A new offer from the government!

Dear Members,

After the amazing campaign run by HP members of the QPSU and LHMU culminating in a state-wide strike on 1 December a new settlement offer has been made by the government.

The new offer provided by the government is summarised below - there are some significant shifts! No cuts, and an increase to the wages offer.

BEFORE this new offer Queensland Health had said the offer was:

2.5% a year in wage increases

Cuts to clinical education allowance

A progression barrier to be introduced at HP3.2

Removal of the indexation of radiation therapy development allowance; and

No further matters to be progressed.

Following a statewide strike by HPs on 1 December, months of work-bans and direct lobbying through petitions and postcards the government agreed to meet to try and resolve the dispute last week. After a week of intensive negotiations the government significantly revised their offer. See below for all the details!

THE OFFER - DECEMBER 13 2010

Wage Increases

Wage increases of 3% from 1 September 2010 and 3% from 1 September 2011 and 3% from 1 September 2012.

On 1 September 2013 an additional bonus payment of $500 to be paid on the basis that demonstrated 'efficiencies' or 'cashable savings' have been established by Queensland Health to Queensland Treasury based on a successful reduction in recruitment and retention costs and other efficiency savings.

There will be no cuts to existing conditions or allowances.
There will be no progression barrier established at HP3.2.

Providing Consistency and Clarity in Classifications

Noting that, the conclusion of Phase 2 Appeals will be in January/ February 2011. The future of Phase 3 and clarity around what evaluation process will exist for HP under the next agreement needed to be determined. In order to avoid the delays, inconsistency and confusion of Phase 2 there will be a central evaluation process established. This will provide greater transparency for workers, consistency in outcomes and equity across the state and across disciplines. A manual of revised, clearer Work Level Statements and some example, benchmarked position descriptions will be created in consultation with union representatives. The manual will operationalise the Work Level Statements and reduce uncertainty or ambiguous interpretations. This work will be finalised in the first half of 2011.

This will then allow Phase 3 to proceed on the basis of:

• The need to ensure greater confidence in equitable outcomes before commencing phase 3
• A working party to be established to develop benchmark role descriptions for each discipline
• Benchmark role descriptions to be completed by mid 2011 and will form an HP Role Description manual
• Phase 3 to be limited to situations where substantial change to role since 30 May 2008
• Central evaluation unit to perform the evaluation.
• Where management has agreed that the role has changed and the applicant is performing the functions of the benchmark role, the central evaluation unit will perform verification tasks.
• Where management does not support the reclassification the employee will have to provide sufficient information to the evaluation unit that the role has changed since May 2008.
• Where a reclassification has been determined to be warranted provided that the position is only being reclassified by one level the employee can be directly appointed.

Workforce Mix

To ensure appropriate career paths develop and the continued retention of skilled and developing clinicians it is vital that there is an appropriate mix of clinical HP positions are available across a range of clinical and geographical settings, the availability of these positions need to take into account changing clinical demands and needs. A workforce planning group comprising Queensland Health and union representatives will be established to develop a framework for determining the appropriate mix of classifications and to ensure staff are not worked or given responsibilities outside the scope of their classification level. Where consensus cannot be reached the Queensland Industrial Relations Commission will be asked to make a determination on what is most appropriate.

Ministerial Review: Scope of Practice

A Ministerial Taskforce around Health Practitioner Scope of Practice will be established that will:

• Develop advanced scope of practice areas/clinics in key occupational areas for HPs
• Enable patients/clients to begin treatments with HPs that do not require surgeon/medical specialist oversight.
• Develop framework to enable assistants to perform appropriate routine tasks to enable greater proportion of Health Practitioners time to be on the high value end of the roles, duties within the classification level they are employed at.

Employment Security

Queensland Health commits to providing greater employment security for the HP workforce and converting temporary staff to permanent under this agreement. HP3 will be considered as 'base-grade' for the purposes of allowing temporary staff at this level to be direct-appointed as permanent staff, having served the appropriate amount of time, without having to undertake a further merit process.

National Health Reforms

To ensure that a progression to a funding system under National Health Reforms provides the maximum efficient delivery of services a Working Party of HP union representatives and the Department will be formed. Underpinning the operation of the working party will be a commitment to employment security and that National Health Reforms will not lead to health services being contracted to third parties.

Clinical Education (Student Supervision) Allowance

The Clinical Education Allowance as per HPEB1 will continue to apply and be paid at $10 a day to eligible disciplines. The eligibility criteria will be amended in order to include Psychology in order to cover those supervisors of provisional psychologists completing their postgraduate training for general registration.

Social Workers Treatment Rooms

QLD Health will ensure that there are treatment rooms accessible for use by Social Workers to deal with clients with suitable privacy.

Other Issues

As previously stated all other issues contained in HP Agreement 1 will be rolled over into HP Agreement 2.

This is the conclusion of the offer received.

This is a significant shift in position from the government.

Have your say!

This offer is distributed to you so that you can let us know whether or not you would support this going forward to legal drafting stage.

If you support accepting the offer 'in principle' and moving forward to drafting and then a full ballot of members let your delegate know or email hp@qpsu.org.au.

If you do not support accepting the offer 'in principle' and wish to continue the campaign for a better deal, which may also include arbitrating the issues before the Queensland Industrial Relations Commission let your delegate know or email hp@qpsu.org.au.

We will be attempting to contact all delegates who will be undertaking a survey of members to ascertain if you would like to accept the offer or reject the offer. If you have questions email hp@qpsu.org.au.

Important - Suspension of Industrial Action

While consultation is conducted around the new offer existing work-bans and industrial action will be suspended.

If you have any questions or problems around work-bans email us at hp@qpsu.org.au or talk with your delegate or organizer.

Please contact us if you have any questions, we will be in touch further to find out what you think.

An exciting week to have your say! Remember - only union members get a say in this poll.

In union,

The HP Stronger Together Team