DIVISIONS

www.nteu.org.au/act

Division Officers ACT Division Secretary: Rachael Bahl (to Jan 2020), Cathy Day (from Jan 2020) Assistant Secretary: Cathy Day (to Sept 2020) Division President: Marie Fisher (to Feb 20), Matthew King (to Aug 2020) Division Vice-Presidents: Dr Belinda Townsend (Academic), Matthew King (General) (to Feb 20)

Division Staff Division Industrial Officer: David Vincent-Pietsch Division Organisers: Dr Lachlan Clohesy, Dr Simon Dougherty The ACT Division represents more than 1,100 members at four ACT public universities: Australian National University (ANU) including ANU College (ANUC); University of Canberra (UC), including UC College (UCC); Australian Catholic University (Signadou Campus, ACU); and UNSW Canberra at the Australian Defence Force Academy (ADFA).

Recruitment & Membership Training and Development The NTEU ACT Division has undergone big changes during the last year, with Dr Cathy Day becoming Division Secretary in January 2020 (having acted in the role since mid2019). During that period, our membership has surged by 9.7% across the Division. This has been driven primarily by a 13.6% increase at ANU, where we have prioritised creating strong Delegate structures. We have also had a modest increase in membership at the University of Canberra during the same period. Though growth was apparent prior to the pandemic, the ACT Division also experienced strong growth in line with the broader NTEU from March this year. We expect membership numbers to fall as a result of voluntary separations and redundancies in response to COVID-19. Nevertheless, we are in a much stronger position to face future challenges than previously. Enterprise Bargaining and Industrial Enforcement Our main site of industrial disputation has been the University of Canberra, as we dealt with matters outstanding from the 2018-9 round of Enterprise Bargaining. The NTEU secured a commitment from the University of Canberra to hold an independent review into the controversial Assistant Professor Scheme.

We moved to a dispute after the University withheld the findings of the ‘Independent Review into the Contingent-Continuing Program’, securing its release. We also initiated a dispute which ultimately led to a widening of the number of members eligible to opt-out of the Assistant Professor Scheme. During the last year we also concluded Enterprise Bargaining with the ANU Student Associations (including the Australian National University Students’ Association (ANUSA), the Postgraduate and Research Students’ Association (PARSA), and Woroni (ANU student newspaper)). Our bargaining team, led by members Kate Buscombe (PARSA) and Sam Guthrie (ANUSA), managed to secure an Agreement which maintained and extended a number of conditions. Most notable were a number of gains on equity issues, including the explicit recognition of Aboriginal & Torres Strait Islander staff for the first time (including commitments on A&TSI employment and recognition of cultural and ceremonial leave). In addition, we’re also bargaining at ANU College, have had an Enterprise Agreement variation at the ANU, and have engaged with various managing change processes

including the School of Legal Practice at ANU, UC College, and the ANU Postgraduate and Research Students’ Association (PARSA).

Campaigning and Public Advocacy

Campaign Infrastructure – ANU Delegates The greatest success in campaigning terms has not been any single campaign, but the establishment of campaign infrastructure. At the ANU we have developed a process for nominating and endorsing Delegates as part of a formal Delegate structure. At the time of writing we have 22 endorsed Delegates across the university – a number which we aim to increase before Enterprise Bargaining next year. This is all the more remarkable considering that we had no formal Delegates prior to beginning this process in mid-2019.

UC Cases & Campaigns Committee In order to broaden organising activity and lay groundwork for the training and development of future delegates, a Cases & Campaigns Committee was established at UC. Members democratically decided to focus on two campaign areas which seek to address crises that have acutely affected the sector in Canberra.

After a summer of smoke, fire, and hail, a Climate Justice Sub-Committee was established to strengthen community partnerships and influence UC’s strategic direction to include goals of fossil fuel divestment and a carbon neutral campus. Work intensification since the COVID-19 crisis has seen the establishment of a Workloads Sub-Committee where members have been revising and enforcing workload guidelines, protecting leave entitlements, and successfully pressuring Deans to train managers in fair workload allocation.

UNSW Canberra at ADFA The Sub-Branch Committee has been organised in a more structured way to encourage member-participation in organising activities run remotely from the Kensington campus, and locally at ADFA. This has enabled members to show solidarity with colleagues in Sydney combatting job

cuts and wage theft, while tending to local issues related to workloads, support for online and remote delivery, and related WHS concerns.

Campaigns

Paid Parental Leave at ANU Our ANU Women’s Action Network (WAN) continued their campaign, which began on International Women’s Day in March 2019, for improved Paid Parental Leave (PPL) at the ANU. The WAN has been campaigning to extend PPL to staff in their first 12 months of employment, and casually employed staff. Their most high profile action was in November 2019. Following ANU’s achievement of Bronze Accreditation in the SAGE Athena SWAN program which promotes women in STEM, the WAN staged a campaign action with ‘Athena the Swan’ visiting Kambri (ANU’s central precinct). The WAN intends to push for greater PPL entitlements through to Enterprise Bargaining next year.

Vote NO at ANU NTEU members mobilised against the ANU Executive’s non-union variation to the ANU Enterprise Agreement in June 2020. Facing a popular Vice-Chancellor, our members were heavily engaged in a campaign involving 19 local area meetings in three days and hundreds contacted through phone banking. Members also braved the early morning Canberra cold to hold signs as staff came to work on the first and last days of voting. Ultimately the campaign for the ‘No’ vote failed by just 39 votes (out of almost 7000 eligible voters). Nevertheless, we were able to use the campaign to build longer term power and shock a management team who expected an easy victory without substantial opposition. The close result was a product of the growing strength of the ANU Branch, and particularly the role of our Delegates network.

ACU Signadou Campus Members have contributed to the central campaign against ACU’s so-called “COVID-19 Recovery Plan” in order to protect jobs and pay from being used to prop up ACU’s surplus. Local NTEU staff continue providing industrial support to resolve member cases often related to workloads and WHS.

Fund Uni Fairly Action at Parliament The NTEU ACT Division sent a delegation to Parliament to protest the Federal Government’s changes to higher education funding. Members recorded a video with a message aimed at Senate crossbenchers, calling on them to block the bill and to fund uni fairly as part of the NTEU’s national campaign. We have welcomed new officeholders at Branches across the ACT Division, as members have sought to get involved in the democratic processes of their union. The skills, knowledge and experience of the people who have come on board as Branch Committee members and Delegates (in addition to those who have served for some time) contribute to our strong position to build upon the foundations we’ve established in the previous year. ◆

Images (this page): Dinith Adikari (ANU) #SaveHigherEd National Day of Action selfie, 21 May 2020; ‘Athena the Swan’ visited Kambri at ANU as part of the NTEU Women’s Action Network’s campaign for improved paid parental leave.