ACTU Secretary Sally McManus has today spoken following the release a UnionsWA survey report on job and wage insecurity among working West Australians.  Financial hardship and the need to find additional hours of work or an extra job were widely reported together with negative impacts on health and lost time with family.

The WA Council of Social Service (WACOSS) and UnionsWA have today released results of an extensive survey that details the extent of the housing crisis in WA and have called on the Federal and WA governments to take urgent action. This Housing, Work and Income Report Part II is available online here.

UnionsWA has today commented on the release of data by the Australian Bureau of Statistics that measures the gender pay gap. This, together with other analyses based on ABS data, highlights the importance of improving job security as a pathway to better pay for women.

UnionsWA has today commented on the release by the WA Government of its’ Mid-year Review that included details of an improved State Wages Policy for our public sector workforce and replaces the existing fixed, low cap.  Another significant policy announcement includes a welcome introduction of a COVID Isolation payment for working people in casual jobs. 

UnionsWA has commented on the release today of new data from the Australian Bureau of Statistics on the gap in pay between women and men and highlighted the many often low paid care work undertaken by women that are vital for a strong, community-wide response to the pandemic.

The Public Good is a union and community campaign led by UnionsWA and public sector unions. Our supporters come from across the WA community. The Public Good is about highlighting the prominent and positive role that the public sector workforce plays in the lives of Western Australians.

This campaign builds on the success of the Save Our Services campaign, which fought the Barnett Liberal National Government’s cuts to public services and successfully fought against privatisation. We believed that to secure better policies there needed to be a change of government at the last state election.

Government has changed and times have changed.

Our public sector ensures that people most in need can access health care, schools, public roads and transport and other services. 

The public sector serves us all, including the vulnerable in society.

Public sector workers deserve a fair go. Like all Western Australians, they need to be paid fairly so that their pay keeps up with the cost of living.

We believe privatisation undermines the quality of our public services. Privatisation leads to the loss of public sector jobs, rising costs of services, maintenance and safety concerns and a loss of future income and the capacity of our public sector.

We will always take a stand against Governments who have a privatisation agenda.

We encourage the current state Government to value our public sector workers and to invest in our public sector for the benefit of the whole community.

Owen Whittle, Secretary UnionsWA 

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For queries please contact Rebecca Doyle at [email protected]

Website: www.thepublicgood.com.au 

UnionsWA has welcomed the release today by the WA Government of the report of the inquiry into wage theft led by Tony Beech, former Chief Commissioner of the Western Australian Industrial Relations Commission. The report and response by the government are available online here.

UnionsWA has today commented on the decision by WA Industrial Relations Commission in the State Wage Case, which sets wages for around three hundred thousand working West Australians on the WA Minimum Wage and reliant State awards including many trainees and apprentices.

UnionsWA has today commented on the release of research commissioned by the WA Government on the health impacts of Fly-in Fly-out work. The research report can be viewed online here.

By making us better informed about workplace health and safety issues you will help make our advocacy stronger. We respect your privacy. You can view or download our Privacy Policy online here. To show our respect for your time, all survey completions will go into a draw for the chance to win a $100 gift voucher. To progress through this short survey you're asked to provide an email (of course you don;t have to give us your real name if you wish). If you do not wish to go in the draw or receive any emails, un-tick the "send email updates" box). In some cases, we'd really like to talk further by phone (optional) and we do follow our privacy policy, we won't sell your number! If you'd like more information about our work health and safety priorities, resources etc., please check out this page here.