HACSU and Hobart City Mission’s team of about 10 employer managers and representatives met today to continue bargaining for your new agreement. At the last bargaining meeting Hobart City Mission told us they were looking at integrating retail employees into the agreement.
As you might remember from our last update, we told them the main issues you need to see real movement on are:
• Wage increases
• A fairer rostering/bidding system
• An increase to sleepover payments
• Rostered sleepover payments to be paid on annual leave
• An increase to your personal/carers leave, and more
Their bargaining representative answered some of these issues, and to say we were disappointed is an understatement!
After our first meeting it appeared your CEO Harvey Lennon was on board with positioning the Hobart City Mission as an employer of choice – but unfortunately the bean counters have come on board (hence the massive team of managers present) and it’s fair to say that dream is in serious jeopardy unless they turn things around from now on.
They told us they could not provide a wage offer until the costs have been assessed.
The issues around a fairer rostering/bidding system, we were told, had been updated earlier last year, but it is still based on a “first in best dressed “system. We raised this as a major concern as we know workers were still having issues in November with this system, but we were told everything is rosy and there are no problems at all – but hey, what would workers know – you only work there!
The buddy shift allowance has not been agreed to, with their representative telling us that you don’t have to do any extra work when buddying in new employees and that you only have go about your usual work as they ‘shadow’ you. They also said there is no extra workload on you due to team leaders providing buddy shifts.
These sorts of issues are why it would be great to have members in the room with us – so you can express outrage that your hard work is being devalued by people that haven’t been out of an office to know what real disability support looks like.
A big issue is also looming in regard to first aid allowance with Hobart City Mission indicating that they don’t plan to require support workers to perform first aid in their workplace under the new Agreement – which is a massive work health and safety issue and puts you in a really difficult situation in an emergency. We call on upon the Hobart City Mission to not skimp on safety and pay you an allowance if they require you to be able to perform first aid.
The increase to sleepover rates that we asked for (and that rate being paid while you are on annual leave) was also not agreed to.
Hobart City Mission does not agree to increase your personal leave days from 10 days to 20 days, and instead offered 2 wellbeing days to be used without evidence.
The more members we have, the stronger we are, and the better the outcomes. If you know a colleague who has not yet joined HACSU, let them know that becoming a member is now as simple as a few clicks: www.join.hacsu.org.au