Fired Up, Some Agreements More Objectionable Than Others

22nd August 2016

On the steps of the Victorian Parliament this year, our Australian Prime Minister promised Victorian volunteer fire fighters that he would save them from the evil clutches of the United Fire Fighters Union if re-elected. When Parliament resumes next week he gets his chance.

Proposed amendments to the Fair Work Act will if passed, outlaw ‘objectionable emergency management terms.’ So, what’s objectionable about the proposed CFA enterprise agreement?

The first point to note about the Country Fire Authority / United Fire Fighters of Australia Operational Staff Enterprise Agreement 2016 is it reads like an operational manual rather than an agreement of terms and conditions of employment.

Three hundred and ninety seven pages covering everything from the role of volunteers, classifications, career paths and opportunities, limitations on the use of contractors, senior operational personnel rank alignment, community support facilitators, community education, industry brigades, appointment and role of a dispute resolution officer, technological change, productivity, natural justice and procedural fairness and good faith, emergency management changes, climate change, multi-agency drills, work organisation, employee representation, CFA policies, and systems conditions, minimum staffing levels, rostering, training and professional development, water for training, and on and on and on.

Almost every section includes detailed arrangements for consultation with the union. There is even a procedure for consultation about consultation disputes. No employee may lose employment due to redundancy. On the contrary, staffing ratio’s must increase during the life of the agreement.

Any manager that willingly signs up to this proposal is a fool. You would be better off handing UFU Victorian Branch Secretary Peter Marshall the keys to office as you walk away from any responsibility for managing country fire operations. If the union were the most benign and cooperative mob in Australia, CFA management would still be unable to decide the composition, nature, skills, and number of the fire fighter workforce without reference to the terms of the agreement and approval of the union.

The Fair Work Amendment - Respect for Emergency Services Volunteers Bill 2016 will, if passed, invalidate terms in enterprise agreements that “… undermine the capacity of firefighting or state emergency service bodies to properly manage their volunteer operations or restrict these bodies from respecting, valuing or promoting their volunteers.” It will also strike out terms that are “inconsistent with state or territory laws that regulate such bodies.” Volunteer fire fighters will have a right to be heard in proceedings to approve agreements at the Fair Work Commission. If the Parliament adopts these amendments at least 300 pages of the proposed agreement would be invalid.

The Bill expands the definition of ‘objectionable’ terms to which parties are prohibited from including in enterprise agreements. The other objectionable terms are provisions that address the general protections already covered by the Fair Work Act and the payment of bargaining service fees by unions. The Bill is quite well drafted to address the specific problem of this agreement. However, the extraordinary intrusions into management prerogatives canvassed in the agreement can just as easily be replicated in other enterprise agreements.

The reason is the less publicised expansion of topics permitted in enterprise agreements to include matters pertaining to the relationship between unions and employers. This section of the Fair Work Act received little attention when introduced in 2009 but has steadily allowed unions to negotiate arrangements (with Fair Work Commission approval) that restrict competition, increase control of decisions over workforces and facilitate payments to and from employers that entrench union membership and influence. The Royal Commission into Trade Union Corruption and Governance uncovered several high profile arrangements of this sort. It is particularly prevalent in the public sector and industries where there are a few large and dominant employers, such as transport, retail and large scale manufacturing.

The proposed agreement with the Victorian CFA is so thoroughly objectionable one can only hope that common sense will prevail. If it doesn’t pass then I don’t hold much hope for any other reform this side of 2020.