An offer we can't refuse
It's hard to resist the image, or the quote, but there could be nothing less sinister about the offer from the Local Government and Shires Associations for a new Local Government (State) Award to operate from 1 November 2010. And while we still have some conciliation listed in the Commission on Wednesday this week (about how the salary system clause should facilitate, or not, performance bonuses) clearly the LGSA was happy to make an offer and the USU has already advised their members that they support the offer and will be recommending it to meetings of members across the State.
There is still a possibility that there can be a provision agreed tomorrow that would be a "facilitative" provision in the salary system award that would make it clear that nothing prevents councils establishing performance bonus payment arrangements for employees who have top-out on the salary system.
We were planning to wait and send something out on Thursday but now the industry has been saturated with the USUupdate, we need to respond as well.
The offer follows months of negotiation and conciliation in the Industrial Relations Commission before Deputy President Grayson and provides significant benefits in the areas where professional employees like our members are most affected.
Every time the Award is negotiated we try to hose down members’ expectations. It doesn't make any sense to be claiming things like 10% pay increases each year when we all know that since the State Award was made in 1991, increases have hovered around the 3% mark and have all been by agreement. And because the Award has been varied by agreement for decades, it’s hard to find areas for dramatic improvement.
This is not a generously paid industry and there are many councils which, if they were corporations operating under the Corporations Act, would effectively be trading insolvent. People like you, doing what you do in local government, rely very much on what Paul Keating used to describe as psychic income - the non-financial reward for doing good works for the community.
It was less than a fortnight ago in the September issue of depaNews that we advised that the Award would include a provision making it clear that the costs associated with accreditation by the BPB would be met by councils and that the IRC had recommended that the LGSA agree to our claim that there be a Leave Reserved provision in the Award to allow us, during the life of the Award, to raise issues about how to deal with accreditation of Council employees.
Both the Local Government Association and Shires Association Executives last week endorsed a package of proposals and now a formal offer has been made to the unions – with a proviso that anything else is possible subject to the approval of their Joint Executives later in the month.
In the past, sometimes we have sent the offer out to members and asked that they convene meetings at each council to consider a recommendation that the offer be accepted - and often when we do this, members complain that they would have been happy to have the Committee decide. On other occasions the offer has been accepted by the Committee of Management in principle and that news conveyed to members with a period in which anyone unhappy about that course of action can make that clear and we can try to convince them of the good sense of the decision.
On this occasion the Committee of Management has again resolved to accept the offer in principle, based on my recommendation as the person who has negotiated every Award since 1984 (gee, doesn't time fly when you're having fun) and now we tell you why.
Accepting it in principle still means that anyone can have a say and we invite your responses to ian@depa.net.au.
Ten good reasons to accept the offer
1 The pay increases are okay – and could have been worse
Normally, the Award applies to 3 years with three pay increases apply from 1 November each year.
While the 2010 Award will operate for three years, because the 2011, 2012 and 2013 pay increases have been brought forward to apply from 1 July, instead of 1 November, the Award will really operate longer than that. The offer is:
2.6% from 1 November 2010
2.15% from 1 July 2011
3.25% from 1 July 2012, and
3.25% from 1 July 2013.
The July dates are a response to financial professionals (sic) in the industry finding it hard to budget if the Award increases don't coincide with financial years. Poor loves. But it does mean that there will be four pay increases during the life of this Award and, importantly, 4.75% by the middle of next year.
To allow this to happen, the parties to the Award have agreed not to press for any further pay increase until July 2014 - effectively making the Award one of 44 months rather than 36 months.
2.6% and 2.15% are figures which result from calculating what 3.25% per and use as a monthly figure and accommodating to increases in seven months. It is the equivalent of 3.25% for 12 months.
2 The Parental Leave provisions are fabulous
One of the challenges of negotiating the Award was that the Federal Government is introducing a paid parental leave scheme to operate from 1 January next year which would provide 18 weeks pay at the Federal minimum wage (around $880 per week) for mothers. The offer is that the Award will top up over that minimum rate (currently none of our members would be on a rate that low anyway) and will also pay superannuation over that 18 week period. This is a great deal.
In addition, the 18 weeks parental leave at the employee’s normal rate of pay and superannuation will also be available to men if they are the primary carer. This is a provision beyond that in the Federal legislation and means that local government leads the way on accepting the opportunity for either gender to be the primary carer. Clearly everyone's been watching Modern Family.
There are also improved provisions for supporting parents and better arrangements for adoption leave.
These significant changes in themselves are almost enough to make us want to accept the offer without even looking at anything else.
3 BPB accreditation costs are guaranteed to be paid by the council
We dealt with this at some length in the September depaNews and, while we never thought there was any doubt that this would be the case, many did. There is now no doubt.
Councils will pay all reasonable expenses associated with accreditation. "Reasonable" expenses means if you have an overnight to training, you can't claim the second bottle of red with dinner.
4 Leave Reserved on accreditation issues is a great protection
We don't know what will happen over the next three years, how the BPB will conduct investigations, consider the role of council employees who are accredited, interview them, penalise them etc, nor do we know how the BPB will accommodate the role of a Council in any investigation or complaint process. Obviously councils can't be ignored and we are expecting to make a joint approach to the BPB with the LGSA to have the BPB Act amended to acknowledge and facilitate this.
Clearly a lot can happen over the next three years (and we dealt with this in the September depaNews as well) and despite the opposition of the LGSA to a leave reserved provision, the IRC has recommended that they agree to our claim and the Local Government and Shires Executives have accepted this recommendation. This is a great provision.
5 It will be harder to put people on term contracts
depa has led the charge against the introduction of term contracts since they were floated by the precious and self-important in the old Institute of Municipal Management in the 1980s as a way of distinguishing senior managers from the hoi polloi. Pressed initially as a cosmetic device to make general managers feel more important, the proliferation of term contracts in the industry has prejudiced good decision-making, increased risks of corruption and remove the normal protections available to employees are unfair termination.
We opposed their introduction in the 1993 Local Government Act, were responsible for the 1995 Amendment Act that significantly reduced the number of employees who could be described as Senior Staff and therefore had to be employed on these contracts, and were able to have the State Award effectively reduce the damage of term contract by requiring that any term contracts for Award employees provide an obligation that the employee be offered another contract if their performance has been satisfactory during the life of the current contract.
There are a lot of common law precedents about where it is, or is not, appropriate to have term contracts and a very explicit clause will now ensure that no employee in an on-going or permanent position will ever be placed on the term contract.
We have always hated term contracts because cowards in management and those less diligent about proper performance management can simply let the contract of an employee who has been working well, but they don't like a variety of unacceptable reasons, expire.
This denies the employee natural justice and the new clause is a great step.
6 It will be harder to take cars away from people with leaseback agreements
In the last 15 years or so there have only been two councils which have given notice to leaseback holders that they were going to terminate all the car leases - Bega Valley in 2005 and Byron last year. We had a dispute with Byron Council and, while all employees did continue their entitlement to a leaseback vehicle, the Council wanted to argue about whether people have it as a condition of their employment or not.
A new clause will ensure that anyone who does have a leaseback car as a condition of employment continues to have that right until they agree with the Council to lose the car. The Clause acknowledges that cars can be provided as a condition of employment as an incentive to accept the new employment or to remain in employment, for example, were simply because an employee has had a car for a long, long time.
While this removes the 12 month notice period (it replaces it with a six month notice period for people who don't have a car as a condition of employment) current employees are protected with a provision that says that anyone with a leaseback car at the time the award is made will have the minimum 12 month notice supply. This is called a win - win provision.
Anyone who can establish that they took a job with a car as part of the inducement, or they remain in the job with the car as part of the conditions, will have those cars forever.
This is a fabulous provision that will remove the risk of losing cars and keep us out of many disputes in the future. It also means that when you change jobs, you ensure that when the council is making an offer to secure your employment, that they incorporate in your letter of offer that the car is a condition of your employment. Make sure you pay attention to this.
The clause penalises those councils which want to increase leaseback fees by ludicrous figures by limiting them to a maximum increase of 10% per annum or the CPI Private Motoring component, whichever is the greater.
The Award also inserts leaseback cars into the scope of the Consultative Committee.
7 Improved flexibility for work and family responsibilities
There will be a facilitative clause which will remind councils that they can introduce arrangements under their flexible work and leave provisions to purchase additional annual leave. This was also one of our claims (based on provisions that operate in NSW Health) and we will be encouraging councils to be creative about arrangements like these where you can sacrifice 25% of salary for four years and then be off on full pay for the fifth!
8 Phased retirement is encouraged
The clause will recognise the ageing workforce and encourage councils to retain skills and experience of the industry to provide flexible work and leave to transition into retirement.
This will be an important provision in conjunction with the current campaign by Local Government Super (this requires Treasury's approval) to allow LGS to provide transition to retirement arrangements consistent with Federal legislation. Anyone approaching or around the age of 58 will understand this.
9 Allowances up, including the car allowance – and more regular increases ahead
We know that there are a handful of employees who still get the car allowance instead of a leaseback car (usually their choice) and the car allowances will go up and be linked to movement in the Federal Local Government Industry Award - thereby providing more regular annual increases.
10 Less significant, but still important, other benefits
Provisions will require employers to accommodate breastfeeding mothers, there will be better guidelines on carers’ leave, there are protective and clarifying provisions about the employer's right to change starting and finishing times and more generous provisions for bereavement leave - four days instead of two.
Any reasons why the offer should be rejected?
None at all.
For reasons of equity the unions have been asked to agree that the notice period to resign should be the same notice period that applies for the Council to terminate employment which will mean up to 5 weeks notice if you've been there more than five years. During negotiations we observed that while this may be seen by the employers as an advantage to the Council where you want to resign, it won't necessarily be welcomed by the council where you are going for your next job.
In any event, the Council and the employee can reach agreement on a lesser period of notice. It's hard to imagine employees being too productive in those final weeks after they've decided to leave a place.
So, how do we wrap all this up?
The USU is recommending the offer for acceptance by their members and the LGEA will also be either accepting the offer or recommending its acceptance to their members as well.
The new Award is scheduled to be made on 28 October so that it can apply and operate from the first pay period after 1 November.
If something goes wrong, if the USU doesn't accept it for example, then there will be no guaranteed pay increases and, if we end up having to arbitrate and you will Award, nothing is guaranteed to be retained and everything potentially is up for grabs. This is something we could all do without.
Ian Robertson
Secretary
