MEMBERS of the National Tertiary Education Union's Newcastle branch will participate in a 24-hour strike on Wednesday, September 21 and they say it could be the start of further action.
Branch president Dan Conway said members resolved last week to notify the university about the strike, which follows a year of negotiations over a new enterprise agreement.
"We know that withdrawing labour accelerates bargaining," Mr Conway said.
"We will take as long as we need to to achieve the outcome that satisfies our members, but none of us want to still be doing this at Christmas."
Members also authorised a further 24-hour strike at a date to be determined if outstanding issues are not resolved by Friday, September 23.
As previously reported, UON management have offered staff a three per cent per annum wage increase over the agreement's slated two years, to December 2024.
The NTEU said this equated to two per cent per annum from September 2021, when the previous agreement expired.
"Our members gave a very clear, unopposed message that addressing our demands around workloads, secure jobs and pay are critical to reaching agreement," Mr Conway said.
"What we are seeking aren't crazy leftist demands as they are sometimes portrayed.
"They are reasonable things that signal that the university cares about staff wellbeing, their job security and their standard of living.
"In fact, to not accept our demands would, objectively, appear unreasonable.
"We have accommodated many of management's requirements in the interests of achieving agreement - it's high time for them to tick some more of ours off the list."
UON Deputy Vice-Chancellor Global, Professor Kent Anderson, said on Friday evening the university had not yet received any official notice about the industrial action.
"In the event that NTEU members engage in protected industrial action, our priority will be to continue to support our students so that any industrial action taken by the NTEU does not negatively impact their university experience," Professor Anderson said.
"We will of course do our best to inform students and colleagues with early notice of any proposed NTEU action to minimise the impact on their education and work."
Professor Anderson said UON's aim in the current round of enterprise bargaining was to develop a new employment framework "that supports our staff where it matters most while balancing our long-term financial sustainability".
"We believe our offer to the NTEU, CPSU and staff representatives strengthens benefits and conditions that work for our staff, while securing the future of our university for the long-term," he said.
"Importantly, this offer is still open to further discussions with the bargaining group, who we continue to meet with regularly."
Mr Conway said there had been significant sector leading progress in some areas - such as management agreeing that casual staff should receive the same 17 per cent superannuation as permanent staff - but no movement in other important areas.
"The most significant areas of concern to our members that remain outstanding are, broadly, protecting safe workloads, creating secure jobs and protecting those in secure jobs, and of course ensuring that pay in real terms doesn't go backwards," he said.
"Given that management have come to accept that paying casual staff lesser superannuation entitlements than other staff was unjustifiable, we remain very hopeful that management will come to accept that the same is true of failing to provide adequate protections against overwork, wage theft, job security and a fair and reasonable pay rise that doesn't leave staff worse off while the university continues to squirrel away tens or hundreds of millions [of dollars] each year."
Mr Conway said members and staff were angry and exhausted.
"Exhausted from overwork," he said.
"Exhausted by micromanagers.
"Exhausted from feeling like if they take one step out of line that they will be the next to lose their job."
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