Fair Work Australia has today released its decision on Equal Pay for the Community Sector. This decision has been a long time coming and recognises this disparity in wages between community sector workers and their government counterparts. The decision will impact on over 250,000 workers across the nation. The decision paper can be read here

PRIME MINISTER
MINISTER FOR WORKPLACE RELATIONS
GILLARD GOVERNMENT TO DELIVER HISTORIC PAY RISE FOR SOCIAL AND COMMUNITY WORKERS

Prime Minister Julia Gillard today announced the Government was prepared to provide over $2 billion to deliver an historic pay rise to 150,000 of Australia's lowest paid workers in the social and community services sector - the vast majority of them women.

This is an important step on the road to closing the long-standing pay gap between men and women and delivering fairness to the workplace.

Workers in this sector have been underpaid for too long because their work was viewed as women's work. They work in incredibly challenging jobs, including:
" Working with people with disabilities
" Counselling families in crisis
" Running homeless shelters
" Working with victims of domestic violence or sexual assault.

They deserve to be properly rewarded for their work.

The Government will put a joint submission on equal pay with the Australian Services Union to the independent umpire, Fair Work Australia. To back up its commitment the Government is prepared to provide over $2 billion to fund its share of any wage increases awarded.

Statement from the Australian Services Union, QLD Branch

The ASU has filed an application for an Equal Remuneration Order in Fair Work Australia. The application was lodged on 11th March 2010. This historic case will determine wage rates for the modern Social, Community, Home Care and Disability Services Industry Award 2010 which came into effect on 1st January 2010.

On the 9th of July the Australia Services Union released an update on the Pay Equity Decision and the funding announced in the State Government's June budget. The update answers these questions: "What are the pay increases? Who does the increase apply to? Where is the funding for the increase? Who gets the funding? What are the Union's plans? What should you do?"

To read it, visit http://is.gd/1zcGJ.

Where is the Campaign up to?

We started our campaign last year for a Youth Services Multi-Employer Agreement (MEA) to secure current and above Award conditions and to campaign to improve wages and conditions into the future by collectively working together.

Since the start of our MEA campaign our Union has made an application for a new State Award combining the Federal SACS and CASH Awards with improved pay scales (see PDF version of this joint statement for details). This application is currently progressing through the Queensland Industrial Relations Commission. The Department of Employment & Industrial Relations as well as QCOSS and some employer groups are supportive of a new State Award for the Industry.

The Union believes a new State Award would establish minimum wages and conditions for workers within ‘non-constitutional corporations'. To improve upon these wages and conditions Enterprise Bargaining remains the best mechanism.  As such the Youth Services MEA should utilize the State Award as its platform from which to Bargain collectively.

In 2007 the Queensland Industrial Relations Commission Pay Equity Inquiry found a glaring disparity between the rates paid in the public sector to those paid in the community sector for the same level of work. The table below clearly shows this inequity.

Source: QCOSS 

Information and training sessions commencing in two weeks! Register now to secure a place.

The Community Sector Wages campaign information and training sessions commence on 28 April and will take place at different locations throughout the state. These are an important part of giving individuals and organisations the tools to conduct their locally based advocacy. Lobbying of your local Member of Parliament is essential to the success of the campaign. We need to make them aware of how important the service you provide is and the critical issues you face in attracting and retaining staff.

A draft copy of the Log of Claims for the Youth Services Multi-Employer Agreement has now been released by the Australian Services Union.  The Log of Claims are the improvements to current pay and working conditions that employees of youth services are seeking.

To help services work out the cost-implications, YANQ has developed a costing tool, which you can also download below.

The campaign to improve the pay and conditions of youth workers is all about improving the quality of services that young people receive.  When a worker leaves an organisation to seek better pay, the young users of that service miss out.  They miss out because the the relationship - the most important aspect of all human services work - with their worker has been broken.

If you are a youth worker, and better pay and conditions will make it more likely you'll stay in the sector then tell us why.   Your stories will help YANQ and the Union to advocate for the improvements to the funding bodies.

Quality Youth Services for Young People

A Joint Statement from the Australian Services Union & the Youth Affairs Network of Queensland 

Download this Statement as a PDF to
printout and pin on your Staff Noticeboard

The Australian Services Union and the Youth Affairs Network of Queensland are pleased to announce the next phase in our campaign to improve youth services and address the chronic recruitment and retention problems that they are facing.

From David Smith, Branch Secretary
Australian Services Union, Queensland Services Branch

Dear Colleagues,

As you are well aware, non-government social and community services in Queensland are facing a significant challenge which poses a clear threat, not only to their viability but to the quality of services they deliver to vulnerable Queenslanders. The challenge that I am referring to is that of retaining and recruiting staff. I am writing to seek your support in our campaign to bring about fair pay and working conditions for staff in these services.

Source: Australian Services Union, 18 February 2008 

A survey by the ASU of over 2100 workers has revealed that there is a crisis in attracting and retaining staff in the social and community services industry. Unless this crisis is addressed, the new focus on the goal of greater social inclusion by Australian governments will not be achieved.

In June this year YANQ and the Australian Services Union (ASU) announced that we were embarking on a joint campaign to lift the pay and conditions of youth workers.  Below is a brief update on how the campaign is progressing.

These are the reasons that YANQ has joined with the Australian Services Union (ASU) in a campaign to provide fair pay and working conditions to youth workers in Queensland¹. In our last two joint statements with the ASU, YANQ has argued strongly that the first step youth workers need to take in this campaign is to JOIN the UNION. Here are the reasons why we are asking youth workers to take this step...

• a very high proportion of small workplaces;
• a predominantly female workforce (87%);
• a high proportion of part time (56%) and casual (20%) employment;
• a lack of ability for widespread collective bargaining to occur;
• that workers in the community services sector are more likely to have a post school qualification than other workers but have lower weekly income;
• and low wages.

As part of the Campaign for fair pay and working conditions for youth workers, Siyavash Doostkhah (YANQ Director) and Stuart Maggs (ASU Organiser) were interviewed on August 31 by The Wire (Independent Current Affairs on Community Radio).

You can find an MP3 of their interview at http://www.thewire.org.au/audio/HAyouthagreement.mp3.

2nd Joint statement by the Australian Services Union &
the Youth Affairs Network of Queensland

Campaign for a Youth Services
Multi Employer Agreement

Quality Youth Services for Young People

Download this Statement as a PDF to print out and pin on your Staff Noticeboard(111.05 Kb)

Support and momentum for the Youth Services Multi-Employer Agreement (MEA) continues to grow as the ASU and YANQ present and discuss the aims of the agreement at Youth Services Interagency and staff meetings around Southeast Queensland.  Feedback from these meetings has been very positive. Many attendees have acknowledged their first hand experience of the issues facing the sector that this Multi Employer Agreement addresses. This includes poor pay and conditions which adversely effects attraction and retention of staff and the impact this has on the continuity and quality of client service delivery.

As part of the campaign for a youth services multi-employer agreement The Australian Services Union and YANQ will be visiting youth interagencies in South-East Queensland.

Come along to your next interagency meeting to hear about how together we can improve services for young people by lifting the working conditions of youth workers.

The following interagency visits have been confirmed:

A joint statement by the Australian Services Union and the Youth Affairs Network of Queensland

 Download this Joint Statement as a PDF(133.47 Kb)

Young people need and deserve high quality community based youth services staffed by professional youth workers. Unfortunately one of the most pressing challenges facing youth services in Queensland is retaining and attracting good staff.