To Vice-Chancellor Ian Jacobs, Deputy Vice-Chancellor Nicholas Fisk, Deputy Vice-Chancellor Merlin Crossley

1. We oppose precarious – casualised, sessional, contract and fixed-term – staff becoming the first victims of COVID-19 cost-cutting. University management should protect all staff regardless of their employment status. A huge proportion of our colleagues across the university are employed on precarious contracts: not protecting them means not adequately protecting the institution. Precarious colleagues should not be treated as an underclass: they do the same work as permanent staff. Precarious workers are experts with specialist knowledge and valuable experience, not dispensable components of budget lines.

2. In Australian universities only 35.6% of workers have secure employment. Many UNSW faculties rely heavily on precarious staff to carry out teaching programs. Across the sector precarious workers provide over 85% of teaching and nearly 40% of general/professional work. Without precarious workers, it would be impossible for the university to function. Sacrificing these colleagues will shift the burden onto academic staff, greatly increasing their workloads and inhibiting their ability to do effective service to the community, leadership, or research.
 
3. We are at risk of permanently losing workers from the tertiary education system. A significant proportion of precarious workers, especially academics, are looking to work in other fields and may never return to academia, removing years of training and expertise from the sector. Professional staff are trained in specific administrative functions; they are not immediately replaceable and removing them discards years of experience, which in turn negatively impacts student experience.

4. There are currently considerations of significant cuts that do not match the decrease in student numbers. We demand that the number of courses run and administrative/teaching work match course enrolments. Despite the shortfall in student fees due largely to the reduction in international students, the university must maintain its teaching conditions for all students still currently enrolled.

5. Staff teaching conditions are student learning conditions. All students who are continuing to study are entitled to the same quality of education that was delivered pre-COVID-19. To this end, the university must maintain the diversity of courses run, ensure that tutorial sizes do not increase, provide appropriate support to students and pay staff for all hours worked.

6. We call on permanent staff to commit to not taking on work that would otherwise be allocated to casuals. The university is currently encouraging academic staff to voluntarily change their workload ratios to be education-focused, therefore teaching a higher number of classes. This will directly take work away from casual teaching allocations. It also removes academic research, which enables academics to stay up to date with cutting edge work in their fields and share this depth of knowledge with students and colleagues

The current crisis that casualised and precarious staff face, with many jobs cut already, is a product of the university’s ongoing and increasing reliance on these workers as a source of cheap and expendable labour. We must ensure that more permanent and ongoing positions are created, and that casualised workers have clear pathways into secure jobs. Until then, we must stand up for our colleagues’ jobs and working conditions.

By signing this document you endorse the demands outlined above and stand in solidarity with precarious and casualised university workers.

Endorsed by UNSW Casuals Network

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Signatures of UNSW staff, students, and former workers:


Kynan Tan, Art & Design
Anna Hush, School of Social Sciences
Max Bledstein, School of the Arts and Media
Michael Richardson, School of the Arts and Media
Mitchell Ryan, Art & Design
Andrew Brooks, School of the Arts and Media
Mahsa Salamati, School of the Arts and Media
Caitlin Biddolph, School of Social Sciences
Cameron Coventry, UNSW Canberra
Jarrod Hore, Humanities and Languages/Arts and Social Science
Paul Monro, Humanities and Languages
Caroline Lenette, School of Social Sciences
Ozguc Umut, UNSW Canberra
Liam Kane, Humanities and Languages
Danielle Hynes, School of Arts & Media
Peter Blamey, Art & Design
Mary Zournazi, School of Social Sciences
Diana Kreemers, School of the Arts and Media
Bonaventure M. Munganga, School of Arts and Media
Kyla Allison, School of the Arts and Media
Kael McCormack-Skewes, School of Humanities and Languages
Sigi Jottkandt, School of the Arts and Media
Georgia van Toorn, School of Social Science
Sonia Qadir, Faculty of Law, UNSW
Sarah Rodigari, Art and Design
Linda Bartolomei, School of Social Sciences
Lenka Olejníková, School of Social Sciences
Pablo Leighton, Humanities and Languages
James Godfrey, Faculty of Law
Luke Robinson, School or Arts and Media
Madison Hichens, School of the Arts and Media
Meg Mumford, School of the Arts and Media
Valentina Baú, School of the Arts and Media
Madeleine Ackerman, School of Arts and Media
George Kouvaros, School of the Arts and Media
Bhupesh Joshi, School of the Arts and Media
Mazda Moradabbasi, School of the Arts and Media
Naama Carlin, School of Social Sciences
Anastasia Murney, Art & Design
Charu Maithani, Art & Design
Joshua Han, School of the Arts and Media
Louise Ravelli, School of the Arts and Media
Peter R. R. White, School of Arts and Media
Alba Boer Cueva, School of Social Sciences
Taylor Coyne, School of Humanities and Languages
Lorenzo Logi, Arts & Media
Tanja Dreher, School of Arts and Media
Jodi Brooks, School of the Arts and Media
George (Kev) Dertadian, School of Social Sciences
Megan Rose, School of Social Sciences and Vitalities Lab
Andrew Murphie, School of the Arts and Media
David Coombs, School of Education
Aneshka Mora, Art & Design
Joyce Wu, School of Social Science