The University of Auckland has put what it is calling a ‘Best Offer‘ to TEU in mediation last week. TEU has responded with a counter offer, which the university has rejected.

TEU members will now be meeting in the first week of Semester 2 to discuss the university’s offer, but the meeting will not be a ratification meeting.

The university’s offer has not changed in any substantive way since it was made to non-members back in November 2010. It still seeks to remove some key academic conditions out of the collective employment agreement and into human resource policy where they can be changed unilaterally by the employer.

The TEU branch committee says it is deeply concerned about the lack of progress in the dispute. The university’s and TEU’s positions have shifted relatively little in the course of the negotiations. These positions are divided by a conflicting view of how terms and conditions for academic staff are to be negotiated, rather than their actual substance.

In an attempt to avoid a stalemate the branch committee is asking TEU members to consider a new proposal that would establish a new set of terms and conditions by mutual agreement. The proposal would first equalise the pay and leave structure for TEU members and non-union staff, then establish a professional working party to meet and report, within the period of the agreement, on a comprehensive review and redesign of the existing academic collective agreement.

The professional working party would include employment relations and legal representatives from both sides and would work to “modernise” the agreement in a way that meets both parties’ needs.

The outcomes of the working party would become the substance of the subsequent bargaining process and agreement. The working party process would have a wider aim, namely, to foster a ‘higher trust’ model in the University.