It happened last week in the Scenic Rim and it may happen here: some SDRC staff are considering industrial action. After getting off to a “slow start”, the Australian Services Union hoped for a good result for SDRC council workers. The good result is yet to arrive.
The Australian Services Union is the largest local government union in Australia. The local government division is the largest industry in the Australian Services Union, making up about half of the Union's membership.
As of last week, union workers at council rejected the Council’s first pay offer and are now preparing for “significant industrial action throughout the region for the first time in decades”.
Bargaining for SDRC agreements began in April this year, according to the ASU.
Council made their first offer on 21st July. Unions took this to their members, who unanimously rejected the offer. This feedback was provided to the council at a meeting in Warwick on Thursday 31st July.
The Town & Country Journal spoke to an ASU representative, and confirmed with council that “council is currently negotiating two Enterprise Bargaining agreements and we look forward to successfully finalising these with the union.”
Now the ASU is “calling on the Mayor Melissa Hamilton and CEO Rachel Brophy to cut through the deadlock and make their workers an offer they deserve”.
According to an ASU spokesperson, council’s pay offer of 3.5%, 3% and 3% over three years “has insulted staff after years of below-inflation pay increases, with outdoor staff not slated to get their first pay increase until February next year”.
The unions claims the pay offer is “well below” what other councils are offering their workers across the region and that the SDRC is already one of the lowest-paid council in Southeast Queensland. The ASU want 6% for each of the next three years, paid from the date of certification with backpay to the 1st of July this year.
The low offer is not the only barrier to an agreement.
“An attempt by the Council to make it easier to extend workers’ ordinary hours to Sunday has also fallen flat, prompting workers across Council to consider industrial action”.
What would that action look like?
David Keenan, former CEO of the SDRC, explained last week from his role of CEO for the Scenic Rim, which received notices of industrial action on 31 July from three of the six unions representing council employees.
"Given the diversity of the unions involved, their proposed actions are likely to impact a wide range of Council services and facilities across the Scenic Rim," he said.
The ASU says that “potential industrial action includes everything from bans on using keys in Council vehicles, to refusing to send or open emails, to full scale strike action and stoppages”.
Membership ballots may now indicate industrial action, but there is some hope. The ASU says that “possible movement” from the SDRC “on their offer in the past few days...is a good sign”.
