GETTING PUSHED TO KERB
Gold Coast staff face a precarious future as the council pursues its costcutting goal of outsourcing work
UNIONS know their pay dispute with Gold Coast City Council will not gain support from all ratepayers. They admit outdoor workers are often unfairly branded bludgers.
Apart from the money, there is a much bigger issue here.
This is the conversation about the winners and losers from council, one of the city’s major employers, contracting out labour.
The best parts of CEO Dale Dickson’s recent update to councillors about the council “roadmap” for the future occurred in a closed session.
But before the doors were shut Mr Dickson produced slides which showed the Coast would grow by 69,000 people in the next five years, the equivalent of a regional city like Gladstone.
The central Queensland port’s council has about 600 permanent staff. Our council numbers will not grow by that much, he cautioned.
What will happen to the workforce?
When Allconnex was absorbed back into Gold Coast Water in July 2012, there were 3486 employees. Five years later, after the city grows from 525,000 to 567,000 the workforce reduces by 72.
Councillors privately admit that employment trend will continue.
Now consider council’s announcement this month about Fujitsu which won a $140 million contract for the next five years to provide ICT services.
A lengthy media statement outlined the benefits of the deal. Council will only pay for the services it needs, Fujitsu is creating jobs by setting up an office here.
But nothing in the release spoke about any job losses at council.
Your columnist was contacted this week by Labor’s Bonney candidate Rowan Holzberger who has been doorknocking around Labrador.
“A woman told me that she had been made redundant. She was made to stay there (at council) and retrain her replacement, which was the first insult,” Mr Holzberger said.
“The work is being sent out to labour hire companies and overseas employees. This a huge loss for our community, a lot of people will find it harder to put food on the table because of this decision.
“This is the problem with wall-to-wall LNP on the Gold Coast. Not a single local LNP member is standing up against policies that are disastrous for families and communities.”
Union insiders told Mr Holzberger that up to 150 workers had lost their jobs.
Mr Dickson estimates 60 staff were replaced, and admits a small group were retained to support the transition of ICT services to Fujitsu.
“This is the normal part of the transition process – this process was consistent with advice from implementation partner KPMG at the time,” he told your columnist.
After months of speculation about his future, Mr Dickson last month was given an extended three-year contract but only after he delivered the “roadmap”.
For Mayor Tom Tate, a major plank of his election platform is ensuring rate increases do not creep above CPI which, in turn, requires controlling the bulging waistline of bureaucracy.
Sitting and listening to the Mayor and the CEO are the councillors, none of them making much contribution yet to the debate.
Back at Labrador and in other suburbs where former workers are looking for new jobs, are potential voters.
Around Evandale there are almost 4000.
What the union knows is these workers are watching carefully to see what support they will get from elected representatives in the chamber in terms of working conditions and job security.
What is the end political game here? Councillors depending on their stand could be looking for work.