Outcomes of Jobs and Skills Summit

I’ve just finished up at the Federal Government’s Jobs and Skills Summit in Canberra and wanted to give you a quick run-down on what happened.

I came to the event with relatively low expectations, as there is only so much that can be achieved in a day- anda-half, especially with such as large group of people.

But the Summit has resulted in an astounding 36 outcomes for the Federal Government to action!

Importantly, for RTBU Members, there have also been some significant hard-fought wins. The most important one is that the Federal Minister for Workplace Relations, Tony Burke, has written to the Fair Work Commission about impending legislative changes which will limit the ability of employers to terminate enterprise agreements unfairly as a bargaining tactic.

This means, RTBU Members at Sydney/NSW Trains can breathe easy knowing that any application to
terminate their agreements will get lost in the internal processes of the Commission which will now ‘go-slow’ until the legislation is amended and the termination ability is removed.

Members should also know that I got caught on camera giving the NSW Premier, Dominic Perrottet some ‘friendly’ advice.

Other important take-outs included:
• We have agreement on moving forward with the same job/same pay laws that will ensure members in
unstable employment get a better deal.
• We are now arguing that skilled migration is part of solving the current problems, but training people and giving them greater opportunities has to be front and centre.

We’ll pull together a fuller summary of the outcomes of the summit for our next edition of the RTBU’s national member magazine, Transport NOW.

In Unity
Mark Diamond
NATIONAL SECRETARY

Download the update here