Community welfare workers to strike

BY CAROLYNE BANADOS

SYDNEY — Rallying under the banner “Quality service deserves quality
pay”, community and social workers will strike and rally on June 23, closing
down welfare services and agencies, most of them recipients of state government
grants funding, across New South Wales.

The day of action is in protest at the state government's refusal to
a new Social and Community Services Award, the old version of which is
by far the worse in the country for pay and conditions. Community and social
workers believe the government's intransigence is causing significant hardship
and uncertainty in the sector and shows a lack of commitment to the provision
of quality community services.

Workers in the community and welfare sector do a vast variety of jobs.
We are counsellors, family support workers, youth workers, resource workers,
education officers, child protection workers, community development workers,
neighbourhood centre workers, disability workers.

We work with the most disadvantaged people in our community. We work
with the disabled, the aged, refugees and newly arrived migrants, people
from non-English speaking backgrounds, victims of domestic violence, youth
at risk, the unemployed, the homeless, victims of incest and sexual abuse,
Aboriginal people, people on the margins of society.

My community, Liverpool, for example, has many dedicated, hardworking
community workers who work in a diverse range of organisations.

Most of these workers have years of experience behind them, and work
tirelessly for the community. Many work in excess of 40 hours per week
and only get paid for 30-35 hours. Much work is done in their own time,
as there is no provision of overtime in our funding.

A lot of workers have extremely stressful positions. Workplaces are
often substandard. Most workers will suffer burnout at some stage in their
career. Many are abused in their workplaces, often by those they strive
to assist. It can be a difficult job at times, but without these workers,
many people would suffer greater disadvantage.

Community and welfare workers have reached the end of their rope. Experienced
and dedicated workers are giving up and finding work in other professions
because they feel that in the community sector their work is undervalued,
underpaid, and that they are not treated as the highly trained professionals
they are.

Inexperienced, untrained or even voluntary workers are filling the void,
but often find the work difficult. Community organisations face high staff
turnover, thus creating an inability to provide continuous quality services.

The majority of workers in the community sector have tertiary qualifications
but see graduates from other disciplines commencing their careers on salaries
far in excess of those at the top of the SACS award scale.

For example, a new graduate entering the community sector would start
at a salary of around $28,341 (Category 2, Year 1); by year five, the salary
increases to $33,157 and there it stops. By comparison, a new graduate
teacher can expect to start on a salary of about $41,000.

It goes without saying that 80% of workers in the community and welfare
sector are women.

Community workers are well aware that they may disadvantage some people
by their decision to stop work on June 23. Some services have decided to
operate with skeleton staff, so as to minimise disruption.

Australian Services Union members in social and community services,
conscious of the impact on clients, have always been hesitant to take industrial
action. In the past 12 years there has only ever been one stoppage. But
now it is time to act before the sector loses more experienced workers
and our communities begin to suffer from this loss.

Community workers will rally outside NSW Parliament House on June 23
at 11am.

[Carolyne Banados is a community worker at the Liverpool Women's Resource
Centre.]

From GLW issue 409