The Government has been negotiating in good faith with unions for many months to provide public servants with a fair and affordable pay rise.
Despite over 113 formal meetings with unions on the wage agreements and the Government revising our wages policy upwards, many unions have not budged at all on demands for pay rises of 9 per cent over three years.
With the AEU recently back flipping on a deal struck with the Government and endorsed by 70 per cent of their members, it is becoming increasingly obvious that unions are not negotiating in good faith and are preventing public servants from receiving pay rises which in many cases could have been flowing to workers from December last year.
The Government is not prepared to accept the pay rise we are offering being blocked by union bosses as a negotiation tactic. Today, we will write to unions asking them to agree to allow a pay rise of 2.1 per cent for the next 12 months to flow to public servants. If the offer is accepted by June 30, the 2.1 per cent pay rise will be back paid to the expiry of previous agreements.
This 2.1 per cent increase is consistent with CPI and it is a larger pay increase than has previously been proposed – and in the case of the AEU, agreed to – for the next year.
The Government’s strong budget position, together with the fact that agreement hasn’t been reached on improvements to employee conditions, means the new offer can be catered for within the broader budget and no savings are required to offset it.
The acceptance of this offer will ensure that our employees can receive the salary increase they deserve, whilst negotiation teams continue to negotiate on other matters including future year salary increases, and improved employment conditions.
This is a simple proposition and one which unions should quickly take to their member for endorsement so that public servants don’t miss out on a pay rise while negotiations continue.