After over a year of tough negotiations that ended up in protected action, ETU members at Serco won a much-improved three-year agreement. ETU WA organiser Andy Giddens shares the story…
The Union entered EBA negotiations with Serco in 2020 fighting the threat of change. Serco wanted to make its employees work weekends, hire more casuals and remove annualised shift workers. The ETU was not going to accept these unfair changes, so we rallied the workers and started our campaign.
From the beginning Serco said no to almost all the Union’s claims, so we decided to take protected action, starting with a 24-hour stoppage and rolling two-hour stoppages in the morning and evening.
We worked together with other unions including the CFMMEU, CFMEU and PPTEU to achieve good outcomes for all members at this facility. By unionising and holding the line, we were able to stop those negative changes and get what we wanted.
ETU Delegate Gary was thrilled with the outcome.
“The workers collectively joined their unions and knocked off all of Serco’s claims and achieved great outcomes for all. Being in a union means 100% in, 100% win! Proud to be Union!” he said.
Listed below are some of the wins Serco members achieved:
- wage Increases between 1.25% and 1.75% each year (backpaid eight months for the first increase)
- moving current employees from level 2 up to level 3, increasing their wage by 7.2% in addition to the yearly increase
- maintaining working hours during the week, (not weekends)
- introduction of an on-call allowance and extra annual leave for employees frequently placed on-call
- introduction of a shift lead position with extra allowance
- new allowance for safety boots and glasses up to $350 total.
