As you may know, for the past year HSU members at Peakhurst Lodge have continually raised safety issues around unsafe staffing levels and excessive workloads with local management. Members wrote a formal letter to local management on 7 April 2023.

Management finally agreed to meet to discuss these issues- at 8pm last night. The Facility Manager and Deputy Facility Manager attended in person, while the Care Coordinator joined online.

The meeting was intense and lasted for 2.5 hours. The main topic that was discussed were severe workloads for night shift workers, but it was also a great opportunity for members who hardly see any management while at work to bring up many other issues.

Your HSU Organiser Hyojung also attended the meeting and informed higher management members expect a prompt response to the important safety matters raised.

Please find below a brief summary of the meeting:

1.    Extra Staff

Local management will hold another discussion around extra staff for night shift with higher management next week, and will inform us on the timeframe by Friday 14 April. We have requested 3 more staff on night shift.

2.    Night shift hours

Members want night shift hours to go back to how they were before the roster change, i.e. 2130 to 0730. HSU members successfully stopped the major roster change in December 2021, but night shift hours have still been affected.  

3.    Online training

Online training hours outside work hour will be paid on request. We will receive written confirmation on the procedure soon.

4.    Workloads

Management confirmed that the workload issue will be a meeting agenda item at least on a quarterly basis, as specified in your Enterprise Agreement.

In addition, a number of other small matters were raised during the meeting. Please feel free to contact Hyojung on 0458 012 322 to follow up on those matters.

Next steps

This meeting was a good start, but it is important for us to keep organised and continue to fight for our safety.

I want to acknowledges those members who came to the meeting and spoke up. Tell your workmates who are not yet members to join the HSU. We are stronger when we stand together. New members can join at www.hsu.asn.au/join or call 1300 478 679.