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The ASU has members employed as private sector clerical and administrative (C&A) employees in most industries in Australia. Almost all C&A workers are eligible to join the ASU.
These workers are covered by a wide range of Awards and Enterprise Agreements, made at the State or National level. Generally speaking, industries or companies organised on a national basis (eg road transport industry, vehicle manufacturers) will be governed by National (Federal) Awards or Agreements where there are named employer parties. Most other clerical and administrative employees are employed in localised industries and rely on State Awards and Agreements.
There are many exceptions to this rule. In Victoria, there is no State industrial system so all employees are covered by Federal legislation, awards and agreements.
If you are in doubt, your local Clerical & Administrative Branch of the Union will be able to tell you whether you are covered by awards and agreements won by ASU members.
Industries with ASU coverage
The main National and State based industries in which the ASU has significant membership are as follows:
National:
- Breweries (eg CUB, Tooheys)
- Customs Clearing and International Freight Forwarding (eg Federal Express)
- Health Funds (eg MBF, NIB)
- Oil (eg Caltex, Mobil
- Paint (eg Wattyl, Dulux)
- Privatised public sector agencies (eg Auscript, AWB)
- Records Management (eg Recall)
- Retail (eg Coles Myer, Target, David Jones, Woolworths etc)
- Road Transport (eg Mayne Nickless, TNT, Finemores etc) (see the Transport & Travel home page)
- Vehicle manufacturing (eg Toyota, Ford, Holden, Mitsubishi)
State:
- Auto Clubs (eg RACV, NRMA)
- Call centres - see Call Centre campaign page
- Chemical & Pharmaceutical (Sigma, Fauldings)
- Community Non-Profit (Blood Bank, RSPCA)
- Data processing
- Food industry (eg Simplot)
- Higher Education (QLD & SA)
- Legal industry
- Manufacturing/Metal industry (eg BOC, Email)
- Newspapers
- Printing
- Security/cash transport (see the Transport & Travel home page)
- TAB
- Temporary office employees
- Vehicle Retail
Skills training and recognition
Clerical and administrative employees are skilled workers but their skills are not always recognised. In some cases this is because they have gained their skills through informal training on the job and don't have formal certificates to hang on the wall to advertise their qualifications. This is slowly changing.
Competency standards now exist for clerical/admin work. Today standards are located in Training Packages developed by Industry Training Advisory Bodies (ITABs) on which unions and employer organizations are represented. The Business Services ITAB currently has the job of looking after the Business Services Training Package, which includes clerical and admin skills.
Training is now available from many sources on a modular "bite sized" basis. No longer do workers have to do complete courses - they can have their existing skills recognised through assessment and access top up training for the rest. If they can demonstrate that they have a full package of skills identified in the endorsed Training Package, they can get a qualification issued by a registered training provider (RTO).
Some problems still exist with access to this process, including who pays for the training and assessment. Workers can and have made this an industrial issue as part of enterprise bargaining to get their employer to pay. More information is available from Keith Harvey in the National Office: kharvey@asu.asn.au or from the following training bodies:
- Business Services Training Australia - this ITAB is responsible for maintaining the Business Services TP. The site has regular updates on developments with the Training Package and other useful info. The ASU is represented on the Board of the ITAB as one of two ACTU nominated representatives.
- Aspire Training and Consulting (formerly Admin Training Company) - this company was formed in 1991 on the initiative of the Federated Clerks Union (a predecessor of the ASU) to promote training and skills recognition for clerical/admin workers in the private sector. Today the Company provides a wide range of training materials to support skill development in office skills as well as assessment and consulting services. ASU National Industrial Officer Keith Harvey is the current chair.
- Australian National Training Authority - the national government body responsible for promoting vocational education and training. This site has a link to the...
- National Training Information Service - which has details of the current Business Services Training Package. The site is often slow and clunky but you can go straight to the Business Services Training Package by clicking here. This page links you directly to the standards, qualification requirements and assessment options set out in the package.
Remember, clerical & administrative workers are skilled workers, too. Let's make sure we tell each other, our employers and the world!
Keith Harvey & John Nucifora
National Industrial Officers
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