What's a Consultative Committee and what does it do?
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- Published: Tuesday, 31 May 2011 10:42
In the 1980s, when there was a co-operative relationship between the Hawke/Keating Federal government and the trade union movement, principles were adopted by the Australian Industrial Relations Commission and the various State Commissions to improve the structural efficiency of industries.
Part of this process was the adoption of the wisdom of having a formalised consultation process in industrial instruments to require employers to consult with employees and to allow employees to provide valuable feedback to management about workplace initiatives and how the work is done.
The provision to require the establishment of Consultative Committees at each council was first incorporated in the State Award in 1992. With almost 20 years of hindsight, it's clear it hasn't been easy but there still remains a valuable role for a genuine consultative process.
This doesn't mean Management wheeling in initiatives with an expectation that they will be automatically rubber stamped by the employee representatives, nor does it mean councils proposing initiatives at the Consultative Committee and, even faced with unanimous opposition by employee representatives, continuing with that initiative.
The process is meant to be genuinely consultative and management is intended to be open-minded to this approach.
It is true that consultative committees have exhausted many, many volunteers who went into a process with open-minds and great enthusiasm to be met by tedium, management regarding the exercise as a waste of time, preoccupations with trivia etc. However, Consultative Committees continue to perform a valuable role.
Clause 28 Consultative Committees prescribes the aim, size and composition, scope (that is, the functions) and requirements about meetings and support services.
Significantly, clause 28C(i) provides the following as the minimum functions of the Committees:
- Award implementation
- training
- consultation with regard to organisation restructure
- job redesign
- salary systems
- communication and education mechanisms
- performance management systems
- changes to variable working hours arrangements for new or vacant positions
- local government reform
- proposed variations the least practical arrangements
The size and composition of the Consultative Committees (clause 28B) is to be agreed "by Council and the local representatives" from the three unions but there is a minimum requirement of representatives of the three unions which have members at the Council.
While this allows an opportunity for councils to try to reach agreement to have representatives of non-union members, these initiatives are invariably rejected by the local union representatives and this opposition is encouraged by the three unions.