Two years ago Finsec members met to consider the future of our union. We discussed the finances, the need for membership growth, the need to build a stronger and more active collective group and the need to change the way we do things.

Members overwhelmingly voted to retain a stand-alone finance sector union rather than amalgamate with another union. We agreed to a substantial fee increase and committed to work together to build membership and activity levels.

The union is now running in surplus after nearly a decade of deficits. During 2004/05 we have been able to increase the numbers of organisers we employ by three to a total of fourteen.

We have also created a new role of Campaign Director to ensure we develop quality campaign plans across enterprises. We review our progress against these plans regularly and ensure that our activity is as membership driven as possible. Over the last year for example, ANZ and National Bank members created and ran a ‘best of both’ campaign, so that the best conditions of each collective agreement were retained for their new merged agreement. In many areas the ‘best of both’ has indeed been achieved, which is a good demonstration of how longer term campaigning can work.

The bargaining process was extremely drawn out, with repeated industrial action being taken. I know that this was hard for everyone involved and that 100% success is never guaranteed in these matters. What is crucial though is that members made the decisions and did so being fully informed on the issues.

There have been many changes to terms and conditions of employment in our industry in recent times, some good and some not so good. Some good examples are most employers moving to four weeks annual leave as standard, loyalty recognition bonus payments in the major banks, and pay rises from most (but not all) employers that have been around 1% higher than inflation. Last month the first employer finally agreed to pay union members a democracy participation bonus that recognises their collective role in setting terms and conditions. Recently one major bank has begun to properly engage with union members over understaffing issues.

Over the last year we ran meetings with thousands of Finsec members ensuring that everyone had their say on issues that were important to them. We supported hundreds of workers in dealing with workplace problems, negotiated thirty-five collective agreements, took over twenty cases to the mediation service or employment authority and ran over 130 training courses for members. (That’s one every two business days!)

But there is still much to do. Critical in this is our ability to grow union membership numbers. Despite much hard work by many of you and by the paid staff of the union, we have yet to achieve this. We have had long periods of stable membership (which is great) but not growth. I urge you to work out a way to ensure that each person who does not belong to the union is invited to join. Ensure every new staff member is talked to about joining the union as soon as they start.

As Finsec members, we take on the hard issues, both with our employers and within our union. We don’t always win the argument or please everbody all the time, but unions have been around for over a century now, working hard to ensure that current and future members get fair terms and conditions of employment. Your decision in 2003 ensures this work continues in the finance sector.

regards
Sue Boraston
President

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