4 May 2023
WHAT A DAY
About 1000 University of Melbourne NTEU members and students overflowed the Market Hall in the New Student Precinct yesterday for the branch's strike action. Our action moved University of Melbourne management to send a revised EBA offer to the branch late Tuesday night.
ACTION WORKS
The revised offer is the first change we’ve seen in writing from management since their first proposal in November. I don’t believe we would’ve received anything if we hadn’t taken this action yesterday as delays from management have sadly become the norm.
MANAGEMENT STILL SAYING NO
The revised proposal does not come close to meeting any of our key claims: containing nothing on pay, no secure work target, nothing on working from home changes, nothing on better parental leave, nothing on ending restructures and nothing on making workloads manageable.
UPDATE FROM BARGAINING TABLE
Just a couple of hours ago we left a bargaining session with management to go over their new proposal and it was clear they haven’t moved on any of the branch's key claims. We’ll provide a proper update on their proposal once we can do some analysis, but right now, it’s nowhere near good enough.
NEXT STEPS
We’ve offered management more bargaining meeting times over the coming weeks to try and come closer on as many issues as we can. In the meantime, members voted unanimously at yesterday’s strike meeting:
1. To hold weekly open meetings of the Strike Committee, to oversee the organising work of building strength and capacity across the university. (sign up here)
2. To hold a members’ meeting in the first week of June to hear reports on bargaining, organising and strike preparation in order to decide on the escalation of our industrial action, up to and including an open-ended strike. (more to come on this soon)
3. To call on the new University Chancellor, Jane Hansen, to bring a fresh perspective to University leadership - one that recognises the invaluable contribution staff make to the University and supports staff to do their best work by listening to them during the bargaining process.
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