GOVERNMENT TO PUNISH MSAV/VPA MEMBERS FOR BEING EFFICIENT

INDUSTRIAL ACTION BALLOT TO OPEN ON 17 DECEMBER 2007

Despite months of effort, our negotiations with DHS and VHIA have come to nothing. The Government is demanding that we pay for our own wage increase by becoming more productive. However it acknowledges that because we are already operating at peak capacity there are no further productivity savings to give. It then says that on this basis we should be denied the same level of wage increases given to nurses. (The Mad Hatter’s Tea Party revisited.) This would mean that scientists, and our other classifications, who provide the benchmark for professional rates in Victoria, would lose professional status, and fall behind nurses in pay, all because we are too productive!

The AIRC has issued an order calling for a ballot of MSAV/VPA members to decide whether we commence a campaign of protected industrial action. This is a requirement of the Workchoices legislation. This ballot will be conducted by the Australian Electoral Commission of members employed at 8 major health services as follows: 

• Melbourne Health
• St. Vincent’s Health
• Austin Health
• Southern Health
• Bayside Health
• Bendigo Health
• Eastern Health
• Goulburn Valley Health

The ballot will be by postal vote, with ballot papers to be delivered to home addresses. Only members will be eligible to vote. The ballot will open on Monday 17 December 2007 and close on 7 January 2008. The question to be balloted is:

“In support of reaching a union collective agreement with your employer, do you support the taking of protected industrial action against your employer which may involve one or more of the following:”

There follows a list of bans and stoppages which have been endorsed by the HSU 4 BCOM. It is not envisaged that all actions would apply at all sites. In order to succeed, more than 50% of those balloted must return a positive vote.

In addition to the ballot, before any industrial action is taken, meetings of members will be convened to decide which, if any, actions will be taken.

It is therefore vital that all members vote “Yes” and post their votes back to the AEC immediately.

Should the ballot fail, either because members vote “no” or because insufficient ballot papers are returned, we will become the poor cousins of the health industry with disastrous consequences for our professions. Industrial action is the only language that this government understands.