Meeting with DET management, June 30

At the meeting of the PSA Working Party and DET management yesterday we were given two new documents, one on the proposed structure and one on development of the corporate services strategy.

The structure document gives more detail on the proposed structure, but no numbers or where the people are going to come from. And no change to the 700 job cuts.

This document was not drawn up over the weekend. As Sue Walsh said last week the real document was in the bottom drawer. It was inconceivable that the rubbish they released on 17 June was not backed up by more detailed plans. The belated release of this document begs the question, "How many more documents are in the bottom drawer?"

The second document is about their preferred process for developing the transition process and their plan.

They propose setting up a project team with representatives of various DET & TAFE sections, other departments, primary & secondary school principals and the one person from the PSA. Nobody from the Teachers Federation.

The PSA has rejected this attempt to make us complicit in their job cuts proposal. Our job is to represent our members, which means making management consult and negotiate openly, not helping them to plan 700 job losses.

The PSA is drafting a response which we will circulate in due course.