IEU members look on as AEU colleagues vote on statewide strike
Recently, a follower of the IEU Facebook page who works in a Victorian Catholic school asked: “Are we voting to strike on 24 March, like the AEU?”
The answer is no: we can’t do so, because IEU members in Victorian Catholic schools are currently denied the right to ballot for protected industrial action, unlike our colleagues in every other large education sector around the country.
Public school educators have a single employer (the state government) which allows them to take protected action when enterprise agreement negotiations reach an impasse.
In the Victorian Catholic sector, however, there are over 30 employers. To enable coordinated fair bargaining across all these employers, a Single Interest Authorisation (SIA) is required. An SIA would give IEU staff access to the same basic rights – including the right to strike – which are available to their colleagues in the state sector and in Catholic systems elsewhere in Australia.
Employers could agree to bargain under an SIA, but the Victorian Catholic Education Authority (VCEA) has on their behalf continued to refuse to do so. As a result, the union has had to campaign to win an SIA by seeking to prove to the Fair Work Commission that there is majority staff support for fair bargaining right across the sector.
IEU members campaigning for an SIA in 2025
On Friday 13 February, the Victorian branch of the Australian Education Union announced:
“On 24 March, if there isn’t a fair and decent deal, there will be a statewide 24-hour stoppage. Public school teachers, principals, and education support staff are being disrespected by the Allan Labor government, which has failed to put forward any offer to resolve key issues of pay and workload despite many months of negotiations.”
On Monday 16 February, every eligible AEU member received a ballot asking whether they support taking protected industrial action. If members endorse it, a 24-hour statewide stop-work will occur on 24 March – unless the government offers a proposal that addresses members’ key claims on pay and conditions.
A strike is the strongest form of protected industrial action available. However, the AEU ballot also includes a range of other lawful options, including stopworks, bans or limitations on activities like overtime, responding to any enquiries, attending meetings, using online systems or personal electronic devices for work purposes, writing reports, structured school activities, and implementing DE initiatives.
The AEU told members: “The measures you are asked to endorse are broad in nature so that our campaign has a wide scope of industrial actions available to apply pressure on the government over time”.
IEU members in Victorian Catholic schools are denied these options due to the structure of their sector and the refusal of their employers to bargain under an SIA.
The SIA campaign last year was a significant grassroots success, with IEU members educating colleagues about their rights. In early February, the independent accredited ballot agent appointed by the Fair Work Commission released its initial report, showing indicative staff majorities for fair bargaining rights in 24 of the 33 responding employers.
While the union believes majority support exists in the remaining nine employers, the VCEA has created doubt over this by suggesting in their submission that there are not 35,000 staff in Victorian Catholic education, but 45,000. The IEU will vigorously contest these figures and continue to push for our SIA submission in the Fair Work Commission.
What we need most right now is to hold the line and consolidate our strength to win this campaign – and the improvements to salaries and conditions that staff deserve. We don’t know if industrial action will be required, but all staff in Victorian Catholic schools should have the right to access it.
AEU claim
The Australian Education Union is seeking a 35 per cent pay increase over three years, including 14 per cent in the first year. The union argued that a substantial upfront increase was necessary to bring Victorian teachers’ salaries into line with those of their counterparts interstate.
State branch president Justin Mullaly said a significant pay rise was essential to attract more graduates into teaching and to encourage experienced teachers who had left the profession to return.
Victorian graduate teachers were the lowest paid in the country, earning about $13,000 less than their counterparts in the Northern Territory and around $8,700 less than those in New South Wales.
