Why University of Newcastle's 'fed up' NTEU members have launched rolling stoppages

We will stop work for 10 minutes - on the half hour, every hour - or until university management make sufficient progress in enterprise bargaining.

For 21 months we have been asking for secure jobs, safe workloads and fair pay.

University management abandoned bargaining in December to go to an all-staff ballot, where its offer was rejected by about 90 per cent of academic staff and 75 per cent of professional staff.

When negotiations resumed, we asked the vice-chancellor for an "administrative pay rise", outside the bargaining system, to alleviate cost-of-living pressures, but this was refused.

Management upped their pay offer from 9.5 per cent to 13 per cent, but that is still short of our 15 per cent claim and below industry standards. In addition, while they 'gave' with one hand, they took away with the other, removing previously agreed extra days of leave at Easter and increased superannuation for casuals.

Workloads for staff are set to increase, with an increased span of hours for many professional staff and concerning increases in academic workloads.

But why should you care? Isn't everyone doing it tough?

Well, there are at least three reasons why you should care.

First, staff working conditions are student learning conditions. Staff who are stretched to the limit, not paid for all the work they do, and living with precarious (casual and contract) employment and job insecurity (the threat of further restructures) cannot give students the attention they need. If staff miss out, so do students.

Second, our staff are falling behind. The NTEU has reached agreements with Western Sydney University, University of Tasmania and University of Technology Sydney which include better pay increases, professional staff workload regulations, fair and transparent academic workloads, and enforceable fix-term conversion to ongoing employment for casual staff. If our university cannot offer competitive pay and reasonable conditions, we run the risk of losing local talent and failing to attract new talent.

Third, our university matters to our region. It is a big employer and a site of world-class research. It gives regional kids (and mature-age students) a tertiary education that is as good as anywhere in the country. Our university is committed to diversity and providing paths for students of low-socioeconomic backgrounds and First Nations people. Our commitment is real and our reputation matters.

The university would have you believe they can't afford to give staff a reasonable pay rise. That is bunkum. They are in great financial shape. They made a $185 million surplus during COVID. They have made a surplus every year since 2008. They have cut the workforce (reducing labour costs) and have the capacity to increase income with returning international students and 1000 new federal funded positions. The university has indicated that it will record a deficit for 2022, but this is not unexpected given the poor performance of investments over that year.

In light of this sound financial position and agreements reached at other universities, management's hard-hearted stance is beyond disappointing.

Staff are telling me they are angry; we are fed up with being ignored and having legitimate concerns such as reasonable workloads discounted.

That is why we have escalated industrial action. We don't want to disrupt learning; the students are why we do this job. The 10-minute stoppages will minimise disruption to students and give staff flexibility to take part when they can.

We must take a stand against management's refusal to budge on issues that affect us most.

Without these essential measures - secure jobs, safe workloads and fair pay - jobs at the University of Newcastle become increasingly unattractive and untenable.

Staff are being treated as expendable, when in fact we are university's biggest asset. We deserve better, our university deserves better, and our community deserves better.

It is not too much to ask for fair pay for the work that we do, and for a pay rise in line with other comparable universities that recognises the university's strong financial position.

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