Employment costs and conditions are the industrial elephant in the Accord room, according to the peak IR organisation for most universities

The Australian Higher Education Industrial Association’s submission to the O’Kane accord panel warns, that HE change is, “inextricably linked to the need for reform to the industrial settings that apply across the sector.

“ The current model is not sustainable and further reforms of the sector, without addressing the industrial settings are unlikely to yield any proposed benefit, “AHEIA advises.

The association points to it’s essential issues including;

* employment conditions for continuing-staff

* risk to research from changes to fixed-term employment terms

* deciding what workforce level of casual staff is “appropriate” and how funding and workload allocation models, “might support a modest reduction in casual staff.”

And it calls on the Accord panel to establish, an IR “element,” including employers, the National Tertiary Education Union and unions representing professional staff, plus government representatives from education and employment portfolios.

To help establish a context for any such element, AHEIA argues, a guaranteed five year Commonwealth grant to universities, “would play some role in creating the financial security that would assist universities in making decisions about longer term employment.”

So what you ask, does the NTEU think about the Accord? It has surveyed members (CMM April 3) and advice on its submission is said to be imminent