Tax office employees vote in favour of pay deal

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Australian Taxation Office staff have voted in favour of a proposed wage deal put to them under the Australian Public Service’s bargaining round, albeit on a significantly reduced margin compared with other agencies.

Questions remain, however, over how flexible work exceptions will be decided.

In an email to ATO staff by commissioner Chris Jordan, the revenue agency said 76.87% of eligible employees had voted in favour of the pay deal, with an eligible voter turnout of 83.96%.

Jordan told staff: “This positive result means I have now signed a determination under section 24(1) of the Public Service Act 1999 that allows me to provide eligible employees with:

• a one-off payment of 0.92% of your base salary, that is expected to be in your pay on Thursday, 14 March 2024;
• the first pay increase of 4% effective from 14 March 2024, that is expected to be in your pay from Thursday, 28 March 2024.

“The ATO executive and I are pleased to be able to deliver this one-off payment to you without delay. The conditions within the agreement will take effect seven days after the Fair Work Commission approves the new agreement.

“We continue to recognise your hard work and dedication in delivering for the Australian community and are committed to delivering the benefits and future pay increases from the new ATO enterprise agreement.

“I want to thank you all for voting and those involved in the bargaining process over the last year, it has been a huge effort to get us to this point.”

The ATO employee vote has been one of the most closely watched across the APS. The agency remains a stronghold for the Australian Services Union Taxation Officers’ Branch, which had advocated for a ‘No’ vote in the hope of retrieving pay rises sacrificed to keep conditions during the Abbott years that cumulatively made up 6%.

The ‘Yes’ vote is certain to be a disappointment to the ASU’s tax branch after a long and hard-fought campaign that saw the union publicly unstitch some of the Australian Public Service Commission’s marketing efforts and trigger apologies and a correction because of a fictitious call-centre worker dubbed “Tammy”.

Aside from the issue of sacrificed pay rises dating back to 2014-2017, the ASU pushed particularly hard on specifics and details on how work-from-home would operate in practice and what constituted reasonable business grounds for refusal, as well as specifics around time-off-in-lieu for executive-level staff.

For pay deals to be voted up by staff under bargaining, a simple majority (more than 50%) of eligible employees must vote in favour. The vote is usually carried out by an independent polling or election agent registered with the Fair Work Commission.

The Community and Public Sector Union, the bigger union in the ATO, had advocated for a ‘Yes’ vote, in line with its support for the service-wide final APSC offer of 11.2%-plus pay increase over three years, plus a sign-on bonus.

While the pay deal is being voted up in no uncertain terms, the level of support varies agency by agency, according to the log of agency ballot results listed on the CPSU’s website.

There are now 43 agency ballot results listed on the CPSU’s website, all in favour.

While still over three-quarters in favour, the ATO employees’ 76.87% vote for the agreement is easily the lowest so far and the only vote to dip below 80% support.

The bulk of agencies so far have votes in favour of the new pay deal above 90%, with the exception of the Civil Aviation Safety Authority (CASA), which came in at 80.39%. The Australian Securities and Investments Commission recorded 85.19% in favour.

Aside from the ASU, opposition to the APS pay deal is fiercest among unions that represent non-administrative, technical, trade or specialist staff on the commonwealth’s payroll.

The Australian Federal Police Association, the Electrical Trades Union, the Construction, Forestry and Maritime Employees Union and the Australian Manufacturing Workers Union have either commenced industrial action or are in the process of having it authorised in protest to the pay deal.

Professionals Australia and the United Firefighters Union are also known to have issues with the pay deal and a number of its conditions.

The broad argument is that while staff that drive a desk can benefit from new flexible work conditions, and even save money on petrol and commuting, tradies, cops and firies get none of those benefits and are seeing their pay languish.

Notably, the Australian Federal Police as an employer has indicated support for the AFPA, whose pursuit of industrial action is unprecedented.

“The AFP continues to work constructively with the AFPA on avenues they are seeking, including through the Fair Work Commission and the requirements of the Fair Work Act,” the AFP told The Mandarin on February 16.

Voting on the new APS pay deal continues.