NSW Catholic Schools take industrial action
Teachers and support staff throughout NSW Catholic schools are facing a massive assault on their wages and working conditions in the proposed agreement being put forward by the Catholic Commission for Employment Relations (CCER).
The CCER has thrown out all notions of fairness for current and future staff. Independent Education Union general secretary John Quessy says that the draft agreement “threatens to increase hours of face-to-face teaching, scrap restrictions on class sizes, abolish all promotion positions, take away the right to a half-hour meal break and reduce sick leave”.
Support staff are threatened with pay cuts of between $6,156 and $17,417 per annum. Basic working conditions are also under attack. Among other things, the Catholic employers are proposing to remove a public holiday for employees who work 48 weeks a year, further reduce the minimum periods of payment for part-time employees, introduce junior rates of pay, and reduce overtime entitlements.
The Association of Independent Schools also is proposing significant cuts to wages and conditions. The agreement would apply to 200 schools in NSW and the ACT. For teachers it would mean a 5 percent reduction in the ongoing base salary over the three-year agreement (assuming inflation of at least at 2.5% per annum). Support staff are facing similar wage cuts.
In response the Independent Education Union has launched the 3Rs: Recognise, Respect and Reward Campaign.
Some 6,500 Catholic school teachers and support staff, 200 schools and thousands of students took part in three-hour stop work meetings in Sydney and Parramatta on 22 and 23 July. Stop-work meetings were also held in regional centres.
