Paid meetings to discuss Sunshine Coast Council agreement
As advised last week, The Services Union finished two days of Queensland Industrial Relations Commission-assisted discussions with Sunshine Coast Council last week with an offer for your consideration.
The offer is the same package your Field-Based colleagues agreed to, but without trading away the conditions the Field-Based workers had to give up.
The proposal comprises the following improvements:
- Pay –
- 6% back-paid to 1 July 2023.
- 5% from 1 July 2024.
- 4% from 1 July 2025.
- Sign-on bonus of $800 upon successful ‘yes’ vote.
- Improved Wellbeing, Health and Safety provisions with Mental Health First Aid/Suicide Prevention training via Mates In Construction.
- Expanded access to Natural Disaster Leave.
- On-Call allowance increased to $60 per day (Mon – Sun).
- First Aid allowance increased to $19.70/week.
- Paid Parental Leave increased to 14 weeks after one year’s service; paid partner leave increased to two weeks.
- One day paid Sorry Business Leave per year.
- One day paid Cultural Leave per year (all cultures).
- One week paid Gender Affirmation Leave during life of CA plus enhanced Equity and Diversity provisions.
- Access to one day’s personal leave per year for proactive wellbeing management (‘One Day My Day’).
- Outdoor supervisor remuneration provision re-worded for clarity.
The Council’s “Productivity/Sustainability” claims are resolved as follows:
- Overtime Meal Provisions – Redrafted to ensure clarity of interpretation.
- Contracting Out – The Council withdrew its claim to remove requirement to demonstrate unavailability of appropriate internal staff when proposing to outsource work.
- Personal Leave accrual – The Council withdrew its claim to have personal leave accrue over the course of a year – meaning you will continue to be credited 15 days up-front upon each anniversary.
- Supervisor Work Location – The Council withdrew its claim to be able to rotate supervisors through different work locations; the parties agreed to consult via the WCF ‘to implement rotating roster arrangements to facilitate operational requirements and professional development/succession planning’.
While more money would have been a further bonus, we successfully got rid of the onerous trade-offs the Council wanted. We were also concerned to finalise the negotiation before the matter could be referred for a binding Arbitration which would have been risky in the current economic environment.
The Council has agreed to our request for paid-time meetings to discuss the offer with members. These 30-minute meetings are as follows on Thursday 14 September. All members are entitled to attend one meeting on paid time:
- 9am – online via Teams (contact us for details) – for those members unable to attend, either of the following;
- 11am – Caloundra Depot Wises Rd (Large Meeting Room);
- 1pm – Maroochydore City Hall (Kondalilla Rm L5)
These meetings will be your opportunity to ask questions about the offer before we put the proposal to a ballot of members, which will in turn decide whether we give in-principle agreement for the Council to put the Agreement to a staff ballot. If you work with someone who is not yet a member and will benefit from what we’ve achieved, joining is easy online.