By Jeremy Sollars
The Southern Downs Regional Council has lost a lengthy industrial dispute over a ‘nine-day fortnight’ working condition for its white collar workforce.
As previously reported in the Free Times, the council and The Services Union Queensland had been locked in a long-running battle over the nine-day fortnight condition, which the council had been seeking to strip back, arguing it is unproductive and that its removal would save the council money.
The case – which was the sticking point in the finalisation of a new enterprise bargaining agreement for the council’s ‘indoor’ or ‘Stream A’ employees – was brought to an end with a ruling by the Queensland Industrial Relations Commission (QIRC) delivered on Wednesday 21 August.
Final hearings in the case were heard in Brisbane in early May but negotiations over the ‘Stream A’ enterprise bargaining agreement commenced in early 2018.
In its decision reasons the QIRC full bench was highly critical of the council’s arguments in favour of scrapping the nine-day fortnight, stating that in his affidavits the council’s chief executive officer David Keenan was “unable to provide evidence of complaints he said he had received from community members and councillors due to the operation of the nine-day fortnight”.
“While the Council identifies some peak times throughout the monthly or yearly cycle and some specific services which are impacted by the nine-day fortnight, addressing the needs of this specific part of Council’s business should not lead to all Stream A employees losing this entitlement,” the full bench decision states.
“While evidence led by the Council indicates that it can be operationally difficult to cover the nine-day fortnight, these days are rostered and are therefore known in advance.
“If the Council is able provide for other types of leave, it is difficult to see how planned absences in the form of rostered days off cannot be accommodated.
“The Council has not demonstrated that rostered days off have any greater impact than other types of leave.
“The Council’s evidence regarding levels of complaints, problems with coverage and productivity were largely supported by the impressions formed by, and observations of members of Council management rather than through any quantifiable evidence.
“Similarly, the Council has not demonstrated through the evidence that the nine-day fortnight is the cause of the Council’s current financial position.”
The QIRC full bench also stated that “the financial circumstances of the Council are not dire” and that there was “no cogent evidence before the Commission to suggest that the implementation of a 19-day month for Stream A employees would have any beneficial effect so as to significantly improve the financial circumstances of the Council”.
“The balance of the evidence does not indicate that there is a need to remove a longstanding entitlement from the employees covered by the proposed Agreement,” the full bench concluded.
“The evidence given by Mr Keenan concerning feedback from Councillors and members of the community about their frustration at having access to staff members when on RDO’s was anecdotal and lacked particularity.
“Equally, the contention that managers and other employees were required to attend to the responsibilities of an employee on an RDO was also not made out.
“The claim lacked any specificity and the evidence before the Commission was not, in our view, such that a conclusion could be reached that the issue was at a level which was an endemic problem for the Council.
“Central to the Council’s case is the contention that the current nine-day fortnight for Stream A Award employees has had a substantial impact on service delivery, productivity and the general operations of Council.
“The evidence before the Commission does not support such a contention.
“The Commission is not convinced, having regard to the matters contained in s180(4) of the Act that the Council has made out the case for change.
“The Council’s claim is rejected.”
The council and the union must now file a “draft agreed determination that reflects the full and complete terms of the clauses of each matter agreed between the parties and this decision” with the Queensland Industrial Registry by Wednesday 18 September.
