SIGNAL No. 677 – 11 January 2016
WELCOME BACK INTO THE 2016 NEW YEAR.
The year will, no doubt, hold a number of new challenges on the industrial relations front. The certainty of a Federal election, the likely focus on a return to “WorkChoices” (even without Abbott), the lack of a real “worker” agenda from the Federal opposition, etc, all mean we could be heading for a year of turmoil.
Let’s hope not.
Added to our main employers’ further plans of offshoring quality Australian jobs, or contracting out the functions that remain in a “sham” alternative to genuine permanent employment, and a plethora of incompetent management at all levels amongst those employers, we are staring down a year (at least) of insecurity.
On a positive note, there have been some really good developments on the sub-contractor front, and an awakening of the collective ideals of this group of workers should have a positive outcome for All union members across the industry.
Our main EBA (Telstra) will generate a number of contentious interpretations, and the analysis of the Union’s performance by its members will be whether (or not) there is still some fight left in the Union membership as a whole.
From a Victorian T&S Branch perspective, we have faced these sorts of issues before, and provided the best strategies are implemented, we will live on. Nothing would suit the current employers more than to deunionise more areas of the industry in an attempt to lower wages and conditions.
Our Branch Committee of Management, and the current officials, are clearly committed to the ongoing survival of this collective organisation in the Telecommunications industry.
All the best for the upcoming 12 months, and enjoy your holiday break (if you still on it)!
LARGE PARCEL SORTING SYSTEM CREATES TECHNICAL STAFFING ISSUE
Now that the expansion of the Melbourne Parcel Facility (MPF) and Sydney Parcel Facility (SPF) has been completed and throughput rates and performance on the Large Parcel Sorting System (LPSS), the technical staffing arrangements for these sites are becoming problematic.
There is currently a proposal to engage fixed term technical employees beyond January 2016.
Further discussions with National Engineering services management have been requested but as yet no response is forthcoming.
TELSTRA FLAGS DECISION TO END NETWORK CONSTRUCTION TRAVEL TIME POLICY
Telstra has notified the CWU of its intention to retire its Network Construction Travel Policy.
Historically, employees involved in what was once Network Design and Construction (NDC)/Network Construction (NC) have had travel time arrangements specific to their particular mode of operation.
These have been designed to reflect the itinerant nature of much Network Construction work.
Telstra now says it wants to end these special arrangements and bring construction employees’ travel entitlements into line with those of all other employees i.e. with the Log on and Excess Travel Time provisions in Sections 12 and 14 of the Enterprise Agreement respectively.
A phone conference to discuss this proposal was held on Monday 14 December and attended by both state branch officials and Divisional Office representatives.
At the meeting the CWU told Telstra that, in its view, the current Log on and ETT arrangements do not adequately cover the circumstances that can arise for construction employees.
That is why there has been a special NC travel policy!
Further discussions on this issue are planned. Members wanting to have input into this matter should contact the branch – cdtsvic@cwu.asn.au .
CWU MEETS WITH TELSTRA ON REDUNDANCY PROCESSES
The CWU met with Telstra on Thursday 18 December to discuss the operation of the new Enterprise Agreement when employees opt for voluntary redundancy.
The Divisional Office has received reports of employees not being paid what the CWU regards as their full entitlements in business areas that have called for large numbers of such volunteers.
In particular, there appears to be a problem with Global Contact Centre (GCC) employees being required to leave the company (i.e. effectively being retrenched) before they have completed 4 weeks in the Placement Period and then being denied payment for the balance due to them in lieu of notice.
The CWU recommended that its members reject the latest EA, largely on the basis of changes to the redundancy provisions.
It is probably fair to say, however, that the focus of union concerns was the requirement that employees accept redeployment, whether they wanted to or not, rather than the provisions around voluntary redundancy.
It is now clear, however, that the practical consequences of the provisions in this area of the EA could be to short-change employees, depending on how certain clauses are interpreted and implemented.
Meanwhile, in other areas of the business, employees who have opted for redundancy and who wished to leave the company before Xmas so as to look for new jobs in the New Year were told they couldn’t leave until well into 2016.
Telstra has agreed to examine promptly the immediate problems which have arisen in GCC. Further discussions around the voluntary redundancy procedures will be held early next year.
In the meantime, any member considering accepting a voluntary redundancy should contact the branch for advice on their options.
ACMA BARGAINING: NO GOOD NEWS
The bargaining stalemate at the Australian Communications and Media Authority (ACMA) continues.
The CWU and other involved unions met with ACMA on Monday 14 December.
At the meeting, ACMA reiterated its position that it could offer no improvement on its latest offer unless the unions could put forward a reasonable counter-proposal i.e. significant trade-offs in return for an increase in the current wage offer.
ACMA has recently increased its wage offer to 6% over three years (2.5%, 2.5%, 1.5%) in line with the slight relaxation of government policy in this area earlier this year.
But ACMA union members have told their representatives that this offer is still unacceptable, especially since they have had a wage freeze for nearly two years.
The CWU understands that ACMA is hoping to put its proposed agreement out for a vote in January.
The unions will be proposing that if a vote is to be held, it should be in February when participation rates are likely to be higher and the vote a more accurate reflection of employee views.
CYBERSECURITY CENTRE WILL CREATE 700 JOBS, SAYS NBN
The new telecommunications network (nbn) will create a cybersecurity centre at Docklands, Victoria, which the company says will create up to 700 jobs.
The plan was jointly announced by Federal Minister for Communications, Senator Mitch Fifield and Victorian Minister for Small Business, Innovation and Trade Philip Dalidakis at nbn’s Network Operations Centre (NOC) on 6 December, evidently to coincide with the Prime Minister’s Innovation Statement the following day.
The pair said 400 tech jobs will be created over two years, with 300 more to be generated later by the project in construction, maintenance and technical support roles.
The new jobs will be created in cyber security, technical support and administration, specialised ICT engineering and customer support.
The centre will be “first line of defence against cyber threat to the NBN”, according to the Victorian Government, and will provide “a collection of services for the delivery of detection, identification, triage and management of cyber events and incident response”.
TELSTRA TO INCREASE CONTRACTOR WORKFORCE
While the latest round of redundancies in Telstra has been accompanied by a reduction in the use of contractors in many parts of the business, it is evidently a different story when it comes to NBN installations.
Here sub-contracting is evidently about to increase.
The Australian of 15 December reports that Telstra will spend some $3 million to create a new “army” of 250 technicians to install Telstra connections to the NBN as the roll-out gathers pace over the coming years. The aim is to sign up as many as 1 million customers during 2018 when the cut-over rate should be rising sharply.
But the new recruits won’t be direct Telstra employees. Instead they’ll be sub-contractors engaged by Telstra lead contractor, ISGM. And of course they’ll be paid on piece rates i.e. per installation.
Telstra has only recently renewed its contract with ISGM, engaging it for a further 10 years to deliver installation and maintenance services. It remains unclear what proportion of any future NBN maintenance work which Telstra might win might be covered by this contract.
What is clear, however, it that both Telstra and ISGM intend to have these 250 new workers, and others like them, carry the risks that are inherent in the NBN project, particularly in relation to workflow – risks that have already spelled financial disaster for sub-contractors and prime contractors alike.
TOP EXECUTIVES NOW PAID 50 TIMES AVERAGE EARNINGS
Australia’s top executives are now earning, on average, more than 50 times the average working person’s salary, according to a survey by the Australian Financial Review. And the gap is growing.
Over the last financial year, the amount going to the 300 highest execs rose by 5%, despite the ASX 200 only rising by 1.2% over the same period. At the same time, wage growth across the nation as a whole was 2.3%.
Supporters of these huge differences in rewards argue that executive pay is now determined by the global market, not by local wage structures. But that is just another way of saying that growing earnings inequality is now a world-wide problem, not only an Australian one.
In the US in 2013, for instance, the average executive earned 313 times as much as the average worker, according to the US peak union organisation, the AFL-CIO.
And in the UK chief executives of blue-chip companies enjoyed a median pay rise of 32% last year, compared with a 7% rise in the stock exchange and a 2% increase in workers’ pay.
These figures point to a global trend that is seeing not only wages but productive investment (and hence job growth) stagnate while corporations and their executives find new ways to enrich themselves – through share buybacks, share options and generous retirement benefits.
JOHN ELLERY
Secretary
CWU (T&S) Vic