News Flash

Senior PSA officials met this morning with The Hon. Michael O'Brien, Minister for Public Sector.

The PSA was represented by President Lindsay Oxlad, General Secretary Jan McMahon and Industrial Officer Josie Barbaro.  This meeting was an opportunity to provide Minister O'Brien an overview of matters the PSA has raised previously with a view to ensuring continuity of this work.

The following issues were discussed:

Conditions of Employment
The PSA provided examples of how conditions of employment are implemented differently across the public sector, including higher duties, special leave with pay and voluntary flexible work arrangements.  The PSA's view is there should be greater consistency given the Government is the employer of all public sector workers.

Redeployment
The need to reduce the number of redeployees within Government with the goal of placing excess employees in ongoing work was identified as a critical issue.

Women in the Public Sector
The PSA indicated it is keen to pursue strategies to increase the participation of female public sector workers in senior positions. 

Shared Services
The PSA has ongoing concerns about the workloads of staff employed in Shared Services which are impacting on the service delivery across Government, in particular the high number of temporary and short term staff used.

Public Sector Jobs
The Minister reported at this stage he is not aware of any future plans to make further job cuts other than those previously announced.

The Minister agreed to hold regular monthly meetings with the PSA.

26 October 2011