Adapted from TEU media release

Workers at Lincoln University’s Telford campus have negotiated successfully the right to be included on the Lincoln collective agreement. Prior to the merger of Telford Rural Polytechnic with Lincoln University, hostel and kitchen staff at Telford had no employment conditions providing rules around hours of work or shift allowances. Their new agreement will give kitchen staff time and quarter for working on the weekends and will give hostel supervision staff an allowance for weekend work.

Tertiary Education Union (TEU) deputy secretary Nanette Cormack says these terms do not yet match those received by other staff doing similar jobs at Lincoln University, but they are an improvement. The university has also committed in its terms of settlement to deliver equity with other employees in comparable roles.

“The changes agreed to in this Terms of Settlement are seen as a first step in that process” reads the ratified Terms of Settlement. The new agreement also affords members a 1.8 per cent pay rise backdated to the beginning of the year. The one-year agreement will expire on 31 December, at which point TEU hopes to continue to move Telford’s kitchen and hostel staff towards employment equity with other Lincoln staff.

Nanette Cormack says the most important step in winning these improved hours of work conditions was staff joining the union and negotiating to be covered by the collective agreement.

“When workers are members of a union and have collective coverage they have far more power to improve their working conditions. Union membership is crucial to winning pay and employment equity.”