UFU orders: stop review

Cease all co-operation, MFB told

THE United Firefighters Union has used its veto powers under a workplace agreement to prevent independent reviewers looking into sexism and bullying from visiting fire stations.

It can be revealed union boss Peter Marshall launched a workplace dispute on March 7 this year in a bid to stymie the independent review by the Victorian Equal Opportunity and Human Rights Commission.

The MFB at that stage had already relented and stopped the station visits by VEOHRC investigators, but told the union it didn’t believe it was required to under their enterprise agreement.

It comes more than 18 months after warnings were first issued about veto powers the UFU was seeking in new CFA and MFB enterprise agreements.

On March 16 this year, Mr Marshall wrote to the MFB telling it to quash the entire review.

“The UFU requires that the MFB cease all co-operation with the VEOHRC Review and join with the UFU in a submission to the government that the review be discontinued and no further use be made of its work so far,” Mr Marshall wrote.

The union then went to the Fair Work Commission to try to stop the review from ever being released.

Based on the workplace agreements the CFA and MFB have with the union, Fair Work commissioner Nick Wilson last week told the parties to come together in a “conciliation”, along with Victoria’s Human Rights Commissioner Kristen Hilton.

Commissioner Wilson told the CFA and MFB “there would need to be modifications of some kind to the form, substance and expected timing of the VEOHRC work.”

Documents lodged with Fair Work reveal the CFA agreed to the meeting, but the MFB did not, leading to the union’s Supreme Court challenge.

“Respectively, the proposed conciliation process and the stated preconditions for its success, would necessarily compromise the independence of VEOHRC,” the MFB wrote back.

“The UFU should not use the dispute resolutions process under the operational staff agreement to pursue an agenda that appears designed to undermine, and interfere in the findings of, the VEOHRC review,” it wrote in another submission.

The UFU’s claim says the MFB failed to consult about the establishment of an acting Deputy Chief Officer to lead the response to the review.

Mr Marshall said his union had long been a supporter of diversity in the fire services, but the review’s flaws meant it could unfairly damage the reputation of firefighters.