LRS bulletin – March 2018 (PDF version)
The CPSU NSW is currently engaged in consultation with LRS management on plans for voluntary redundancies.
CPSU officials and delegates have already met once with management to express some of the feedback delegates have received from the membership.
Everyone has different circumstances and as we are still in consultation until 21 March it is encouraged you speak with your delegates to provide your feedback.
CPSU’s primary consideration is whether the organisation will maintain enough employees to be able to effectively carry out work. We don’t want members to be adversely affected by WHS factors resulting from fewer staff.
We have expressed these concerns to management who advised it would look to overtime as a solution. In your union’s view this would not necessarily be adequate, depending on what levels of staffing would be needed for overtime. It may be unsustainable.
We have also pressed the case for potential job swaps. Management has verbally advised that it is not in favour of it, due to the risk of uncertainties with tax issues that may arise in respect of eligible termination payment (ETPs) and genuine redundancies, but has not ruled it out.
At the meeting, the CPSU put to management that we are currently in unchartered territory. While it is acknowledged that LRS are offering VRs line with the government’s Managing Excess Employees policy – we say that it fails to recognise that many staff have given a significant part of their working lives to this organisation – its successes in being one of the world’s leading titles registry. The privatisation of LPI was purely about ideology. An ideology where the accumulation of money has become an end in itself. With that in mind, it seems completely reasonable and uncontroversial that the executive ought to share equitably the profits which are generated by you.
We put that exact argument to management. In particular, we requested a redundancy equal to 50 per cent greater than is currently on offer, based on the fact KPIs are being met, staff do not receive/have never received bonuses, and additionally, with the four-year guarantee, ARI is effectively receiving a windfall by not needing to pay out those additional years if some staff decide to leave early.
A more substantial redundancy package may result in an increase in uptake which will reduce LRS’s wages and conditions liability in the long term.
LRS will come back to the union with it’s response by the end of the consultation period.
