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 Home About PSA
PSA Achievements
This is a short list of the PSA's major achievements in recent years. Every union can put together a similar list. Nearly all pay and conditions enjoyed by ordinary employees have been won by unions, through awards and agreements and by creating the demands that lead to legislation. These contributions to your standard of living and your rights at work have been won in the traditional, uniquely Australian industrial relations system where there is an independent umpire and an obligation to negotiate. The Howard Government's new laws will hinder and many cases prevent the progress that is possible under the traditional system, e.g. there can be no "pay equity" or other test cases under the Howard system. Here is the Public Service Association's short list of achievements:-- Protection of Government employees' rightsWith Unions NSW and other public sector unions, successfully lobbied the NSW Government to legislate to protect most employees from John Howard's IR laws.Maternity Leave and Parental LeaveThe last pay negotiations resulted in NSW public sector maternity leave being increased for 9 weeks to 14 weeks paid leave. As well one week paid parental leave was introduced. In most universities, which are under federal enterprise agreements, maternity leave is now 26 weeks paid. (Most have 14 weeks at 100% pay then part pay for the remaining weeks). The Australian Catholic Universities pioneered these improvements in 2001 with one year paid leave in the previous pay award (12 weeks full pay, the remainder at 60%).PayPublic Sector Pay increases of around 4% per year since 1994 (i.e. ahead of inflation). Total cumulative- 1994-2008 of 71.6%. The 1994 increase resulted from this union breaking the Greiner Government's quasi wage freeze. The government had a policy of dragging out for as long as it could negotiations for enterprise agreements and demanding employees trade off conditions to pay for pay increase.School AssistantsSchool assistants have received increases on top of the general public sector increases. Increases range from 98% for administrative offices to 150% for administrative managers over the 1993-2008 period.Pay in UniversitiesWhere we have settled pay increases in the last round, the increases exceed that of the NSW public sector.Bullying at WorkPSA is undoubtedly the leading campaigner against bullying at work. We have generally succeeded in making management realise it has a problem and that they must act.Teachers Aides (Special)660 new permanent positions are currently being created. This resulted from PSA and Teachers Federation lobbying for more positions.Department of Community ServicesMore than 1350 new jobs are being created over four years -- when completed that will mean an injection of $1.1 billion per year into DOCS. The PSA has campaigned for these extra positions since the Greiner Government abolished over 1,000 positions in 1989.Office of Public ProsecutionsIn 2003 PSA ran a campaign to get extra staff. The management said it couldn't be done - Treasury wouldn't give the money. It was done. 36 new staff and $6 million per year.Pay Equity (2002)An issue where PSA has been in the forefront. We lobbied the Minister and Government to get the Pay Equity Inquiry established in 1998. We made a major contribution to Justice Glynn's inquiry, and then made a further contribution to the case which established the Equal Remuneration Principle. We then ran a pay equity case for librarians and archivists. Pay rises averaged 16 percent. This case was the first under the new Equal Remuneration Principle and is the most significant equal pay case since the late 1960's.Electricity Privatisation (1997)PSA was a major force in blocking the privatisation of the electricity generating and distribution industry. The unions, particularly the PSA, mobilised and persuaded the ALP to confirm its anti-privatisation policy.Jail Privatisation (2004)The Government was seriously considering privatisation of new prisons at Kempsey, Dillwinya (at Windsor) and Wellington. The PSA negotiated a new award covering these three jails and that was instrumental in keeping the jails public.OHS ProsecutionsNew legislation allows unions to prosecute for breaches of occupational health and safety. The PSA is the first union to take advantage of these provisions. We have run successful cases against RTA, DOCS, DET and Police.PermanencyThe Government has been persuaded to have a stronger policy allowing long term temporaries to convert to permanent appointment.Job SecurityDuring job cuts and restructures we have been reasonably successful in ensuring those members who want to stay in the service keep their jobs or find equivalent jobs. (Statistics show that unionists generally are more likely to keep their jobs partly because they are more conscious of what they can do and partly because their unions help them).Union MembershipUnion membership is slowly growing. At February 2006 we had 44,900 financial members. The low point was 39,300 in 1994.
Further information on the campaign to protect rights at work and the unions' ability to represent employees and achieve improved pay and conditions, see the ACTU's Rights at Work website. To join the PSA/CPSU, just click, print out and fill in the application forms. |
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