2024 - 2027 Paramedic/Ambulance Officer EBA Negotiations

To view what is happening in your Paramedic negotiations click here.

Meeting Chaired By
Brendan Brodie-Hall.

Meeting Conducted
13:00 – 16:00.

Committee Attendees
John Thomas, Mike Hardwick, Lee Waller, Dave Higgins, Callan McClure, Rick Candy, Conrad Fairhead, Gary Davies, Dave Bryant, Shannan Bradley, Justin Ingrey and Paul Davies.

Committee Apologies
There were no apologies.

SJA Attendees
Brendon Brodie-Hall, Karen Stewart, Joe Cuthbertson, Joel Moore, Carly Rees, and Stephanie Freemantle.

Meeting to Improve Current Issues
Triple time, overtime, shift extensions, operational improvements, scheduling meal breaks rather than a best endeavours model. There is lots of work in the background and the work will be discussed at the next EBA meeting.

The Summary of Todays Meeting

The AEAWA negotiation team met with St John representatives on Monday for the 9th EBA meeting to replace the 2021 Paramedic Enterprise Agreement.

Today, the anticipated full-day of negotiations was downgraded to a half-day meeting due to the Crowdstrike IT outage on Friday. The outage impacted meetings planned to finalise the St John position on specific claims.

The main areas for discussion were Country and Regional claims. St John presented a ‘Regional Proposal’ to resolve all claims relating to country allowances and the Northwest Duties Allowance. This reasonably complex proposal seeks to reform the pay and conditions for country relief and the pay and conditions for permanent positions.

At this stage, we await the details and figures in the PowerPoint presentation shown during the meeting. The negotiation committee needs this data to analyse and consider the proposal’s short-term, medium and long-term implications before we can provide an update on the committee’s position.

Naturally, this process will also involve discussions with our country representatives and delegates. Once this process has concluded, we will provide a detailed summary of the proposal to our members here.

Moving on to the other business discussed, Brendon Brodie-Hall briefly updated the bargaining groups. Brendon indicated that much work was occurring ‘behind the scenes’ to present a proposal to address the apparent root cause of several claims relating to meal breaks, unreasonable shift extensions, and overtime fairness.

These are issues which have repeatedly been stated to be critical to improving morale. They hope to present this proposal at the next EA meeting.

During this discussion, your negotiators again raised the issue of unfair and inconsistent overtime allocation, particularly concerning triple time. Your delegates again pushed for an automated ‘app’ for overtime distribution and acceptance, which would ensure fairness and transparency.

As a result of this discussion, St John indicated they would try to implement short-term measures regarding overtime allocation until a dedicated electronic system could be developed. We will keep you informed.

Once again, we apologise for the short update and hope to be able to summarise the country proposal once we have received and analysed it in detail.

Meeting Closed
16:45.

Next Meeting
TBA.

Meeting Chaired By
Joe Cuthbertson.

Meeting Conducted
09-00 – 16:00.

Committee Attendees
John Thomas, Mike Hardwick, Lee Waller, Dave Higgins, Callan McClure, Gary Davies, Dave Bryant, Justin Ingrey and Paul Davies.

Committee Apologies
Rick Candy and Conrad Fairhead.

SJA Attendees
Joe Cuthbertson, Joel Moore, Carly Rees and Stephanie Freemantle.

The Negotiations

The AEAWA negotiation team met with St John representatives yesterday for the 8th EBA meeting to replace the 2021 Paramedic Enterprise Agreement.

As you will see below, the areas for discussion today related to CCP and PSO claims only..

CCP Claims

CCP Salary
The CCP claim is to increase the salary to $180,000 plus any rises in future from year 2025, 2026 as per final agreed EBA pay increments.

The CCP delegates presented a slideshow comparing salary with RFDS Senior Flight Retrieval nurses ($178,000) highlighting that the CCP cohort attend cases to which a Flight nurse would not be tasked alone but would attend with a senior flight doctor. Our CCP members attend these high clinical risk cases alone, and perform interventions that would traditional be the remit of a senior doctor in ED.

CCP’s also perform rescue crewman duties (typically a specialist role in itself), and have increased their skills and scope in recent years:
· Ultrasound EFAST, ultra-sounded guided IV access,
· ISTAT POC blood gas analysis, with associated training.
· Fibrinogen (blood product), Magnesium Sulphate, Insulin, Calcium Gluconate, Noradrenaline, (Oxytocin coming soon) GTN IV, Paracetamol IV, Keppra, (Levetiracetam) Glucose 50%, Sodium Bicarbonate, Hypertonic Saline, Solucotef (Hydrocortisone Sodium Succinate), Hartmann’s Solution (Sodium Lactate) Ropivacaine.
· Non-Invasive Ventilation, Abdominal Aortic, Junctional Tourniquet
· ETT removed from Paramedics so more chance CCP required to use the skill in CPR where indicated.

St John state their offer of 5%, 5%, 4%will apply equally to all roles, and will not entertain an alternate pay claim for CCP.

CCP to be Made Permanent Appointment Rank
Accepted.

Crew Formation (Dual CCP or CCP & CCP Intern)
This claim relates to creating a clause in the EBA which would guarantee a specific crew formation for CCP, particular for the CCP On Road role. CCP members strongly believe the CCP On Road role needs to be dual operator to ensure operator safety.

St John state that at this point in time, they cannot commit to a specific crew formation in the EBA. This is because of the contractual arrangements with DFES and the Aeromedical Inquiry currently ongoing.

St John were reminded that this claim was specifical aimed at CCP On Road, which is not related to contractual arrangements.

The claim remains open.

Classifications and Role Clarity (CCP1, CCP2, CCP3 & CCP4)
At this point in time, St John are unwilling to introduce a classification for CCP Intern. St John did indicate support for the idea of a senior CCP but are unwilling to break down CCP Road vs CCP Helicopter or introduce tiers of progression (CCP1/CP2/CCP3 etc) for the reason that the helicopter is contracted.

It was highlighted that the organisation does have the Student Ambulance Officer (SAO) classification in the EA, and Paramedic Intern positions in the EA, so why does CCP Intern not warrant its own classification and pay-scale?

St John will take away the discussion around a progression-based clause, but will not agree to breakdown of the classification.

Redrafting of ‘other duties’ clause (clause 16.3)
Rather than redraft the other duties clause, St John instead proposed to delete the clause. We will examine the potential impacts of deleting the whole clause and respond to St John in due course.

Helicopter Flight Allowances
This claim relates to travel allowances. St John’s position is that the travel allowances would operate in the same way as permanent AP positions, which would mean that if a CCP is allocated a permanent ‘base’ or depot, they would not receive travel allowances.

St John position is that any time a person works on the helicopter, they should be receiving the flight allowance.

Discussions are ongoing.

Preferred position requests (CCP Intern)
This claim concerns creating preferred position requests for CCPs. The AEAWA position is that when an intern has successfully completed their internship, or should a qualified CCP wish to change their permanent work location, they should be able to place a preferred position request in for any current or future bases. This would operate with the same mechanism as current AP preferred position requests, including the establishment of lists.

Agreed.

Lead Allowances
St John state they are not in a position to offer renumeration for any of the portfolios which have been created and assigned to CCP’s (e.g. airway lead)

The claim remains open.

Mentor Allowance
St John agreed that where tutoring of CCP Interns takes place, the allowance should be paid. St John was reminded the clause is for a ‘tutor’ allowance, not a ‘mentor’ allowance to be payable where a CCP is tutoring a CCP Intern.

Agreed.

Time Rostered on Helicopter
This claim related to increasing the time that a CCP will be rostered to the helicopter. The current clause states St John will ‘endeavor’ to ensure eligible Critical Care Paramedics receive a minimum of 3 x 8 weeks per year of active operational duty on the helicopter.

This claim was to increase the minimum time rostered to the helicopter to 4 x 8 weeks rosters, and change the word ‘endeavor’ to ‘will’. St John proposed to delete this clause entirely, citing that it is there intention to always roster CCP’s to the helicopter.

The AEAWA delegates raised a concern that despite the suggestion to delete the clause being well intentioned, the proposed deletion of any clause regarding rostering to the helicopter leaves the CCP cohort vulnerable.

The claim remains open, with discussions ongoing.

CPHC CCP Trainers – New Allowance
In principle St John have agreed to this, however they cannot confirm agreement until they have run the numbers.

Death Cover/ Life Insurance Cover
St John have met with finance to discuss on several occasions but have no solution/proposal at this stage.

Night Shift Payment
Currently CCP’s receive a night shift payment at AP3 rank, rather than CCP rank. This is because there is no CCP night shift allowance listed in the EBA, despite the fact that the allowance generally increases in rank.

St John indicated agreement to adjusting this appropriately and stated they are calculating this allowance and will report back.

Deployment Allowance
The deployment allowance should apply not only to PSO and CCP, but to any AP that is deployed to an event.

Gym Allowance
St John state they believe the Health & Wellbeing Allowance covers this claim. St John also argue that both bases also have gyms in place, therefore St John do not support this.

Job Share
St John are in agreement that Job Share should be available to CCP’s where two officers are interested in establishing that arrangement.

Overtime Matrix
This claim intends to formalise the allocation of CCP overtime, rather than continue using a ‘local arrangement’, which has in the past led to unfair distribution.

On-Call Allowance
On call allowance changed to be based on the individuals rank i.e. SM 2 would receive 0.5% of SM base hourly rate not 0.5% of the Student Ambulance Officer – Operations weekly base rate of pay.

This claim is for CCP’s to be paid on call allowance pro-rata rate for being on deployment roster (done in 2023 for flood and fire season) also part of DFES contract to be available.

Shift Commencement Check – include

Agreed.

CCP Structure – formal structure in the EA
St John decline this, but as above will look at a senior role and a formal Intern role.

Rescue Crewperson Allowance
St John were informed that a qualified rescue crewman role typically receives around $82,000 for winch and rescue skills, whereby they do not have any additional clinical responsibility.

St John declined this claim as they believe the Flight Allowance covers the additional skills and training required for Rescue Crewman.

PSO Claims
Rates of pay to be equivalent to the proposed SM4 base rate. St John reject the claim for SM4 and so reject this claim on that basis.

PSO Crew Formation
This claim is for all crew PSO activations to be PSO/PSO. The AEAWA have proposed that single operator responses will be considered where a PSO is deploying with other agencies i.e. DFES, USAR etc but they should not be deployed alone to a scene.

St John indicated in principle agreement and will draft a clause for consideration.

Update 30.9(b)(i) to be consistent with intent of 17.2(b)
This claim relates to the ‘Filling an Allocated Position’ clause, and the associated time of depot limits on losing a permanent position. St John have proposed instead to make the PSO role a permanent position and therefore subject to the normal permanent position mechanisms.

Increase the Current Value of On-Call Allowance
This claim is to increase the value of the on-call allowance, noting that PSO’s can be advised of a potential deployment several days in advance of a deployment occurring, and are asked to effectively put their lives on hold waiting to hear if they are being deployed.

Allowance When PSOs are Deployed Without Facilities. Parity with DEFS, USAR
St John are looking at this. Under consideration…

Next Meeting: Monday 22 July 2024

Meeting Chaired By
Carly Rees.

Meeting Conducted
09-00 – 16:00.

Committee Attendees
John Thomas, Mike Hardwick, Lee Waller, Dave Higgins, Callan McClure, Rick Candy, Shannan Bradley, Gary Davies, Dave Bryant, Justin Ingrey and Paul Davies.

Committee Apologies
Conrad Fairhead.

SJA Attendees
Joe Cuthbertson, Joel Moore, Luke Carpenter, Carly Rees Mike Eyre, Brendon Brodie-Hall, and Stephanie Freemantle.

SJA Undertakings

Employee Personal Leave Breakdown
At the last meeting the AEAWA asked St John for balances of personal leave dates across the Paramedic workforce. St Jon returned with the below figures.

• Over 200 days 0.26%
• 150-200 days 0.53%
• 100-150 days 2.11%
• 75-100 days 4.75%
• 50-75 days 5.99%
• 25-50 days 17.17%
• 15-25 days 17.69%
• 10-15 days 13.20%
• 5-10 days 14.00%
• 0-5 days 17.69%
• Less than 0 days 6.87%

The AEAWA negotiation team met with St John representatives yesterday for the 7th EBA meeting to replace the 2021 Paramedic Enterprise Agreement. Today, the team were treated to a full day of negotiations. As you will see below, the big-ticket items for discussion were the alternate roster proposal and the St John pay offer.

Apologies in advance for the long post. There is a lot of stuff to summarise during this meeting.

Alternative Roster Proposal
Firstly, St John has indicated that they will not seek to introduce a new roster during this Agreement. The proposal’s purpose at this EA negotiation is to facilitate a trial or ‘pilot’ to enable a small group of employees to work an alternate roster, better understand the operational impacts, and gain feedback from those involved with the trial. St John wishes to gradually implement a trial culminating in up to four vehicles working the alternate roster.

Initially, four officers from each shift colour will be voluntarily moved onto this new roster for the trial. These 16 officers will facilitate the first vehicle (at the new Cowcher depot), which is proposed to commence sometime after July 1, 2025. If resources can be funded and recruited, a potential further trial vehicle would be placed at Wangara. If the MEP (metro expansion project) is funded and implemented as currently proposed to DOH, additional trial vehicles could be located at MEP locations from January 2026 or after once resources are available. As you can see, there is unlikely to be any wholesale rollout of any alternate roster during the life of the Agreement.

The AEAWA has always been open-minded towards alternate roster proposals. The AEAWA recently presented our alternate roster to reduce fatigue and improve morale. This was a blended 224 / 4×4 roster (i.e. Day/Day/Night/Night -> Day/Day/Late/Late -> Day/Day/Night/Night) but was rejected by St John. The AEAWA supports roster choice.

Given St John’s neglect of night shift cover in recent years, we anticipate any new roster containing fewer night shifts will be popular. Of course, we are mindful that any roster change may not suit all employees. A wholesale change to shift times will likely affect pre-existing family and carer commitments for some employees. Therefore, guided by member feedback, we will always advocate that no member should be forced onto a new roster pattern unwillingly To facilitate the trial, St John would like to amend the Agreement currently being negotiated. Hmm.

St John has indicated that start times for the early and late shifts would ‘need to vary at different locations’ to match the demand profile for that region. The AEAWA are mindful that introducing changes into the EA before any trial data or feedback and without any clear commitment to the roster itself could expose our members to having their work hours changed unilaterally by St John. We disagree that an EBA amendment is immediately required to facilitate this trial, especially given the timescales stretching to at least 2026. Any changes to the EBA should be made with full awareness and transparency regarding how a new roster would operate, what ‘flexibility’ would mean concerning start and finish times, and firm information relating to any effects on pay and conditions. We must understand the ‘warts and all’ picture of any new roster before introducing new ‘flexibility’ for St John into the current Agreement.

Should the trial prove successful, and our members show interest in formally adopting a new roster, we will endorse any required changes to the EBA, mindful of factors which will only be apparent following trial data and with consideration to possible impacts on individual members. In the interim, we suggest St John facilitate the trial by creating IFAs for employees interested in participating. This will enable the trial to proceed immediately with the full support of the AEAWA, without the undue delay of waiting for negotiations to conclude and for the FWC to ratify the agreement.

When discussing alternate rosters, it is also worth noting that St John admitted yesterday it has been ‘several years’ since the full complement of 224 vehicles and Day ambulances was fully staffed. When St John offers triple time, and the organisation nears full staffing, response times improve, and 224 becomes more tolerable. We support any roster that benefits our members but require any roster we adopt to be fully staffed. We will proceed cautiously, ensuring that conditions governing work hours are not sacrificed before the trial has even been scoped.

More skeptical members might wonder what St John has to gain from proposing a roster with fewer night shifts, but that does not (by their admission) improve standby capacity. We have it on good authority that this is not a priority for St John. Even more skeptical members may suspect this is a smokescreen to distract members from a sub-standard pay raise (more on this below) and cause division in a united workforce.

The AEAWA team reserves judgment, but we do wonder if an organisation that struggles with four shift colours could manage eight shift colours and perhaps whether this proposal may be a vessel to introduce the exact roster flexibility we rejected at the last EBA (ability to alter hours of work at short notice, ability to move an employee across shift colours etc). Rest assured, should our members wish to work on either of the proposed new rosters, we will 100% support their introduction. But we will do so in a way that preserves roster choice and secures consistency of shift patterns and hours of work, which is required for adequate work/life balance. One of our current system’s key benefits is knowing your work days and work hours well into the future.

On to the proposals…

Metropolitan Roster Proposal
After considerable preamble, St John presented two proposals for new rosters. Day/Early/Late/Night (DELN) Joel Moore announced that the DELN roster had been inspired by the ACT’s new roster. However, the ACT roster is actually based on 44 hours (as below), not the 48 hours proposed by St John. Employees on the latest ACT roster suffered no loss of pay or conditions. They received a ‘Roster Adjustment Allowance’ and ‘Leave Adjustment Allowance’ to ensure they retained salary and annual leave from their earlier 224 roster. The ACT roster would be preferential to the St John variation on that theme. We imagine the short first day and the short night would be particularly welcome to our members.

It is worth noting that the ACT Government had to increase funding by $20m for an additional 10 F/T ambulances to ensure there was no coverage shortfall. St John has not indicated how they intend to fund the shortfall in night coverage, but we suspect they have a cunning plan.

ACT ROSTER (for comparison purposes)
0630-1630 (10 hour)
0900-2100 (12 hour)
1100-2300 (12 hour)
2100-0700 (10 hour)

Primary Roster Proposal (DELN)
The hours below are for the DELN model as proposed by St John. While they suggest there will be no loss of conditions (same pay, eight weeks leave), it is worth noting that St John has indicated an intention at the next EBA to unroll the salary. This may mean future changes to shift allowances/loading under any new roster with different hours.

We will examine this and report back.
0700-1900 (12 hours)
0800-2000 (12 hours)
1000-2200 (12 hours)
1900-0700 (12 hours)

The initial plan is to overlay the DELN roster onto the existing shift patterns; however, while St John skirted the issue, their comments suggested Day Ambulance will not feature in the longer term under this model. Again, the AEAWA would not support the compulsory movement off any existing roster pattern. We believe the workforce is sufficiently large to accommodate multiple roster patterns.

St John has also acknowledged that the current physical capacity of certain metro depots means they are unable to accommodate an 8-shift colour workforce. They also state that while the middle two shifts are listed starting at 0800 and 1000, they will require *flexibility* to alter those times to tailor the model to operational demand in different areas. They have also acknowledged they would be unlikely to be able to operate this roster in many regional and remote areas.

St John also presented a second option, a variation on 224. This variation would change all shifts to 12 hours, incorporate a staggered start time to improve standby capacity at shift changeover, and (allegedly) allow St John to hold P2 calls in the last 30 minutes of the shift, thereby helping to reduce shift extensions.
0700-1900 (12 hours)
0600-1800 (12 hours)
1900-0700 (12 hours)
1800-0600 (12 hours)

Potential Benefits
– Shorter night shift
– Ability to increase minimum mandatory break between shifts
– Possible reduction in day shift extension due to decreased
– Offset finish times will enable *consideration* of holding cases in the last 30 minutes of the shift.
– Travel to and from work occurs at less peak times.

Drawbacks
– Longer day shift
– Less ability for family time and engagement in social activities after the day shift for 1900 finish.
– Implementation of staggered starts will impact individual/carer responsibilities.
– Once we have further information and have digested the proposals, please be assured that the AEAWA will survey the membership about any new roster.

Wage Offer
Both the AEAWA and UWU have a claim for a 10% pay raise for each year of the Agreement, back paid to 1 July 2024, allowances included. Today, St John has offered 5%/5%/ 4%, which is applied to wages and allowances. They have not committed to including back pay at this stage, and they note that some claims with additional costs may negatively impact this offer. This was NOT well received.

St John attempted to confuse the group by first highlighting historical wage data showing that paramedics in WA have received a 20% increase since 2014. However, subsequent PowerPoint slides focused ONLY on CPI/WPI increases between 2020 and 2023. 20% was intended to sound impressive over the previous ten years. However, it is only equal to 2% wage growth per annum. A quick visit to the RBA website shows that a ‘basket of goods and services’ valued at $100 in March 2014 would now cost $130.40 as of March 2024.

This represents a total increase in CPI of 30.4% over ten years, at an average annual inflation rate of 2.7%. Clearly, our wages have fallen behind inflation over the last ten years. While most of this occurred unexpectedly during the last three years, St John must do better to rectify this shortfall. St John claims that the organisation has been ‘hit by the same cost-of-living pressures’ as the workforce and is financially constrained by the Ambulance Services Agreement (ASA) and the associated contractual amount of government funding.

They claim the company will be ‘in the red’ for the next 12 months, even with the offered 5% increase, as their wage funding is linked to the Wage Price Index in the ASA. St John was reminded that the ASA is allegedly ‘commercial in confidence’; therefore, we do not know what the Government funding increase has been under the new Agreement. Nonetheless, it was felt that perhaps they should not have signed a service contract with WA Health, which does not allow for a decent pay raise for their staff. This is especially true given the previous three years’ pandemic response provided by our members and the unprecedented cost-of-living pressures our members are facing.

St John also compared paramedic wages between States, and WA was the second best-paid state after the ACT. The AEAWA team questioned these comparisons, as the scope of practice of a WA ‘paramedic’ exceeds that of the base-level paramedic in several other states. St John was informed that our members will not settle for a pay offer that does not bring us back above CPI. The claim remains open.

Other Claims
Amend clause so that changes to shift will be provided preferentially during working hours in the shift worked immediately or at least 24 hours before the proposed shift change. St John argued that due to the volume of short notice book-offs, St John needs the flexibility to contact our members before they have commenced work to instruct them to attend a different location. We fundamentally disagree that our members should be effectively placed on call, contactable during their personal time, and given directions on where to turn up at work. For too long, our members have been required to show increasing flexibility to compensate for antiquated, poor rostering practices. The claim remains open.

Incorporate longstanding Custom and Practice on Agreed Overtime Increments for Overtime Calculation
As per SOPP-1003 ‘Time Cards’. St John has declined this claim, citing work towards a new payroll system (likely due 2056). The claim remains open.

Incorporate the Overtime Distribution Policy into the EBA.
St John has declined this, ironically citing a need not to follow their own policy regarding overtime distribution. The claim remains open.

Clarify and Restrict the Permissible Deployment of Single Officers Between the Country and the Metro.
The AEAWA argue that metro officers rostered to a metro station should not be deployed to fill ad hoc vacancies in country locations. This is for the following reasons:
– The Government funding for metro and country is contractually different.
– St John has stringent (excessive) recruitment processes to work in a country; why do they not matter when someone books off in, for instance, Dawesville?
– This goes against the principles of the metro crew formation clause, whereby metro officers are not supposed to work with volunteers.

St John has rejected this claim. The claim remains open.

Spare Officers
Add no officer will be ‘spare’ for more than 16 weeks in a calendar year. St John indicated they could agree to this. However, there may be ‘unintended consequences’ in that Staff Deployment may have to move other officers from the allocated position to maintain sufficient flexibility in the workforce. They also indicated that officers may be spared over and above the 16 weeks should they move or split leave. St John has promised to draft a clause for further examination.

Meal Allowance
Change the subsequent hours to every three hours was Agreed. While shift extensions of 3 hours or more are rare in the metro, this happens frequently in the country.

Employees Should Not be Expected to Travel > 45km to Commence Work.
Any further travel time should be completed from a depot. St John has rejected this claim but countered with an offer to limit travel to a maximum of 55km from their home station. This 55km proposed by St John was based on the assumption that an officer would have to move from Dwellingup to Rockingham! We still seek commitment to 45km. Any further distance needs to be travelled during shifts and from a depot. The claim remains open.

Add a Preparation Allowance Equivalent to the Officer’s Hourly Rate Per Shift.
Increase the break between shifts to a minimum of 12 hours. At this point, St John began to recognise that multiple claims aimed at protecting Spare Officers and indicated that they were hearing the message clearly. The AEAWA is aware that junior staff typically shoulder the burden of being Spare, which allows St John to respond to short-notice book-offs.

We have proposed multiple claims intended to reward Spare officers for this burden and penalise St John for their reliance on Spare officers. Many of these claims would not be necessary if St John invested in a rostering and overtime system that proactively showed live data, enabling vacancies to be filled immediately without such reliance on Spares. The claim remains open, but St John is willing to look at this issue.

Night Shift Payment Related Claims
The night shift penalty will be paid to officers who complete the full night shift overtime. Night Shift Penalty to be 2x increase for full night shifts worked Monday-Thursday Night Shift Penalty to be 2.5x increase for full night shift worked Friday/Saturday/Sunday. St John initially rejected this claim as not being financially viable. However, St John received a strong counterargument from the AEAWA for increasing night shift penalties. We strongly believe that a financial reward would incentivise staff to work night shifts, reduce the overtime burden, and lessen fatigue. St John promised to examine the figures and consider this proposal again. The claim remains open.

When an employee is rostered to work a late shift which extends past 2400 hrs, then the employee will receive the prescribed overtime and the Night Shift penalty as described in Appendix 2 Rejected. St John declined this, stating that night shift penalties would only be paid for night shifts.

Travel Allowance-Related Claims
Change 19.1(b) – delete the ‘rostered to Preferred Station’ exemption from the travel allowance. Rejected. St John claims this would result in an exponential increase in costs. The claim remains open.

Change to Double Time Per Minute of Excess KMs From Home to Station if Greater than 60KMs From Residence to Station
Rejected. This claim was proposed to incentivise employees to complete distant ICBs and recognise that Spare employees are often required to travel excessive and unreasonable distances. St John argues that they don’t want to incentivise long-distance travel because it would fatigue an employee. If that is true, St John should never ask an employee.

Adjust Travel Allowance (Appendix 2) from $0.76 per/km to $0.85 (ATO Rate 2023/24)
Agreed. St John agreed to increase the travel allowance rate to $0.85c per km and link to the ATO rate in the future. This is a significant win for our members, resulting in an 11% increase in travel allowance.

Delete Clause 19.1 (e)
Clause 19.1 relates to contacting employees outside of hours of work and being able to give them instructions while not being paid. “If an Employee is directed with at least 2 hours’ notice, as described in clause 30.16(b) of this Agreement, before the beginning of the shift, to report to another Station, that Employee must proceed to that Station in their own transport and will be paid applicable travel allowance.”

This claim is linked to the ‘Right to Disconnect’ legislation, as the above sub-clause on the current EBA would conflict with it. St John believes that being an ‘emergency service’, they would be exempt from this legislation and entitled to contact their staff out of hours. We are willing to test their interpretation and get an opinion on this from Fair Work if necessary. We know that Victoria Police recently had an agreement certified by FWC that included a ‘Right to Disconnect’ clause. They are also an ‘emergency service’, so we do not feel we, as St John employees, would be exempt from this impending legislation.

St John was advised that many of these claims result from poor operational rostering processes, which increasingly rely upon the flexibility of the workforce to compensate for their inadequacies. They are beginning to recognise that many of these claims would not be necessary if they improved their internal systems and stopped leaning on their employees’ flexibility and out-of-hours availability.

New Allowances
New allowance equal to one hour at base rate of pay for any shift with a completion time of >1930, and any shift completed during Special Leave block out periods – Rejected. The claim remains open.

New Allowance For Depot/Call Sign Where Average Call Volume Falls in the Top 25th Percentile, Based on Previous 12 Months’ Data
Rejected. The claim remains open.

Miscellaneous
Discuss the status of this clause (ASL). St John indicated they are happy to delete this clause.

Rename the SM Classification to ‘Station Officer’.
Change the name and badge colours to keep with the non-managerial role (no direct reports as per job description). Agreed.

Meeting Closed
16:00.

Next Meeting
Monday 8 July 2024.

Meeting Chaired By
Carly Rees.

Meeting Conducted
09-00 – 11:30.

Committee Attendees
John Thomas, Mike Hardwick, Lee Waller, Dave Higgins, Conrad Fairhead, Callan McClure, Rick Candy, Shannan Bradley and Paul Davies.

Committee Apologies
There were no apologies

SJA Attendees
Joe Cuthbertson, Joel Moore, Carly Rees and Stephanie Freemantle.

SJA Undertakings
At the last meeting the AEAWA asked St John for the employee breakdown (full time/part time/casual) to see the spread of employees across the workforce. St John advised that currently the breakdown is.
• 959 full time officers (81.07%)
• 198 part time officers (16.74%)
• 26 casual officers (2.2%)
• A total of 1183 officers

Paramedic EBA Update
AEAWA negotiators met with St John yesterday to discuss the replacement Paramedic Enterprise Agreement. Once again, the lesser-spotted ‘full day’ of negotiations failed to materialise, with the promised full day meeting being shortened to 3 hours.

As of 1 July 2024, our members would be due a pay raise. Given the cost of living and housing affordability crisis, this raise is not only fully deserved but also badly needed. While backpay is likely (not guaranteed), at the current slow pace of negotiations, we cannot realistically expect the Agreement to conclude until well into 2025. Negotiations need to proceed more quickly.

We have formally written to St John (listed on the AEAWA Correspondence page) to express our concerns. We have requested that all meetings going forward be ‘full day’ so that we can make genuine progress toward a pay raise our members deserve.

Paramedic EBA Agenda Items

CSP roles to be permanent and included as a classification UWU.
This is a UWU claim that we would like to discuss briefly. This claim predates the Emergency Stream Transformation, in which the CSP role is essentially (but not wholly) replaced. St John advised that a CSP classification will remain in the Agreement, as they anticipate needing a CSP in SOC. St John is still determining if this will be permanent, secondment, or a mixture of both.

As the Agreement already has a CSP classification, we, of course, support that classification remaining. We also favour incorporating the new Clinical Lead role into the Agreement and have communicated this to St John. We do not support the remaining SOC CSP role as being permanent. Under the new structure, our members have diminishing opportunities to gain experience in other roles. A secondment would allow our members to develop clinically and experience working in different parts of the organisation.

Health and Wellbeing Benefit – include in the EA – UWU/AEAWA.
St John agreed to incorporate this benefit into this Agreement. This means the benefit is protected and can not be withdrawn unilaterally by St John without being bargained off. The claims to increase the benefit and expand its potential uses are undergoing internal consultation because the benefit applies service-wide.

Code of Conduct to be Included in EA – AEAWA
St John declined to incorporate the Code of Conduct into the EA. This claim exists because the Performance Management and Misconduct processes are currently outlined in Policy only. This means that St John can unilaterally change the policy. In the past, this flexibility has led to punitive measures being applied to one employee rather than to another in identical circumstances. The AEAWA has not withdrawn this claim, as we are committed to ensuring that disciplinary processes and any associated outcomes are fair, consistent, and transparent.

Right to Disconnect – Not to be Contacted Outside of Regular Hours of Work, Unless by Agreement – AEAWA
For too long, St John has relied upon contacting staff outside rostered work hours to change their work location or shift start time, often at short notice. The goodwill of our members has been exploited to the extent that the rostering system now relies heavily on spare offers and the flexibility of part-time officers. These employees can be directed to distant metro locations late into the evening before a shift, in the early hours before a day shift, or between nights.

This is our members’ downtime; an ‘on-call’ allowance does not exist to compensate for this time. There is no regard for an employee’s family, carer responsibilities, or shift extensions that can result from being sent large distances from their rostered station. Worse, employees often receive just a text message advising of a change. The expectation is that the employee will obey the instructions and arrive on time wherever they may be sent. The Labour Government’s recent addition to industrial relations reforms is the Fair Work Legislation Amendment (Closing Loopholes No. 2) Act 2024 (Cth), passed into law on 12 February 2024.

The Right to Disconnect Amendment provides employees with a new right to “refuse to read, monitor or respond to contact or attempted contact” from their unless their refusal is “unreasonable”. Importantly, as this is a new workplace right, it is a right that falls within the scope of a ‘general protection’ claim. The AEAWA has anticipated this legislation for some time and seeks to incorporate its principles into the Agreement. We believe that our Agreement forms a more accessible document for ease of reference and provides us with a mechanism to raise disputes quickly on behalf of an individual or group of employees.

St John declined this claim, countering their belief that Ambulance employees may be exempt from this protection. We see no evidence in the explanatory statements to indicate ambulance employees would be exempt from this general protection. We believe this will remain a claim, and we do not believe contacting employees to compensate for poor rostering practices would warrant an exemption. That is, St John could improve systems and capacity sufficiently to avoid relying upon the goodwill of our members and that any such contact would, therefore, be unreasonable.

Victoria Police recently had their Enterprise Agreement certified by the FWC, which contained their own ‘Right to Disconnect’. In our view, there should be no difference.
Our members increasingly have to manage commitments while travelling to far-away depots and ensuring they arrive on time for shifts. Our members deserve sufficient, reasonable notification of where they are working so that they can plan their lives and especially manage any carer responsibilities. If they do not receive this notification at a reasonable time, they should be able to start from their rostered depot.

Shift workers already suffer a significant impact on work/life balance, and this further intrusion during rostered time is unacceptable. St John has increased their reliance on spare officers over previous years to compensate for their inadequate rostering and poor staffing levels/standby capacity. The claim remains open.

Managers on Road to Include Those Who are in a Pool (define) – AEAWA.
The AEAWA seeks to clarify what roles are considered ‘managerial’ to trigger the Manager on Road clause, requiring a potential work partner to be notified and allowed to withhold agreement. St John declined to include ‘pool’ managers in the definition as this might have operational impacts.

The AEAWA advised St John that because the existing clause is silent on the issue, it would be a matter of interpretation regardless. So, an employee could still legitimately refuse to work with a pool manager should they have concerns. St John was advised that the change would not restrict or ‘hamstring’ the ability to roster pool managers, as it simply means that the officer concerned would need to be consulted beforehand.

In most instances, employees have no issues working with a manager. Still, St John should respect the fact that there may be prior or pending disciplinary issues that may create problems for a particular employee who is required to work with a particular pool manager who was acting as MMSOC or AM the day before. Indeed, employees working in a managerial pool often still have system-level managerial access. St John will take this away and look at the operational impacts. Claim to remain on the table.

Clarify Wording – Break to be Completed Within the Window – AEAWA
St John declined this claim. St John stated that they do not have the operational resources to ensure meal/crib breaks are completed within the window, not simply allocated within the window. The AEAWA have other claims relating to meal/crib breaks; as such, we will consider them in conjunction with this claim.
Claim to remain on the table.

Triple Time for any Shift Extension Over 1 Hour – UWU
This is a UWU claim, though it warrants discussion here. The AEAWA is open to any mechanism that reduces shift extensions. We had considered this concept in formulating our Log of Claims and instead settled on a significant extension to the mandatory break between shifts (from 9 hours to 11 hours), coupled with the following parameters:
• P3 calls are not to be allocated in the last 60 minutes of the shift unless by agreement.
• P2 calls are not to be allocated in the last 30 minutes of a shift unless by agreement
• P0 calls only during the last 15 minutes of a shift unless by agreement.
• The crew may travel from the hospital towards the depot in the last 15 minutes. Available for P0 only.
• No P2 inter-hospital patient transfer in the final 90 minutes unless by agreement.
• Priority 8 card which allows adequate travel time to return to their original station for dynamically deployed crew or any crew who in the last 60 minutes of their shift is greater than 30km from their original station, limiting crew availability to P0 while on P8.

St John argued that the UWU claim of triple time after 1 hour of shift extension is not commercially viable. St John claims that they do not wish to incentivise shift extensions by offering triple time, which would contribute to fatigue. The AEAWA argued they have no concerns regarding fatigue when they offer triple time or when employees work 50-60 hours OT a card, or when issuing night shift ICB at 6 pm with an employee having no chance to sleep/rest prior. The AEAWA have asked what they believe to be ‘reasonable overtime’. St John did not respond. The AEAWA have tabled other claims related to reducing shift extensions, including the above parameters regarding the times that certain priority calls can be allocated, but we support in principle any mechanism which means our members can go home as close to ‘on time’ as possible.

Despite being financially welcome, we believe that triple time alone will unlikely result in finishing a shift on time. The invoice from a P2 call, instead of (for instance, a takeover crew), would cover this expense. We also know that SOC managers have KPIs that conflict with our paramedic members finishing on time. We, therefore, believe that multiple mechanisms may be required to help curtail unreasonable shift extensions.

Defence Leave – AEAWA
St John has agreed to increase Defence Services Leave from 8 shifts to 20. This is a huge win for our members who serve our country in the defence forces.

St John to Advise All Parties of any Dispute Raised – UWU
Another claim by UWU warrants mention. UWU wishes to be notified of all disputes raised by AEAWA or by private individual employees. St John is willing to agree to this; however, AEAWA has concerns over certain disputes that may have confidentiality and privacy implications.

We believe disputes under the Dispute Settling Clause or disputes brought before Fair Work should be private and confidential matters between the Applicant and Respondent and that involving third parties may frustrate and delay the dispute process. Further, this will significantly impact the AEAWA as we raise far more disputes with St John protecting the workplace rights of our members. In raising disputes on behalf of our members, we do not feel that negotiating with UWU in addition to St John and FWC will be helpful. We will take this on notice and respond in due course.

Remove Exclusion of Disciplinary Processes From Dispute Settling Procedure – AEAWA
The AEAWA seeks to remove the exclusion of ‘matters relating to disciplinary processes’ from the Dispute Settling Procedure to better assist members undergoing workplace investigations. St John’s initial response is to reject this claim. The AEAWA believe that being unable to raise disputes and activate the dispute process in relation to disciplinary processes limits our ability to assist our members fully and diminishes the ‘fair process’ during such procedures.
The claim remains open.

50% of Personal leave to be paid at base rate following termination by Employee – AEAWA
St John has declined this claim, stating that they do not wish to incentivise people to keep their Personal leave if they are unwell. This claim remains open from our end.

Paid Time Off for Dealing With AHPRA or Inquiry at Work – AEAWA
The AEAWA is seeking equivalent access to paid time for employees who are required to provide evidence to AHPRA, as an employee would be entitled to when attending a court case. St John is considering this claim further, though their initial impression is to reject this claim.

Union/Association Leave – Delegates Require Paid Time to Perform Their Duties – AEAWA
It was highlighted that Association and union delegates do not receive paid time or TOIL for attending the countless meetings, working groups, JCCs, representations, or Induction school briefings. The Fair Work Legislation Amendment (Closing Loopholes No. 2) Act 2024 (Cth) also prescribes that union/Association delegates should be provided with sufficient time to undertake duties. St John seemed surprised by this and has promised to look at the current entitlements of union/association delegates and return with a response.

Mental Health Leave – AEAWA
The AEAWA seek 2 non-accruable shifts that can be taken outside of block-out periods. St John suggested this type of leave is best managed with MDL (Managerial Discretionary Leave). The AEAWA argued that this is not the intention behind the claim. And also means that:

You have to involve management; therefore, St John needs to be privy to mental health issues. The process for MDL is slow and can take many days to respond. This can in fact, contribute to further mental health stresses. The MDL process is inconsistently applied, with some officers granted MDL while others are declined. This claim is designed to help our members better manage their mental health needs in an industry that can have well-accepted psychological impacts. Employees should be able to take steps to manage their mental health without needing to notify their line manager or needing to deplete their personal/sick leave balance. The claim remains open.

Meeting Closed
11:30

Next Meeting
The next meeting is promised to be a full-day meeting on Tuesday, 25th, 2024. At this meeting, St John plans to outline a proposal for a new roster.
Full-day meeting….apparently.

Meeting Chaired By
Brendon Brodie-Hall

Meeting Conducted
09-00 – 12:00.

Committee Attendees
John Thomas, Mike Hardwick, Lee Waller, Dave Higgins, Conrad Fairhead, Callan McClure, Gary Davies, Dave Bryant, Rick Candy, Shannan Bradley, Paul Davies, Justin Ingrey and Kirsty Roberts.

Committee Apologies
There were no apologies

SJA Attendees
Brendon Brodie-Hall. Joe Cuthbertson, Joel Moore, Karen Stweart, Carly Rees and Stephanie Freemantle.

The AEAWA negotiators met with St John this morning for a scheduled Paramedic EBA meeting. Once again, the promised ‘full day’ of negotiations did not eventuate, with the meeting being shortened to 4 hours to accommodate this afternoon’s service-wide briefing on the Emergency Stream Transformation.

As such, most of the meeting was dedicated to previewing the planned new restructure, leaving only a short window for discussing EBA claims.

Emergency Stream Transformation

St John has presented a proposal to significantly restructure the organisation, particularly its management structure. If you were working or otherwise unable to view the presentation (or perhaps where not aware changes were being announced today), you can view the overview slides here:

The structural changes announced were triggered by the disappointing Culture Survey in 2022, which forced a lengthy review of the fabled ‘Metro Management Model’. The ‘Metro Management Model’ was itself introduced following a disastrous Culture Survey in 2019.

Changes to organisational structure also occurred in the years following reports from the 2016 Independent Oversight Panel and the Phoenix Report, the latter of which lamented the “panel has reached the conclusion that there is an element of the culture of St John which displays aspects which can only be described as toxic and dysfunctional”.

You do not have to squint too hard to see a pattern emerging. Our view is that organisational structure alone will not change culture, though we remain hopeful that this latest restructure will be successful.

While we welcome the current regime’s efforts to better support our members (including any restructuring of front-line management intended to promote a more visible and accessible leadership), the missing detail is ensuring the appointed managers are capable, supportive and committed to fostering a positive and inclusive work environment.

To this end, we welcome the ‘Emergency Leadership Development Program’, a programme designed to equip future leaders with a Diploma of Leadership and Management, something this organisation has never provided to appointed managers before.

The restructure plans to establish a similar management model across all areas of the state. In metro, MMOs and Area Managers’ roles will be abolished and replaced with District Operations Managers (DOMs) and District Operations Leads (DOLs). DOM’s will work Monday to Friday, while DOLs will be 4×4, likely crossing over day shifts and the start of nights. In Metro, a District Clinical Lead (an appointed role (not seconded)) will also work 224, providing a blend of clinical support and lower-level ORM-like managerial functions.

In country, Country Operations Managers and Regional Managers will likewise be abolished and replaced with a District Operations Managers (DOMs) and District Operations Leads (DOLs), following a similar pattern of management structure. These changes also affect our SOC members. The Duty Manager role will be abolished, and new roles of Manager State Operations and Shift Supervisor will be established. Multiple new leadership roles will be established to cover our Patient Transport Officer/Medic/LAR members, including a Transport Operations Lead and a much-needed Medic Operations Lead.

As you can see, the plan as presented will significantly change how our members are managed, affecting their reporting lines, clinical oversight and support, and the geographical regions of management.

At this stage, the AEAWA executive is still digesting the information presented and considering its full impact on our members. While our options to alter the planned restructure are limited (especially regarding roles outside of the Certified Agreement), St John has indicated they are open to feedback and consultation.

We are mindful that many good and effective managers within the organisation face challenging and uncertain times during this restructuring. Please be aware that while the AEAWA will always advocate for the best leaders for our members, this remains a difficult and stressful situation for colleagues affected by these changes.

Paramedic EBA Agenda Items
As mentioned, this section was very brief, with only approximately 45 minutes available for discussing claims. St John used this section to respond to some of the more simple and straightforward claims.

Joint Consultative Committee
SJA is happy to review the wording to provide a more productive and efficient JCC process.

Watches and Glasses Allowance
St John has Agreed to increase the allowance from $200 to $220

Proximity Allowance
St John agreed to increase the range for which the proximity allowance is eligible, from 15km to 25km from the subcentre.

EMA Minimum Standard
This claim is proving more challenging. The role of ‘EMR’ was introduced during COVID-19, primarily as an observer role, to enable crewing in extreme circumstances. It was intended as a stepping stone to EMA qualification, not as a level at which a volunteer would remain indefinitely. It has incredibly minimal scope, and the paramedics who are required to work regularly with these volunteers are effectively working alone.

This exposes our members to a higher risk of injury and creates increased clinical risk to patients. St John continues to employ and promote the EMR-trained volunteer as an acceptable standard and continues to crew these volunteers with paramedics. This causes undue stress and pressure for our regional paramedics, especially in busy sub-centres, and puts them at increased risk of injury.

St John argued that providing EMA-trained volunteers in many locations state-wide may be too challenging. To our surprise our colleagues from UWU did not support country paramedics working with volunteers with a higher clinical scope, believing that officers who go to country regions should be able to manage this.

To be continued…

Meal Break to be Renamed ‘Crib’ Break.
St John agreed to this renaming. For those wondering, this was proposed by the AEAWA to ensure we align with Fair Work definitions:

Under FW, a meal break is uninterruptable and can be paid or, more usually, unpaid. A crib break is a paid meal break where an employee:
– might need to resume work during their meal break
– needs to stay at work – that is, they can’t leave their work area or the workplace.

AP2 and above for Country SM
St John has agreed to this claim, which simply intends to align and codify practice for SM appointments in the country with that of AP.

Add a Clause to Offer Overtime Equitably
In principle agreement.

St John sought to understand the rationale behind this claim. The AEAWA negotiators explained that there have been ongoing inconsistencies with overtime allocation for a number of  years and that the current policy is not adhered to or only adhered to when it suits St John. We wish to promote equity and fairness in allocation of OT, and so would like the policy principles incorporated into the EA.

We also are pushing St John for an ‘app’ or website which shows live current shift vacancies, which can be selected by employees (subject to equitable parameters)

Agenda Items Not Discussed
• Health and Well-Being Benefit
• Code of Conduct to be Included in the Agreement
• Right to Disconnect

Tasks Required for Next Meeting
None

Meeting Closed
14:00

Next Meeting
TBA – most likely in two weeks’ time

Meeting Chaired By
Carly Rees.

Meeting Conducted
09-00 – 12:00.

Committee Attendees
John Thomas, Mike Hardwick, Lee Waller, Dave Higgins, Conrad Fairhead, Callan McClure, Gary Davies, Dave Bryant, Rick Candy, Shannan Bradley, Paul Davies, and Justin Ingrey.

Committee Apologies
Kirsty Roberts.

SJA Attendees
Carly Rees, and Stephanie Freemantle.

The AEAWA EBA bargaining team met with St John today for a short 2.5 hour meeting. This meeting resulted in the AEAWA negotiation team reaching REAP Level 3 (Re-negotiating Enterprise Agreement Pain).

This meeting was originally scheduled to be a ‘full day’ with the negotiation team keen to get on with detailed and productive bargaining. Alas, the meeting length was again shortened to just 3 hours, with agenda items being covered in just over 2 hours. A very short and unproductive day. Again, this meeting was predominantly geared towards bargaining groups providing additional detail and clarity to St John. This really could have been done 6 weeks ago, and we would be 6 weeks closer to a bargaining outcome.
For those attempting to sleep, please read on.

Agenda Items

Clarity was provided on the claims below.

AEAWA to provide clarity on inconsistencies between access to overtime. Members have raised concerns about equitable access to overtime. This issue is compounded by the organisation’s increasing reliance on ICB to fill vacancies. Many employees who have family or child-care commitments to work around on their rostered days off feel disadvantaged as they are unable to work short notice ICBs. The overtime calendar system has fallen into complete disuse, and the overtime distribution policy is ignored. We are seeking St John’s commitment to develop an app or website during the first 18 months of the new agreement showing live roster vacancies, with OT able to be booked in advance. This will help our members plan their days off and ensure family commitments can be satisfied. It will also reduce risks of fatigue, with employees better able to sleep/prepare before night shift OT.

AEAWA to provide the number of shifts required per year to achieve progression milestones. The AEAWA propose that the wording around paramedic progression be clarified.

Currently, to progress from SAO or Paramedic Intern to AP you are required to complete a set number of clinical operational shifts. Due to the initial wording in the Agreement being poorly constructed, this mechanism was not extended to Paramedic progression. The failure to extend this formality has had unintended consequences in situations where St John advertises roles that require an amount of clinical experience for specific roles (i.e. AP2 for CCP). The current wording takes no account of clinical operational shifts completed, in progressing from AP1 to AP2, which is linked purely to years employed, rather than the number of operational clinical shifts completed. This could mean for instance that an AP1 may spend 2+ years on Worker’s Compensation and perform no clinical shifts, but have this time counted towards progression to AP2. That was not the intended purpose, and it therefore makes no sense then to have minimum role requirements of AP2 for instance as is required for CCP or CP.

Working with a Medic
Remove reference to training (AEAWA to clarify intent). The AEAWA want consistency of wording in the Agreement. The term ‘tutor’ or ‘tutoring’ exists in the Agreement and that is the preferred wording as it distinguishes the role performed from ‘mentoring’ and also attracts the On-Road Tutor allowance. St John would argue that training or mentoring is part of registration and so employees could be forced into these roles without remuneration.

Introduce a new clause ensuring maximum opportunities for all employees to gain experience and develop their careers in relation to various secondments and pools.

Our members have raised concerns that they are not given fair and equitable access to different roles within the organisation as many of these positions are filled by a relatively small group of employees who may occupy 4 or 5 different pools.

As an example, a significant number of substantive (permanent) Area Managers have successfully applied for pool ORM roles, thereby limiting opportunities for other on-road staff to gain experience. It is not unusual for select employees to be in not only the HLM pool but also the AM pool, the ORM pool and the CSP pool all at once. There is a general lack of governance and transparency over entrance to, and timeframes involved in many clinical pools, as well as the operation of STT and APTC pools (if indeed they are pools), and college roles appear to again be a closed shop with many secondments moving between roles that are rarely advertised.

In addition, some successful pool candidates appear to enjoy endless extensions in their pools or move seamlessly into other similar roles without due process. The ‘tap on the shoulder’ system is undoubtedly cheaper for St John, but this limits opportunities for other employees to experience new roles.

Having a small proportion of employees monopolising limited opportunities is unfair to the wider workforce; a workforce which undoubtedly contains many more talented and capable employees than are represented in the current pool membership. We seek to introduce a clause with provides better equity, fairness and transparency, for the benefit of the whole workforce. Our view is that employees should occupy no more than two pool positions simultaneously. This, we hope, will force St John to engage a larger and more diverse range of candidates.

Clarify and restrict the permissible deployment of single officers between country and metro.
St John has a very stringent recruitment process in place to ensure metro officers applying for country positions are suitable to work in country locations. Prospective candidates for country locations have to undergo rigorous panel interviews, psychometric testing, assessment centres etc. All this goes out the window when ‘operational requirements’ suddenly change, such as when an officer becomes spare/single at Mandurah or Secret Harbour, in which case SOC can happily send the officer to work with volunteers in Pinjarra or Dawesville. No psychometric testing is required. While we have long campaigned against the overly complex and lengthy (personality-based) country recruitment process, we strongly believe that metro and country are separate employment locations and St John should not be able to transfer you as ‘operationally required’.

Introduce retention bonus payable after each 12 months continuous service (excl annual leave) (difficult to fill county locations only).
Discussion occurred around ‘how to establish what is a difficult to location’. The AEAWA believe this should be self-evident, once the recruitment process has failed to attract applicants or find suitable candidates that it is difficult to fill. In terms of the monetary value of the retention bonus, this needs to be sufficient to attract candidates but the amount may be different for each location i.e. it may (for instance) be a $15,000 bonus for completion of 12 months in Kalgoorlie, or $30,000 per completed 12 months in Newman.

New clause restricting dynamic deployment locations to depots only.
Crews who are dynamically deployed must be returned to the shift start location, by the end of the rostered shift.

The AEAWA are aware that as St John preferences Hub model over new depots, and continues to struggle to meet demand, it is leaning more heavily upon dynamic deployment. Officers may live in Scarborough, get rostered to Cowcher Depot, then dynamically deployed to Mandurah, whereupon they struggle to get back to their starting depot towards the end of their shift. We need to put restrictions in place that protect members from unreasonable shift extensions, which are incurred because of poor infrastructure planning and staffing levels.

Remote Location Allowance – Sliding scale for current and future locations.
The AEAWA highlighted the inconsistencies in the Agreement whereby Norseman attracts the remote location allowance, but Esperance does not even though you have to drive through Norseman and continue driving a further 200km to get to Esperance.

Add minimum EMA standard (Working with Volunteers)
The AEAWA want to see the minimum volunteer qualification to be ‘EMA’ should a paramedic at a hybrid location be required to work with the volunteer.

Define a Country Crew
The AEAWA negotiating team seek to introduce a Country Crew Formation clause. Currently, the only provision which touches upon crew formation in country locations is 22(c) ‘Working with volunteers’. We want to see the introduction of a Country Crew Formation clause, similar to the Metropolitan Crew Formation clause the AEAWA successfully introduced at the last EBA. This clause would help codify accepted crew configuration and restrict the use of ad-hoc classifications to work in country locations.

CCP claims
Several CCP claims were explored with the rationale being provided by CCP delegates from the AEAWA due to the specialised nature of these claims. Claims discussed/clarified were clauses to create a permanent CCP classification for on-road CCP, travel allowances to Jandakot airport/Belmont CCP base, flight allowances, rescue crewman allowance, CCP Lead positions, TPD and life insurance due to the difficulty obtaining affordable insurance on the helicopter, Deployment allowance for any deployment for all classifications AP, CCP, ECP etc.

Meeting Closed
11:30

Next Meeting
09-00 – 16:00 Monday 13th April 2024. St John indicated that this is likely to be a full day meeting designed at. As usual, we will do our best to keep you informed.

Meeting Chaired By
Carly Rees.

Meeting Conducted
09-00 – 12:00.

Committee Attendees
John Thomas, Mike Hardwick, Lee Waller, Dave Higgins, Conrad Fairhead, Callan McClure, Gary Davies, Dave Bryant, Rick Candy, Shannan Bradley, and Justin Ingrey.

Committee Apologies
Kirsty Roberts and Paul Davies.

SJA Attendees
Carly Rees, Karen Stewart, Joe Cuthbertson, and Stephanie Freemantle.

Terms of Reference
Today’s meeting was just to provide detail to the log of claims presented at the last meeting.

The EBA negotiation team met briefly with St John this morning, primarily to clarify the intent and proposed operation of some AEAWA claims so that St John can assess and cost.
St John also provided an update on the NW Claims and presented a new claim in relation to Clause 22 of the Agreement ‘Working With Volunteers’. Below we have outlined the main topics clarified.

Updates

Northwest Duties Allowance
St John indicated that they plan to hold consultation and discussions with North West Employees and AEAWA representatives to try and understand what a replacement for the NW Allowance should look like. St John are aware that the current allowance is not fit for purpose.

Emergency Transformation Update
The project team is seeking feedback and are reviewing the future design of this program. St John would like to have the leaders of the program come in to brief the Paramedic EBA bargaining team. There should be an overview and discussions occurring next EBA meeting.

Introduction of New Claims
St John stated that there was a clause missed off the claim. This claim was Working With Volunteers (current Clause 22 – Working With Volunteers). St John want to change section (c) which means that they can change the crew formation.

The AEAWA stated that there is zero trust in St John Country Management, and these new plans will be rolled out across the State, therefore we cannot agree to change this wording.

St John New Claim
SJA sought to introduce a new claim in relation to Working With Volunteers. SJA wish to amend the 22(c) of the EBA which currently reads:

The standard crew at a Country Location, will be as determined by St John and will generally consist of one employee and one clinical volunteer ambulance officer, with the exception of Bunbury Station, where St John retains the ability, with the agreement of the employee, to form a crew with a clinical volunteer ambulance officer.

SJA’s intent is to allow rostering Bunbury employees with volunteers in certain emergency instances such as “emergency road crash response”.

The AEAWA today voiced our outright rejection of this proposal. History has repeatedly shown us that should SJA be given an avenue to reduce funding additional paramedics in regional areas, they will exploit at every opportunity. The ability of the organisation to pair Paramedics with volunteers (especially in highly populated urban areas, which should be 100% paramedic staffed), will be a regressive step for the ambulance service, and damage efforts to promote the rollout of more registered paramedics to regional areas.

The clause as it stands is sufficient. In the event of a multi casualty event, Paramedics in the Bunbury area would work with volunteer crews to naturally form crew configurations which would maximise patient care.

Agenda Items

Secondments
UWU want to have the CP roles moved to 5-year secondments, and if you are still in the position after that time frame, you take the roll permanently.

Night Shift Payment
The AEAWA clarified intent of night shift payment for full shift overtime. The intent is to encourage and attract employee to complete night shift overtime.
Currently there is minimal financial difference between a 12-hour OT day shift and a 13-hour OT night shift.

In terms of raw hours there is no incentive to choose a night shift. The financial difference was further reduced by the move away from 10/14 shifts. This issue was highlighted at the last negotiation but at that time SJA refused to extend the night shift payment to overtime shifts.

The organisations increasing dependence on triple time will hopefully mean they can now see the value in having a genuine financial incentive for those working nights.

Spare Officers
The AEAWA clarified the intention of several proposed claims in relation to Spare Officers, to reduce the overall reliance on spare officers and to increase fairness. SJA were advised that there are too many spares on the roster, most likely this is to compensate for deficiencies in rostering.

Spare officers are undertaking excess travel, are being routinely contacted outside of work hours and are then expected to act upon instructions to attend depots a long way from their home.

Spare officers generally experience more fatiguing shift extensions than rostered officers and are more vulnerable to workplace stress due to not having a regular work partner. Spare Officers have added uncertainty at work, with no consistent work partner who can share in, and monitor wellbeing and exposure to traumatic events.

On Call Allowance
The AEAWA clarified that this requires review for all positions which may be eligible. The On Call Allowance is currently calculated (randomly) at 0.5% of a Student Ambulance Officer – Operations base rate, regardless of position being worked (i.e. PSO/CCP/AP).

This allowance (currently $5.76 per hour) is insufficient if expecting employees to effectively put their lives on hold while on call.

CCP On-Call Deployment Roster Payment
The AEAWA wanted to know how St John established the $5.76 hourly rate paid to CCPs. SJA will return with that answer at the next meeting.

Personal Leave Balance Exchange
The AEAWA provided clarification on the intent of this clause. We propose a mechanism to exchange surplus Personal (Sick) Leave balances for Special Leave at a 2:1 ratio, where an employee holds a balance over (initially proposed) 336 hours of Personal (Sick) Leave.
This would allow employees to better manage their fatigue, and also give SJA up to 3 months’ notice of an employee’s intent not to be at work.

A similar system already exists in reverse where employees who have depleted sick leave are able to convert special leave and annual leave into sick leave.

Redraft of Allocated Position Clauses
Clear understanding within the Agreement, there are multiple policies at the moment that create confusion.

High Call Volume Allowance
SJA wanted clarification of the intent of this claim. The AEAWA recognise that certain depots and indeed certain call-signs experience a disproportionately high workload and minimal down time. These depots are difficult to fill with long term permanent staff because they are consistently (brutally) busy.

The AEAWA wish to open a discussion as to what an allowance or penalty might look like for such depots/call signs, but we will require data from St John which illustrates current workloads by depot/call sign to determine an appropriate penalty. We have suggested this allowance be known as the Pineapple Penalty.

Country Retention Allowance
The AEAWA propose that incentives need to be put in place to attract and retain employees to difficult to fill country locations. The current system is not working with a heavy reliance on country relief. For many new locations, the current relief allowances often do not prove attractive.

Meeting Closed
10:50.

Next Meeting
09-00 – 12:00 Monday 29th April 2024. St John indicated that this is likely to be another short meeting designed at clarifying further clauses. As usual, we will do our best to keep you informed.

Meeting Chaired By
Carly Rees.

Meeting Conducted
15:00.

Committee Attendees
John Thomas, Mike Hardwick, Lee Waller, Dave Higgins, Conrad Fairhead, Callan McClure, Rick Candy, and Shannan Bradley.

Committee Apologies
Kirsty Roberts and Paul Davies.

SJA Attendees
Carly Rees, Joel Moore, Joe Cuthbertson, and Stephanie Freemantle.

Terms of Reference
Today’s meeting was just to present the Log of Claims.

St John Agenda
– St John are seeking a 3 year Agreement.
– St John recognise there needs to be wage increases, though obviously this will depend on allowances and other costs incurred through negotiations.
– St John have no ‘starting position’ in relation to a wage offer.
– St John informed parties that many legislative changes will need to be included St John intend to amend CPHC definition to align with new department name, and amend definition of ‘Employee’. Amend superannuation.
– Ammend A/L to ensure is accruable on Workers Compensation in accordance with legislation.
– Family and domestic violence updated to reflect legislative change
– Amend on call allowance to align with figure in appendix.
– 9.29(d) remove amend 20% non clinical component of CEP due to increased need for non clinical training.
– Creating a HAD for clinical education trainers to ensure equitable pay across the classification to ensure equitable ‘pay bump’ for AP1 – AP3. Possibly a percentage bump or a flat rate allowance on top of base salary.

Introduction of New or Alternative Roster Arrangements to Provide Greater Options.
– St John like to explore an option of Day/Day/Late/Night. 7-7 9-9 / 10/10/ 12/12.
– St John not sure how that would fit in with existing shift colours.
– St John suggest one option might be to move some day vehicles, some 244 to this new roster.
– St John believe might be able to keep pay and annual leave as currently is.
– St John open to discuss other options.
– Will need to bring in 8 shift colours.
– Comparatively to process in ACT.
– Will have to examine effects on part time, job share etc
– Relief to be offered to local paramedics in the first instance.
– Special Services remove clause linking to DFES and health contracts.
– Remove wording ‘posting’ and replace with ‘secondments’.
– Secondments to be capped at 5 years tenure.
– Progression, updating clause to reflect amendments with medic pathway etc (consistency) Allowances
– Amend 19.23 to would like to provide country relief accommodation, rather than being optional.

– Discussion as to what is ‘reasonable’ accommodation?
– Possibly this is plan to secure longer term suitable accommodation, more reasonably.
– NW allowance – to amend the allowance to better compensate for cost of living, not so much compensation for OT and training etc. SJA believe the NW allowance is no longer fit for purpose. Separate the allowance to no longer be ‘rolled up’ to clearly understand what is covered and for what purpose.
– Extend training requirements as per NW allowance to Goldfields area.
– Proximity allowance, Increase distances from 15km to 25km
– 16.4 Reflect that employees will be eligible for travel / flights allowance once they are ready to deploy.

– Paramedic Log of Claims presented by Lee Waller (see linked LOC)
– PSO Log of Claims presented by Conrad Fairhead
– NW Allowance Log of Claims presented by Shannan Bradley

UWU Claim
– 10% per annum, one off 3% payment
– Overtime to be paid in period it is worked
– Other Maxxia Salary Sacrifice providers
– Support 224 roster
– Support filling 224
– Shadow rostering
– Night shift to be scaled by rank. Flat allowance, inequity to be resolved OH additional $100
– Fatigue – double time from meal break broken.
– Increase Triple time shift extension
– 10 hours break between shifts
– Automatic takeover crews
– No non emergency transfers after midnight
– No outbound RFDS within last hour.
– Mandatory out of service for last half hour unless P1/P0
– Resource allocation – disparity between north and south. SJA to resource south more effectively.
– Meal break night to be extended to 45 minutes,
– Meal break not to be allocated to crew on the dot at multi crew depot.

Country Resourcing
– increase pay, training and scope, appropriate staffing (AP2 and opposed to DE AP2), facilitating family visiting, ability to visit family.
– Airfares and travel to visit family to be fully reimbursed
– Undesirable location allowance
– No owing of days when moving between metro and country
– Better posting conditions
– Increase in permanent allowances
– Relief incentives for hard to fill locations

Applying to Country Positions:
– Allow country staff to be a roster metro each year
– SNR – 2 weeks or less not to be counted toward country score
– Reintroduction of the Country List System
– Process for filling Country Relief positions
– Country Extensions

Leave
– Want leave flexibility to support family arrangements
– Smaller leave blocks
– Leave can be taken at half pay
– Expand annual leave entitlements
– PT one or two week blocks
– Purchase extra leave
– Paid family and domestic leave
– Paid Culture and ceremonial leave, 20 days defence leave
– LSL should be taken when convenient to employee, smaller periods, not less than one week
– Carers leave 5 days per annum, non-accruable, standalone from Personal leave
– Increase personal leave entitlement.
– Be able to talk half shift off for medical appointments or urgent carer leave
– Special leave ability to be used on public holidays
– Include Medics in Paramedic Agreement
– St John to cover cost of registration
– Paid Professional Development leave
– Increased regional Allowances to reflect differing needs of different regions
– Increase on call allowance substantially
– Metro travel matrix to reflect current fuel prices
– Air conditioning allowance substantial increase
– Review period which can be rostered away from home depot
– Time plus Km to rostered station

Death Cover for Whole Workforce
– Allocated positions clauses redrafted for clarity
– Backfill with holder of next person on list

Adequate time to be provided to relocate form metro to country.

Paramedic Leadership Roles
CSP to be permanent classification
AM to be a classification
STT to be a classification

Country SM JD to be reviewed, and properly compensated. Admin hours without approval.
Rate to be based on CP salary
CP- seek permanent CP positions, dual CP as per WACHS strategy
ECP should be classification.

Secondments – Some secondments to be longer.
NW Allowance – removal of tier, return flights clarify.
Dispute Settling Procedure – advise all parties of any disputes raised.
Wellness – seek new wellness entitlement, increase to type and activity that can be used for.

UWU CCP Claim
New classification for CCPs
– CCP1 (intern) (on current pay)
– CCP2 road ($180k)
– CCP3 helicopter (rescue crew qualified) ($180, then when crew qual additional)
– CCP4 (chief CCP / Senior CCP)

New Pay Structure
Amend ‘Other duties’ to be re-drafted
CCP roster
CCP Crew Formation (CCP/CCP Intern or CCP/CCP)
Helicopter subject to DFES
Ultrasound lead, sims lead, airway lead (appropriately compensated)
Tutoring allowance to apply to CCP
TPD and Life Insurance into an allowance
New allowance (deployment allowance)\
New allowance (gym payment of $500 a year, in addition to existing allowance)
New allowance (CCP3 and CCP4 will not receive travel to Jandakot base)
Bring all CCP conditions under one section of the agreement
Road CCP – perm CCP can make a perm position request for new bases.

New Clause CCP Job Share
Able to job share
Standalone clause to be placed in CCP section
Allocation of CCP overtime to be reflected in the EBA
Changes to overtime matrix to be by agreement.
On call roster to be 0.5% CCP of salary

Meeting Closed
15:00.

Next Meeting
April 15th 2024 (09:00-12:00).

To view the Combined Log of Claims once available, click here.

To view the St John Log of Claims, when available, click here.

Meeting Chaired By
Carly Rees.

Meeting Conducted
13:30.

Committee Attendees
John Thomas, Mike Hardwick, Lee Waller, Dave Higgins, Conrad Fairhead, Paul Davies, Callan McClure, Dave Bryant, Rick Candy, and Shannan Bradley.

Committee Apologies
There were no apologies.

SJA Attendees
Carly Rees, Joel Moore, Joe Cuthbertson, and Karen Stewart.

Terms of Reference
Today’s meeting was just to discuss the bargaining process. In essence, good faith bargaining, the parties log of claims and being released to attend meetings. St John want the next meeting to be on March 25th for a half day meeting, in which all parties will present their items. The meetings will be held each fortnight on Mondays.

This may progress to weekly meetings or full day meetings, but this will depend on the agenda.

Meeting Closed
15:30.

Next Meeting
March 25th 2024 (09:00-12:00).

Click here to view the AEAWA FAQs regarding the EBA.

Survey Status – Closed
Survey Data Collected – 30/12/2023- 13/01/2024
Number of Participants – 710
Survey Results – Click here for the demographics and here for the results.