Southern Shorthaul Railway EA negotiations begin again

Sep 21, 2017News

Negotiations have recommenced after the correct “Notice of Representations Rights” were re-issued to members. At a meeting, which was held on 31 August 2017, the RTBU and SSR Management discussed the following;

 1st book off day to be 30 hours – unacceptable from SSR’s point of view.
 Annual leave not be sign back on before 0600 hrs – agreed in principle.
 Annual leave rosters to be created – agreed in principle with new annual leave request forms.
 A minimum of 4 Book Off days to be posted per fortnight. Having this posted on the Master Roster was
deemed unacceptable to the Board. The RTBU then questioned as to what if an employee doesn’t use all
the allotted Book Off Days – awaiting on response.
 Definition of Multiple Booking off and appropriate benefits / allowances / timeframes. The purpose of
Multiple Book Offs is to facilitate the operations of our regional services where it is unviable to have
numerous underutilised regional depots – awaiting on SSR to provide details
 Timeframes for advising Lift Up / Lay back – Discussions surrounded the hours between 2200 and 0600
where you will receive a call to commence work in an allotted timeframe
 Proper Home Depot with all facilities – SSR does not have any sign on offices. All sign on locations are
classified as remote locations.
Possible sign on zones (6hrs) for TBA or Blank line Working – SSR to investigated, but nothing has happened as yet.
 Duty Cycle of only 4 weeks – SSR want to set up a consultation process to review the Duty Cycle. This means that it may be reduced but it won’t increase. Awaiting feedback from members.
 Personal Carer’s Leave restriction for Doctor’s Certificate is too harsh – At a minimum in the event someone who is identified in clauses 31.3 & 31.4 is deemed by medical practitioner to require on-going care will mean that an initial medical certificate will be required.
 Working past 12 hrs entitling members to an Overtime Payment was deemed unacceptable to SSR
 Advice outside of advice times should be at overtime rates – agreed in principle to include the words (the
employee can refuse to accept a job outside of the advice period)
 Pay increase plus pay increase to make from the no pay increase within the last EA – SSR are saying that your pay increase will only be CPI each year for 3 years.