We accept LGNSW offer for a new State Award
- Details
- Published: Monday, 19 June 2017 11:54
On 2 June, the LGNSW Board endorsed an offer to be made to the three unions for the new 2017 Local Government State Award. This was formally provided to the unions late that afternoon.
The offer was individually emailed to members at 9:20am on Monday 5 June (not a bad turnaround, early in the morning of the next business day) with an explanatory email and three links. The first, a nine page attachment identifying the changes and particularly those that would provide benefits to our members, the second a copy of what the Award would look like with the proposed changes marked up and the third, the recommended Guidelines on Workplace Investigations.
We acknowledge the contribution of Lake Macquarie Council - in conducting such a heinous, prejudicial and clumsy investigation last year - that we felt obliged to pursue twelve fundamental requirements of procedural fairness which was supported by the other unions and ultimately also by LGNSW and they found their way both into the Award and by reference into the Guidelines. No more hanging prosecutors/judges when Lake Macquarie complies with these guidelines next time they conduct a workplace investigation and, if they do train people who revealed shortcomings in the exercise, no more nominations for the Golden Turd either.
Members had the opportunity of responding to the documents up until the close of business on Wednesday 14 June and the recommendation was made to the Committee, providing each of the individual responses from members so that the Committee would be aware of the feedback, to accept the offer.
The Committee of Management has now unanimously accepted the offer in an email and a letter with our characteristic clarity.
It’s no secret that we were disappointed at the way LGNSW conducted the negotiations. While we look forward to the Award being made now by Commissioner Murphy in the IRC on 30 June, and there is little point complaining about the change of historic attitude evidenced by the behaviour of the LGNSW, we hope next time that we can resort to the cooperation historically provided by LGNSW rather than the unhelpful attitude displayed this time.