Federal police and aviation firefighters have teamed up to take direct aim at hardline government wage tactics that they claim are an “abuse by public service bosses of a rigid bureaucratic employment policy designed for large departments”, upping pressure on the Australian Public Service Commission.
The Australian Federal Police Association (AFPA) and the United Firefighters Union Aviation Branch (UFUA) on Tuesday took the high-pressure hose to the current pay deal, officially branding it as “designed for desk work” and “a public sector bargaining policy designed for admin work without any input from first responders.”
The move has largely removed any timely opportunity for public service minister Katy Gallagher and the CPSU to do a victory lap on the wider pay deal struck with public servants. The federal first responders have doubled down on the inequity of the deal, and their ability to negotiate separate deals for their workers.
Last week airport firies secured a ballot to authorise protected industrial action that threatened to cause major disruption over Easter, with the union giving assurances a day after the authorisation that it would spare the public and politicians Easter chaos.
The AFPA also currently has an authorisation to take industrial action but has said it will not do anything to jeopardise safety or security.
The fracture point is that while many administrative employees accepted the 11.2% APS pay rise over three years, the agreement came after a trade-off over a new workplace condition in a right to work from home, which is largely unavailable to cops, firies and most frontline staff — as well as tradies.
Now airport firies are aiming the high-pressure hose at Airservices Australia in an attempt to get the APSC and the government to rethink the one-size-fits-all policy.
“First responders like firefighters and police tackle the most important and dangerous work in our society,” United Firefighters Union aviation secretary Wes Garrett and Australian Federal Police Association president Alex Caruana said in the joint statement.
“Our workplaces are the sites of catastrophic incidents and devastating events. In training and in high-risk critical incidents, firefighters will willingly run into burning aircraft to save lives and minimise injury.
“Police officers risk their personal safety for public benefit, infiltrating and neutralising transnational organised crime networks.”
The double-up of the two first responder unions, not to mention a swag of other powerful unions with federal trade and technical employees, could yet find its way to the Fair Work Commission in the event an agreement cannot be reached on a deal. Which is looking increasingly likely.
If this happens, it would be a major defeat both for Gallagher and the CPSU, as both backed the change of the bargaining policy so it not only took in APS agencies but those outside it like the AFP and Airservices Australia.
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