You all recently participated in a vote on Management’s EA Offer. As you are aware, the USU held meetings with you to discuss the offer and to affirm our commitment that if you voted NO then we would continue to pursue your key claims that you had previously indicated to us.

The key claim that was strongly debated in these meetings and confirmed by you was for the USU to continue to pursue a Working from Home Allowance (Distributed Working Allowance).

It was clearly put to us that by having this claim pursued, it recognised your work and your working needs. The feedback that you provided was that you work hard, produce good results for Essential Energy and it was about time that you as indoor staff received some recognition for the hard work you do!

We agree! And we indicted that if you voted NO then we would go back as a Bargaining Committee to strongly put your claim as a key claim that is deeply and widely felt by you and this vote affirms to Management what we have been saying all along!

The USU is happy to say that on Friday we received news that the offer was significantly voted down by 74.88%.

This sends a powerful message to management that they need to sit up and listen to what members are saying and we commit to negotiating your claim with the confidence of knowing that this claim, as well as your other key claims, are strongly felt by you all.

We are happy to report that Management have already indicated that they remain committed to continue Bargaining in Good Faith with the combined unions and that they will be contacting the unions to set up bargaining meetings.

Congratulations to you all for taking this stand and as we indicated in our meetings with you – we will be meeting with you in coming weeks to discuss the negotiations and allow the great debates on your claims that occurred in our meetings recently to continue with you because that is unionism. We also want to be sure that we are bargaining with the confidence that the claims we are negotiating on are deeply and widely felt by you!

If you have anything that you wish to raise in the meantime, please contact one of your Bargaining Representatives (see over).

You can also contact your Organiser Melissa Pond at mpond@usu.org.au

If you are not a member and wish to join, you can do so at www.usu.org.au/join! Remember the more members at Essential Energy, the stronger as a union we become together!