Threat of action forces progress at Uni of Canberra
BY PAT BREWER
CANBERRA — After 18 months of stalling and evasion by management at the University of Canberra, enterprise agreement talks have progressed further in four weeks than they had in the previous year and a half, National Tertiary Education Industry Union (NTEU) negotiator Nick Sellors told a meeting of union members here on May 2.
The threat of industrial action, made by an earlier union meeting, seems to have contributed to management's sudden change of attitude.
The union's general secretary, Grahame McCulloch, told members that the union's national enterprise bargaining campaign has resulted in no loss of conditions, greater job security, better regulation of workload, greater control over contracting out and a substantial pay increase in all agreements finalised to date.
A further union meeting has been scheduled for May 22, when members will consider a range of industrial and other actions to be taken if core claims have not been satisfactorily resolved.