University unions ordered off campus

by Kerri Carr

Some universities have issued eviction notices to staff unions using free office space, citing the Federal Government's new funding requirements.

Newcastle, NSW, Southern Cross and New England universities and the University of Technology, Sydney have withdrawn the offer of free union office space to the National Tertiary Education Union and Community and Public Sector Union (CPSU).

A letter received by the NTEU on November 22 ordered NTEU members to vacate the NTEU premises at the University of Newcastle by close of business that day. Newcastle management also refuse to allow unions to commercially lease premises.

National Tertiary Education Union (NSW) Secretary Chris Game said the Government was making $260 million contingent on individual universities meeting the Higher Education Workplace Relations Requirements (HEWRRs) which include restricting union involvement, restricting the content of enterprise agreements and forcing staff onto Australian Workplace Agreements.

But Ms Game said there was nothing in the HEWRRs stating that unions cannot have office space on campus, nor do they preclude the university from entering into a commercial leasing arrangement with whomever it likes. "This sudden shift of management's attitude at a minority of universities has outraged NTEU members," Ms Game said.

"Rather than understandable attempts to secure scarce government funding it appears that these managers now want to proactively use the HEWRRs to attack the union. This is plainly a ruse. The Government only supplies 40 per cent of the funding to universities, yet are trying to exert 100 per cent control."

"We will work with university management to secure HEWRRs funding for the University of Newcastle, but will resist management's attempts to pander to Minister Nelson by adopting a belligerent anti-union approach. In the mean time, we're not going anywhere".

"We will also be investigating legal avenues such as trade practices and anti-discrimination legislation, given that the university sees fit to lease out considerable office space to many other organisations and businesses, but not the union," said Ms Game.

"The NTEU and its predecessor staff associations have had offices located on campuses for decades, which does much to assist the expeditious handling and resolution of disputes between staff and management. Other universities are having constructive dialogue over office space with the NTEU to ensure all funding requirements are met, and recognise the benefit for both management and staff of having NTEU offices located on campus."

CPSU industrial officer Xanthe Thomson said the eviction notices had arrived without prior negotiations.

The CPSU told the universities the union would not vacate until they agreed to talk.

There have been some negotiations and some universities are looking at staff representative offices, but we may have to share space," she said.

Ms Thomson explained staff representatives would need to be elected to the position.

"Others say we will need to pay the full market rent," she said.

Ms Thomson described the rent of $7000 per annum per campus as "exorbitant".

"There's no rationale on the rent. It is the same whether it is in Sydney or Armidale."

Ms Thomson said the universities had been told if they didn't comply with HEWRRs by November 30 they would lose five per cent of funding for 2006-2007 and 7.5 per cent for 2007-2008.

Ms Thomson said HEWRRs require that Commonwealth grants can't be used to resource union activities.

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Last Modified: 08 Dec 2005