SymbioticA Update
The management decision around the award-winning, internationally renowned research centre SymbioticA was announced on Thursday last week.
Despite over 13,000 signatures on petitions, hundreds of letters, and dozens of well-thought-out alternative proposals, the Head of Human Sciences, in conjunction with the SDVC and the Change Management Committee, have decided that SymbioticA will permanently close on 30 June, 2024, after an eighteen month “transition period.” This transition period will allow the remaining postgraduate students attached to the centre to finish their studies, mitigating to a degree the original claim by the Head of School that there were no students attached to SymbioticA, and allowing the Vice-Chancellor, who airily promised last year that no student anywhere would be affected by the restructures and redundancies, in what appears to be a face-saving exercise. This decision is disappointing given SymbioticA’s international profile, a profile that was reinforced by the responses from around the world to news of its closure.
Both the Head of School and the SDVC could provide little certainty in the face of questions in the all-school “town hall” about whether SymbioticA could continue if sufficient funding was to be obtained over the 18-month transition period. It goes without saying that the substandard way in which this change proposal was put together, with what appears to be a lack of genuine consideration of the alternate proposals and arguments put forward by SymbioticA staff, other members of the Human Sciences School, and staff at other universities, is deeply disappointing. It is also concerning to see (once again), important frontline research and teaching staff being put under tremendous and damaging pressure during these processes. I’d like to thank our UWA Casual Rep/resident Branch Historian, Dr. Andrew Broertjes for providing support to several individuals directly impacted by this change, attending the announcement meetings on behalf of the UWA NTEU Branch, and putting words to the outrage we all truly feel at this decision.
Enterprise Bargaining Across the Nation - some very good wins!
It has been a big week in bargaining for the NTEU. Our Comrades at Griffith University were able to defeat a non-union ballot on Tuesday, with 62% of Academic Staff voting against a management-proposed agreement. This was a major win for the academics, who would have been significantly worse off. Unfortunately, the University-proposed Professional Staff Agreement won majority support and will be implemented. Griffith do not yet have the strong professional staff membership we do, as they were represented by other unions until the beginning of this round of bargaining. Encouragingly, Staff and members at the University of Newcastle came out in force and voted overwhelmingly today to reject their management’s attempt to get a non-union agreement across the line. These results represent a big win for the union-led bargaining efforts across the sector, particularly after a string of agreements that did not meet members' standards were voted in earlier in the year. Many of these losses were supported by unions representing professional staff in those states but opposed by our members. In WA, the NTEU are the sole union bargaining for you, and will always fight for the best deal for ALL University staff.
2022 – The Highlights Reel
The NTEU UWA team wraps up 2022
To bring this final update for the 2022 to a close, we’d thought we’d share a montage of UWA NTEU members, representatives, and our excellent WA Staff fighting and standing up for your rights at work. Also hanging out with the Workload Creep, Weekend at Bernie's-style. I’d like to include a tally of the number of times one of us have walked into the Branch office meeting room and mistaken it for Andrew, but I lost count somewhere in the triple digits.
Enjoy your holidays, make sure to disconnect, and do something for
you.