, university staff are feeling the pinch of inflation. This is because our pay rises this year and last were well below inflation. The university needs to invest in its staff and commit to a program of real, meaningful pay rises. 

NTEU Wins Ballot for Industrial Action 

The NTEU UniMelb branch is delighted to announce the results of the Protected Action Ballot, concluded last Friday. 

For all of these reasons and more, NTEU members voted overwhelmingly for the right to take industrial action last week. 

Members voted to take this step because management is not listening to the voice of the people who keep the University running: staff. Industrial action is an effective, sometimes necessary, way to open management’s ears. 

Help us make this university a wonderful place to work

The NTEU log of claims addresses the problems of most concern to university staff. So far, university management has said no to most of them. We need your help to convince university management that the time of squeezing staff is over. 

The more university staff join the NTEU and participate in our campaign the better we will all be. NTEU members are the ones who determine what action we take, and what our next enterprise agreement will look like. 

An information session for university staff on the NTEU’s claims will be held on zoom at 1pm Thursday 27 April. Register here to attend. 

In solidarity, 

David Gonzalez, Branch President, NTEU, University of Melbourne branch

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