Page 628 - Week 02 - Thursday, 21 February 2019
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Appendix A
Citizen’s right of reply:
Response by Mr Fowler, Secretary of the Australian Education Union, ACT Branch
I am the Secretary of the Australian Education Union ACT Branch (AEU). On 24 October 2018, Ms Elizabeth Lee MLA referred to the AEU during the debate over a motion that she moved in relation to workplace safety in ACT Government public schools. The AEU is one of the largest unions in the ACT. We represent over 3500 members made up of teachers, principals and learning support assistants in public schools and CIT.
On 24 October Ms Lee asserted that the AEU had not advocated sufficiently for our members who were victims of occupational violence. Ms Lee implied that we had failed to keep our members safe in their workplaces and suggested that we were not fulfilling our duty to represent members. The representation of our members is our core business as is ensuring that they work in safe workplaces.
I seek to correct the record in relation to Ms Lee's comments which are an attempt to sully the reputation of our union and of me personally. The AEU stand by the well-known historical union principle that an injury to one is an injury to all.
In October 2016, WorkSafe ACT (WorkSafe) were alerted to the issue of occupational violence in ACT Government Schools by the AEU office. To my knowledge the information that we provided to WorkSafe sparked the investigation that Worksafe conducted into occupational violence in ACT schools. Our first complaint to WorkSafe was in the form of an affidavit by AEU member now known in the media as Melanie. Melanie first contacted the AEU office in July 2016 about alleged occupational violence that she had suffered at her workplace. It was Melanie’s case that alerted the AEU to begin the journey that we embarked on to address what we discovered were systemic failures to address occupational violence (OV) in schools.
In late 2016 we conducted a survey of our members. The response to this survey was the strongest that we had ever had in a short timeframe. The results indicated widespread under-reporting of OV. A culture of acceptance of OV had developed and little was being done to minimise the OV risks to our members. The survey prompted members to contact our office if they had been or were currently victims of occupational violence. It was at this time that the AEU became aware of the enormity of the issue of OV in the workplaces of our members. It also became clear that OV was perpetrated by people including parents and carers and that this issue needed to be addressed on a systemic level.
As the WorkSafe investigation progressed we needed to respect the process, but we did not rest on our laurels. We sought meetings with the relevant Minister, with the Education Directorate and through the broader union movement we were successful in achieving a position on the ACT Work Safety Council. We embarked on what we
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