Media Statement: Australian Services Union secures first ‘four-day’ full-time working week for Oxfam employees

23 March 2023 The Australian Services Union has secured an agreement with Oxfam Australia to introduce a four-day, 30-hour working week at full-time pay – the first such arrangement affecting full-time employees in Australia to be formalised within an Enterprise Bargaining Agreement. Oxfam, which has 97 full-time and 37 part-time employees in Australia, of which…

Exclusive ASU Budget Analysis – Epic Fail

The federal pre-election sales pitch budget has failed to provide any plan to increase real wages or deliver secure jobs. Scott Morrison and the Coalition Government has used $4 billion in unspent NDIS money to prop-up a budget surplus and at the same time have given tax cuts to people who earn over $200,000 a…

Blaming workers belittles the “fair-go”

This year has started on a worrying note with Government Ministers blaming workers for receiving a decent, fair, living wage Industrial Relations Minister Eric Abetz recently said: “We risk seeing something akin to the ‘wages explosions’ of the pre-Accord era, when unsustainable wage growth simply pushed thousands of Australians out of work”. This belittles the very…

Service skills trickle overseas, along with our privacy

ASKED ”What will you be when you grow up?” Australian children would be expected to reply with any of a number of occupations: builder, doctor, pilot, teacher. It would be unusual, but far more realistic, for a child to call out customer service officer, business development consultant. The services sector employs more Australians than any…