Higher Education

University General Staff

General Staff on Campus will suffer

Sydney University drops Nursing and its Orange Campus drops Rural Management courses and confirms the CPSU's predictions that University of Sydney staff will suffer.

Sydney University has confirmed it will be pulling the plug on undergraduate Nursing courses in line with Federal Education Minister Brendan Nelson's strategy to hive off the so-called 'unprofitable' education streams.

Under the Nelson 'reforms', universities can differentiate on price by setting fees charged under the Higher Education Constribution Scheme (HECS). But not Nursing courses which have capped HECS fees.

The CPSU, the University general staff union, believes this will start a two-class system in the higher education sector and is a leap backwards. Courses which attract students who can afford to pay higher HECS such as Medicine and Law, will remain with the "sandstone" Universities. Those more wealthy Universities will abandon the "cheaper" options.

Courses such as nursing and teaching will be pushed back into those Universities struggling for funding from the Government. This will create stratification of the Higher Education System.

Furthermore, the Government and the University have failed to consider the impact this political interference has on the job-security and conditions of employment for the staff at Universities.

David Carey, the Secretary of the Union representing University General Staff, the CPSU, said to day:

"This is just the beginning. Today we have found out that a minimum of 100 General Staff jobs are going to be hit by this announcement. That is only because a single University, Sydney, has decided to get out of undergraduate Nursing, and to drop Rural Management courses. "

He said; "The impact will fall most heavily on the regional General Staff. They do not have the ability, as academic staff commonly and frequently do, to move around from university to university.

If a job goes in Orange there isn't much more to choose. If the job shifts to Sydney it isn't easy to up stakes and shift their whole family".

© 2001 Community & Public Sector Union - State Public Services Federation (CPSU-SPSF) - National Office

http://www.cpsu-spsf.asn.au/latest_news/higher_ed/20040610_Nursing.html
Last Modified: 15 Nov 2005