Dear Senior Staff Group colleagues,

We the undersigned UTS staff wish to express our deep concern at the University’s approach to the Creative Industries Change Proposal process.

Since announcing a Creative Industries Steering Committee on 17 August 2023, the University has engaged in a series of workshops and other work ultimately leading to two rounds of consultations this year. The proposed change will merge FASS and DAB into a new Faculty (Faculty name TBC), disestablishing the existing DAB and FASS. The University has received feedback from staff through phases of this process. Staff participated in the consultation in good faith, believing that the University was seeking staff input into the proposal to disestablish two faculties and to form a new faculty. Staff invested in this feedback process believing that they were providing insights from their knowledge of the work of their faculties and asking questions that could assist the University in the decision about the value of forming a merged faculty. Much of this feedback included requests for further information regarding the business case and financial implications of a new faculty. This feedback also raised serious concerns about the lack of clarity of how a new faculty would realise the aims of the Creative Industries Strategy, while sustaining the health of all existing activities of FASS, DAB and the Animal Logic Academy.

In response to feedback submitted by the NTEU to the recent consultation, the University has indicated that the changes proposed in the Change Proposal document did not constitute major change for staff other than members of the Senior Staff Group. We find it extraordinary to claim that changes to the leadership structure of the faculty within which staff work does not have implications for staff workloads and arrangements. It suggests that the leadership works in isolation of the everyday work within the faculty, raising concerns about the kind of leadership the University is proposing to put in place.

The claim that the Change Proposal released in September was only about the leadership structure is disingenuous since that would require the decision to form the new faculty to have already been decided; a decision staff were assured had not been taken throughout the workshop period. The University claim that staff are merely, "seeking more information about how the establishment of a new faculty leadership structure might affect them" appears to be a bad faith interpretation of genuine attempts to participate in what has until now been treated by UTS leadership as a major change.. Staff are engaging in good faith in what was presented as a major change constituted by the disestablishment of two faculties, the movement of their contracts into a new faculty, and everything such changes entail. It is entirely reasonable for staff to request the information they require to meaningfully participate in consultation on what self-evidently constitutes a major change due to its effects on them.

By claiming that only Senior Staff Group members are affected by this Change Proposal, the University is seeking to leverage the significantly weaker clauses of the Senior Staff Group Enterprise Agreement (2013) to disadvantage other UTS staff, moving their work into a new structure that they have not had opportunity to provide meaningful input about. UTS leadership suggests (a) that it has already met its obligations for consultation; and (b) that because the current change proposal does not include redundancies explicitly and immediately for non-SSG staff, that all staff can be subject to further change proposals within the coming two years.

Considering that previous faculty mergers have resulted in redundancies and that redundancies can be reasonably expected to arise from the present proposed change, we are advocating for all affected staff to be consulted, and that the University follow the Major Workplace Change process under the UTS Staff Agreement 2021 (cls 51.9 and 52). UTS leadership has failed to respond to the numerous concerns staff have raised about the lack of clarity and significant impacts if DAB and FASS were to be disestablished to form a new faculty.

Staff – SSG, professional, and academic – deserve access to information that could help them understand the rationale for a new faculty so that they can provide meaningful input on it. Staff deserve to know the name of the unit they are being moved to, and how foreshadowed changes – likely including redundancies – will play out. Across the UTS Staff Agreement and the baseline consultation obligations of employers under Fair Work legislation, staff have the right to be consulted, and to receive information to provide input in that consultation before decisions are made.

We have participated in the consultation process in good faith. In fact we were encouraged by the respective faculty leadership to provide input, presumably because our faculty leaders also understood the change process to be inclusive of all staff. We believe that our right to consultation under the Staff Agreement (clauses 52.12 and 52.13) are being denied by the University leadership.

Almost half (49%) of staff at UTS have a negative view of support for change at UTS, 55% lack confidence in the ULT to make the right decisions for UTS, 55% think UTS lacks open and honest communication (Pulse, 2024); UTS could address these weaknesses by following the clauses set out in our agreements, and improving the kind of consultation characterised by this change process.

We urge SSG to:

- Support and advocate for staff concerns, at most basic, that the disestablishment and establishment of faculties constitutes a major change for all staff in those faculties

- Engage with rights under both the staff and the SSG agreements to advocate for a more open and transparent approach to change

- Request and share information regarding the business case or forecasts, assumptions, and needs underpinning the change

- Support NTEU members’ efforts to advocate for staff

Staff are positive about the need for greater investment in the social and creative disciplines at UTS, and seek assurance that this is not to be achieved at the expense of the other established disciplines. However, it is crucial that UTS staff not only have the information to make an informed decision about our own futures, but also be afforded the opportunity to contribute to decisions about the University’s future.

Yours Sincerely,
The Undersigned,
Sarah Attfield,
Keiko Yasukawa,
Simon Knight,
Jane Hunter,
Nick Hopwood,
Keith Heggart,
Don Carter,
Carolyn Cartier,
James Goodman,
Elizabeth Humphrys,
Christina Ho,
Patrick Grant,
Natalie Krikowa,
Cameron Tonkinwise,
Lucy Fiske,
Jesse Stein,
Emi Otsuji,
Jess Gifkins,
Liz Giuffre,
Ilaria Vanni,
Alice Loda,
Anna Clark,
Mark Titmarsh,
Kate Barclay,
Siobhan Irving,
Catriona Bonfiglioli,
Melissa Bradbrook,
Jen Beattie,
Rowena Lennox,
Chela Weitzel,
Gregory Ferris,
Chloe Michele,
Cherine Fahd,
Erin Heywood,
Rebecca Cushway,
Michael Fabinyi,
Jonathan Marshall,
Caitlin Biddolph,
Rachida Pearce,
Damian Maher,
Germana Eckert,
Donna Rooney,
George Harb,
Natalie Krikowa,
Vassiliki Veros,
George Catsi,
Nicholas Manganas,
Jacqueline Gothe,
Dave Pigram,
Justin Harvey,
Feihong Pan,
Anne Casey,
Andrew Toland,
Timothy Laurie,
Martin Bryant,
Stephi Hemelryk Donald,
Thea Brejzek,
Deborah Szapiro,
Shankar Sankaran,
Jacob Hirsh,
Katelyn Wood,
Sigrid Li,
Timo Rissanen,
Sarah Jane Jones,
Meg Foster,
Mukesh Ray,
Gabriel Clark,
Margaret McHugh,
Lawrence Wallen,
Sara Oscar,
Stefan Lie,
Naomi Parry Duncan,
Juliette Kidston-Lattari,
Chris Brown,
Debra Luke,
Andrew Burrell, and
Bettina Frankham