Term 3 report card: 14,500 staff build the pressure for a strong Catholic Agreement
14,500 Victorian Catholic education staff have backed the Petition of Support through the Term 3 campaign, with six employer groups now beyond the halfway mark and almost 300 workplaces reaching 50 per cent support or higher.
Victorian Catholic education staff entered Term 3 with a clear objective: build the collective strength needed to win a strong new Agreement without unnecessary delay.
Members and Reps have done exactly that. Beginning with a head start during the school holidays and continuing throughout the term, 14,500 staff have now backed the Petition of Support for fair bargaining rights.
Almost 300 workplaces have reached 50 per cent support or higher. More than 200 workplaces are at 60 per cent or above, around 130 have reached 70 per cent, more than 50 have reached 80 per cent, and almost 30 workplaces are at 90 per cent support or higher.
It is an extraordinary statewide organising effort – and it leaves Catholic education staff in a substantially stronger position heading into Term 4.
Why did we have to prove majority support again?
This campaign did not begin from scratch.
Catholic education staff had already demonstrated majority support at the 24 employers now covered by the IEU’s current Single Interest Authorisation application before the Fair Work Commission.
But employers vigorously disputed aspects of that evidence, including workforce data, identity matching and which employees should count towards the relevant totals. Those disputes meant a number of Catholic employers were left outside the current application.
Rather than allow those disputes to stall the campaign, staff at the remaining employers were asked to re-assert their support through a fresh Petition of Support.
The response has been emphatic.
Staff have not simply reproduced the support shown previously. Across employer after employer and workplace after workplace, they have built much stronger margins.
That experience is also why 50 per cent cannot be treated as the finish line. When employers have already shown a willingness to contest the numbers, moving from 50 to 60, 70, 80 or 90 per cent provides much greater confidence in the strength of staff support – and much greater collective pressure at the bargaining table.
Six employer groups now beyond the halfway mark
The employer picture has changed considerably during the Term 3 campaign, and there is now clear majority support across six employer groups.
MACSS Specialist Schools is above 70 per cent support.
FCJ College Benalla is above 65 per cent.
Catholic College Sale and MacKillop Family Services are both above 60 per cent.
St Bede’s College is above 55 per cent.
And at MACS, well over 10,000 staff have now backed the campaign, taking support comfortably beyond the halfway mark across Victoria’s largest Catholic education employer.
There is still more work to do across the employers that have not yet reached the halfway mark – but the position heading into Term 4 is dramatically stronger than when the campaign began.
Support runs deep in workplaces
Employer-wide figures tell only part of the story. Across hundreds of schools, support has moved well beyond the halfway mark, with many workplaces now sitting in the 70, 80 and 90 per cent bands.
That depth matters.
A workplace moving from 50 to 70 or 80 per cent is not merely adding names to a petition. It demonstrates that support for stronger bargaining rights is broad, visible and increasingly difficult to dispute.
That is why the message throughout the term has remained: 50% is a milestone – not the finish line!
None of these results happened automatically.
Throughout Term 3, IEU Reps and members have spoken with colleagues, followed up unsigned staff, circulated campaign information, organised workplace conversations and used their protected workplace rights to communicate with members and non-members alike.
Digital communications, SMS and calling have helped extend that reach, particularly during the campaign’s launch and major mobilisation periods.
But some of the clearest later movement has come where those central communications have been reinforced locally. The evidence is clear: where members organise locally, support grows.
The Agreement remains the goal
The Petition of Support and the SIA proceedings are not the final prize - members are organising because they want a strong Agreement.
That means substantial and timely salary increases, no erosion of existing conditions, genuine workload improvements, effective time-in-lieu arrangements, improvements to planning and assessment time, and fair outcomes for teachers, education support staff and other covered employees.
The government-school outcome has also changed the bargaining environment.
It demonstrates that major improvements can be achieved, and it has raised legitimate expectations among Catholic education staff.
Catholic staff have too often been left waiting after improvements are achieved elsewhere in the sector.
This bargaining round must be different. Comparable outcomes will not arrive automatically - they have to be won!
That is why the extraordinary organising effort members have made throughout Term 3 matters so much. The Petition campaign, the prospect of stronger bargaining rights and the changed benchmark elsewhere in education have all increased pressure on Catholic employers.
The Agreement is the goal. Member organising and the SIA campaign provide the leverage.
Pressure is producing movement
Employers have moved during the course of Term 3, with a new offer being tabled right at the end of term – but important issues remain unresolved.
Members still need a salary outcome that keeps pace with developments elsewhere in education. They need meaningful workload improvements, not simply different ways of accounting for existing work.
They need time-in-lieu arrangements that work in practice, protection of existing conditions, and proper outcomes on outstanding matters including leave and other entitlements.
Pressure is producing movement – but maintaining that pressure is essential to winning the Agreement members deserve.
Preparing for the FWC decision
We are still awaiting the Fair Work Commission’s decision on the existing SIA application covering 24 employers.
That decision will matter. But our campaign does not depend on guessing when the decision will arrive – or assuming one particular path to an Agreement.
If Catholic employers put forward a timely and acceptable offer that properly addresses members’ priorities, the progress that produced it will have been achieved in an environment transformed by collective organising.
Members will decide whether any offer is good enough.
If employers do not deliver an acceptable outcome, members and the union need to be ready to pursue the stronger bargaining rights available through the SIA pathway.
That two-path approach means the work undertaken during Term 3 is valuable whatever happens next.
Every additional Petition strengthens members’ position.
A stronger position in Term 4
The Term 3 campaign has transformed the position of Catholic education staff, and across Victoria, thousands of members and colleagues have demonstrated that they are prepared to organise together for a better Agreement.
There is real progress – but the job is not finished.
Important bargaining issues remain unresolved, and several employers still require considerably more Petition support.
And even where 50 per cent has been achieved, every additional supporter strengthens the mandate members have built and reduces the scope for employers to dispute the strength of staff support.
We enter Term 4 with far greater collective strength than we began the Term 3 campaign.
The task now is to turn that strength into a strong Agreement.
Keep organising. Keep building. And keep the pressure on.
VISIT THE PETITION OF SUPPORT HUB
100 workplaces leading the way across the four dioceses
The depth of support built during Term 3 is extraordinary. Every workplace in our Top 100 has reached at least 70 per cent Petition density, while 27 have reached 90 per cent or higher!
90%+ Petition density
1. St Peter’s School – Keilor East (MACS)
2. Our Lady of the Rosary School – Kyneton (MACS)
3. St Anne’s School – Kew East (MACS)
4. Sacred Heart School – Morwell (DOSCEL)
5. St Oliver Plunkett’s School – Pascoe Vale (MACS)
6. St Joseph’s College – Ferntree Gully (MACS)
7. St Richard’s School – Kilsyth (MACS)
8. St Joseph’s School – Wonthaggi (DOSCEL)
9. St Mary’s School – Alexandra (MACS)
10. Marymede Catholic College – Doreen (MACS)
11. St Clare’s School – Thomastown West (MACS)
12. Queen of Peace School – Altona Meadows (MACS)
13. St James’ School – Sebastopol (DOBCEL)
14. St Monica’s School – Footscray (MACS)
15. St Mark’s School – Dingley (MACS)
16. St John’s School – Heidelberg (MACS)
17. St Laurence O’Toole’s School – Leongatha (DOSCEL)
18. Holy Cross Catholic Primary School – Mickleham (MACS)
19. St Therese’s School – Essendon (MACS)
20. St Catherine of Siena School – Armstrong Creek (MACS)
21. St Philip’s School – Blackburn North (MACS)
22. St James’ School – Brighton (MACS)
23. St Mary’s School – Sale (DOSCEL)
24. St Francis Xavier’s School – Corio (MACS)
25. St Paul’s School – Monbulk (MACS)
26. St Francis of Assisi School – Tarneit (MACS)
27. St Mary’s School – Ararat (DOBCEL)
80–89% Petition density
28. St John Bosco’s School – Niddrie (MACS)
29. St Thomas the Apostle School – Cranbourne East (DOSCEL)
30. Thomas Carr College – Tarneit (MACS)
31. Marian College – Myrtleford (CESL)
32. St Augustine’s School – Keilor (MACS)
33. St Therese’s School – Kennington (CESL)
34. Sacred Heart School – Colac (DOBCEL)
35. St Therese’s School – Cranbourne (DOSCEL)
36. St Kevin’s School – Hampton Park (MACS)
37. St Joseph’s School – Springvale (MACS)
38. St Thomas’ School – Sale (DOSCEL)
39. St Joseph’s School – Boronia (MACS)
40. St Paul’s Catholic School – Kealba (MACS)
41. St Mary MacKillop School – Bannockburn (MACS)
42. Ave Maria College – Aberfeldie (MACS)
43. St Bernard’s School – Bacchus Marsh (MACS)
44. St Patrick’s School – Port Fairy (DOBCEL)
45. St Vincent de Paul’s School – Morwell East (DOSCEL)
46. Padua College – Tyabb (MACS)
47. St Luke’s School – Lalor (MACS)
48. St Patrick’s School – Kilmore (MACS)
49. St Mary’s School – Cohuna (CESL)
50. Catholic Regional College St Albans – St Albans (MACS)
51. St Mary of the Cross School – Point Cook (MACS)
52. Lisieux Catholic Primary School – Torquay North (MACS)
53. St Patrick’s School – Mentone (MACS)
54. St Mary’s School – Mansfield (MACS)
55. St Margaret’s School – Geelong East (MACS)
70–79% Petition density
56. St Thomas the Apostle School – Blackburn (MACS)
57. St Joseph’s School – Mernda (MACS)
58. St Damian’s School – Bundoora (MACS)
59. St Gabriel’s School – Reservoir (MACS)
60. St Brigid’s School – Officer (DOSCEL)
61. Our Lady of Lourdes School – Bayswater (MACS)
62. Aquinas College – Ringwood (MACS)
63. St Patrick’s School – Ballarat (DOBCEL)
64. Sacred Heart School – Diamond Creek (MACS)
65. St Mary’s School – Lancefield (MACS)
66. Sacred Heart School – Preston (MACS)
67. St Bernard’s School – Coburg East (MACS)
68. Our Lady Help of Christians School – Brunswick East (MACS)
69. Avila College – Mount Waverley (MACS)
70. St Joachim’s School – Carrum Downs (MACS)
71. St Gregory the Great School – Doncaster (MACS)
72. Holy Trinity School – Wantirna South (MACS)
73. Sacred Heart School – Tatura (CESL)
74. St Francis Xavier School – Montmorency (MACS)
75. St Joan of Arc School – Brighton (MACS)
76. St Peter’s College – Clyde North Campus – Cranbourne East (DOSCEL)
77. St Dominic’s School – Melton (MACS)
78. St Ambrose’s School – Woodend (MACS)
79. Emmanuel College – Altona North (MACS)
80. St Joseph’s School – Trafalgar (DOSCEL)
81. St Anne’s School – Sunbury (MACS)
82. Padua College – Mornington (MACS)
83. St Patrick’s School – Lilydale (MACS)
84. Catholic Regional College Keilor – Keilor North (MACS)
85. Holy Trinity School – Sunbury (MACS)
86. Mother of God School – Ardeer (MACS)
87. St Luke’s School – Wantirna (MACS)
88. St Mary’s School – Myrtleford (CESL)
89. St Margaret’s School – Maribyrnong (MACS)
90. St Bernadette’s School – The Basin (MACS)
91. St Raphael’s School – Preston West (MACS)
92. St Theresa’s School – Albion (MACS)
93. Our Lady of Lourdes School – Prahran East (MACS)
94. St Kevin’s School – Lower Templestowe (MACS)
95. Annunciation School – Brooklyn (MACS)
96. Emmaus College – Vermont South (MACS)
97. Corpus Christi School – Glenroy (MACS)
98. St Agatha’s School – Cranbourne (DOSCEL)
99. St Francis of Assisi School – Mill Park (MACS)
100. St John’s School – Mitcham (MACS)
The campaign doesn’t stop at the end of Term 3.
If you haven’t signed the Petition of Support yet, add your voice. If your workplace has reached 50 per cent, keep building.
Every additional supporter strengthens members’ collective position heading into Term 4 – and helps build the pressure needed to win a strong Agreement.
