Health and Community Services Union

Premier John Brumby has announced that the State Labor Government will support the Union’s equal pay case in Fair Work Australia (FWA) and to funding the outcome if re-elected at the November State Election.

This is a great win for all HACSU members working in Non Government Disability Services and Mental Health PDRSS and a major breakthrough in our campaign for Equal Pay.

On Thursday 10 June, thousands of union members, including a strong HACSU contingent, took to the streets in support of the Equal Pay case currently being heard by Fair Work Australia.

This was the biggest rally for Equal Pay since the 1970s.

Well done to the broad cross section of HACSU members that took the time to attend the rally in support of their colleagues in the Non-Government Disability and PDRSS sectors. 

Health and Community Services Union members working in the non-government disability sector will be marching in support of Equal Pay at Federation Square tomorrow along with a range of other unions.

HACSU members are calling on the Brumby Government to fund the outcome of the Equal Pay case currently being heard by Fair Work Australia.

The Equal Pay case is a challenge in Fair Work Australia to the wages attached to the new community sector award on the basis of gender equity. Unions are arguing that the wages are low because the sector is predominantly female and paid less than others working with similar qualifications in male dominated industries.

In Australia women are still paid 17% less than men on average.

"It is clear that caring work is undervalued in Australia because historically it has been considered the work of women," said HACSU State Secretary Lloyd Williams. "The Equal Pay Case is a historic opportunity to address this imbalance and recognise the incredible contribution that these workers make to the lives of some of Victoria’s most vulnerable citizens."

Disability Support Workers in the non-government sector are paid between 17% and 30% less than their colleagues in the public sector who do the same work and have not suffered the same undervaluing.

"We are using this rally to call on the Brumby Government to support the case and commit to funding the outcome of the Equal Pay case," said Mr Williams. "The state government provides the bulk of the funding for Community Sector Organisations and without this commitment the Fair Work Australia ruling will have little impact."

The Rally will be held tomorrow from 11am at Federation Square and will be followed by a march to Parliament House.

The sensationalist tone of Melissa Fyfe’s article in the Sunday Age ("Drug restraint 'shame' in care homes", May 9 2010) is disappointing. As is her oversimplification of the highly complex issue of providing support to people with behaviours of concern.

This article has done nothing to further the argument for better resourcing of the disability sector because she misses a fundamentally important point: an overuse of chemical restraint in the disability sector is just one symptom of a systemic failure that is the result of years of sectoral funding neglect that dates back to the previous Liberal Government.

The characterisation of staff “reaching for drugs as a quick solution” is offensive to Disability Services Professionals. Staff do not ‘reach for drugs’ in the absence of appropriate arrangement’s first having been put in place by treating health professionals.