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
09:00 – 13:00.

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

Committee Apologies
Mike Hardwick and Dave Higgins.

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

Outstanding Items

CCP Salaries
St John gave the number of $158,000 at the last meeting as the base rate for the CCPs, and today they returned with a $159,000 base rate (inclusive for both the car and the helicopter).

They showed a calculation of x2 helicopters working x2 shifts per year (over 365 days), coming up with a costing of $10,200 as an annualised total, this is to be dived between the 13 CCPs. This would equate to $392 per fortnight per officer. The CCP interns will not get such an uplift.

The AEA performed some brief calculations that identified if a CCP works every roster on the chopper, they will get be signing up for a $4,000 pay cut, under this new proposal.

The CCP representatives state if this was the case, it would be better to keep the status quo, and uplift the agreed percentile increases to the CCP allowances (which the latest St John offer is 5%, 5% and 4% over the term of the Agreement).

Currently, the EBA is moving along slower than a snail with Asthma. This is the same pay offer they gave at the commencement of the negotiations. And when it comes to the pay offer…. Hold on as it gets quite confusing, as we are hitting the stage were if we want other items agreed to, then it comes off the pay rise.

Discussion occurred around long-term officers who are CCPs who leave the classification (chopper or car), basically, if they come back on the road and have given up a position, would they keep their substantive shift.

There was an agreement around the room that if a CCP gave up a day van to keep their CCP position (say on green/black), when they returned to the road (giving up their CCP classification), they would retain the shift pattern they had before they became a CCP, but not their specific vehicle. They would essentially become a spare green/black officer on day shifts.

There were further questions regarding those who are training to become PSOs or CCPs and working in the car (as this will become a permanent position), and their training extends over their 2-year period, could they effectively keep their depots.

The example provided was an officer who needs to extend their training 6-months over the two-year period, meaning they are now out of their depot in accordance with the current Agreement; under clause 30.9(b) ‘Filling an Allocated Position” the wording stipulates:

“An Employee’s Allocated Position will be considered vacant, and will commence to fill the position within a 3-month period, when the Employee accumulates time away from their Allocated Position in excess of 104 weeks in any 156-week period excluding the following:

1. Critical Care Paramedics;
2. an authorised period of paid leave and/or unpaid leave, including unpaid personal/carer’s leave, unpaid parental leave, and unpaid domestic violence leave;
3. Country relief; and
4. time away from the allocated position in accordance with clause 30.10(a) and clause 30.10(b)(ii).

A further issue for CCPs is if they are offered a permanent depot, whilst working as a CCP. The current Agreement states they need to take up the position within the three-month timeframe in order to accept the depot, but their CCP contract often conflicts this by their commitment to be placed on the helicopter.

St John stated, in certain circumstances, officers moving amongst country locations are often afforded more time, due to the depot they are leaving may be harder to fill once the officer has left. Basically, St John are happy to review and return with an answer.

Talks around those who are training in specific roles such as CCPs, PSOs and ECPs on whether ‘training’ should be classed at times out of their depot, under the clause. Further talks will continue.

ECP Salaries
St John calculated that an ECP would get $153,000 as a base rate, and the ECP Interns would receive $148,304.

Discussions went around the room, as it appeared that ECPs would be on a lesser rate than CSPs. It was highlighted to St John by an ECP representative, that those fulfilling this role require a post graduate qualification, where CSPs do not. It was also discussed that clinically, they have a higher risk, as their role is to leave patients at home.

St John stated they will send more information, but they believe this new rate should increase the ECP base rate to $6,000 above the CSPs. S John will clarify this shortly.

Community Paramedic Back-to-Back Model
Last meeting St John provided the delegates with a plan for CPs, this ‘new roster’ seen officers working 10.5-hour days, effectively meaning they would no longer be allocated an 8-week leave block, which many of our CP members were not overly happy with.

St John returned today, with the updated slides of a change to the roster, so that CPs keep their annual 8-week leave period. Further information will be provided to the membership once St John reviews the slides and sends them to us.

Meal Breaks
St Johns position has not changed, again highlighting the glacial pace of these negotiations. $25 per meal break with the progressive increase to $100 if a crew over their set of 4 are not allocated one. This is as far as they will go.

There is still the mindset of not providing breaks. St John stated it would be applied to the current meal break window or the other possible discussed 7-hour window. The AEAWA’s position has not changed, and the data provided by St John always shows the percentage of crews being given a meal break, but not the percentage of those completing one.

St John states they are working hard and have made headway in this space; they want crews to take meal breaks, to which we responded…. We do too, however YOU ARE NOT GIVING US ONE!

Data was provided to St John that in July 2024 only 43% of crews were given a meal break (not completed of course), and in October 2024 with the proposed headway in this space a total 41% were provided with one.

mmmmmm…. after intense calculations, we think this is worse off!

St John then stated they will make further progress in the area, which they are actively trying to identify issues and fix them so that breaks ‘become the norm’.

Could these illusive issues be

1. More staff are leaving, which St John are not replacing,
2. More managers are being hired, and St John are recruiting more,
3. ProQA upgrades everything, which St John aren’t fixing,
4. Ramping is increasing, and St John are asleep at the wheel, and
5. Workload is increasing and St John are not hiring in line with this increase.

Hopefully more managers, further meetings and faith that St John will fix this continues…… meanwhile back on planet Earth.

The AEA re-emphasised there is NO trust, that St John can fix this, there is no appetite.
St john stated they can not afford double time for missed meal breaks.

Examples of crews not being able to refuse P3 transfers on meal breaks was discussed, arguments of the Ambulance Service Agreement and hospital response times was also highlighted, as being more important to align to than providing crews meal breaks.

The AEA stated if you can not stop P3 transfers on meal breaks then the only option left is for us to give you a harsher penalty. It is not that crews want the money, they want the break, and the penalty is to ensure you take this seriously and provide us one.

Night Shift
St John provided three options for the night shift penalty. Those being.

• All Night Shifts worked shall receive the Night Shift payment (including overtime shifts.
• Night Shift payment s payable for any shift which concludes after midnight (not for day vans finishing a shift extension past midnight).

Option One

• Employees to receive a Night Shift payment of $100 per shift worked Sunday – Thursday.
• Employees to receive a Night Shift payment of $150 per shift worked on Friday and Saturday.
• This would mean the base wage increase in the first year would be adjusted to 4.5% (net wage increase of 5.3% in the first year of the Agreement including the higher night shift payments).

Option Two

• Employees to receive a Night Shift payment of $80 per shift worked Sunday – Thursday.
• Employees to receive a Night Shift payment of $200 per shift worked on Friday and Saturday.
• This would mean the base wage increase in the first year would be adjusted to 4.5% (net wage increase of 5.3% in the first year of the Agreement including the higher night shift payments).

Option Three

• Employees to receive the current Night Shift Allowance plus the proposed 5% increase (net wage increase of 5% in the first year of the Agreement).

Options One and Two would replace the current Night Shift allowance and would not be over and above what we currently get.

Although option 2 was preferred for the uplift for the Friday and Saturday nights, we were not entertained by buying this out of everyone 5% pay increase (which of course has been rejected) or replacing the current allowance with. So, in effect NO means a very strong NO!

Parental Leave
SJA want equity between primary and non-primary caregivers, so in response to the claim of 12-weeks’ pay for those on Paternity Leave, St John responded with this uplift.

1. Non-Primary caregivers would get 8-days leave at the rolled-up rate.
2. Primary officers would receive 9-weeks leave at the rolled-up rate

St John were also happy to discuss options such as leave at half pay, as some officers may want the leave, while others may rely on the pay.

St John will review these options and provide further updates.

Day Vans
St John again, opened this discussion in true form. Basically, in order to pay for the night shift payment increasing, for those being belted on night shifts; yep, you guessed it… it needs to come from employees’ pockets who are getting belted on the day shifts, and not theirs.

St John have withdrawn the ‘agreed in principle’ offer for this payment. There were discussions to top late day van crews finishing past midnight, for those ‘who want too’ to go to 11-11 instead, to compensate for not getting the allowance.

St John are again, looking further into this.

Next Steps
St John stated that they have now addressed everything on the log of claims. There are a few points that will be clarified shortly, and the suggestion of rounding this up was strongly hinted…. NOT A CHANCE!

The question ‘anything else you would like to add’ came up… We jumped straight on that one.

The Overtime SOP
The AEA again reiterated that this SOP is a joke! St John are hiding behind the fatigue card… For those wanting to come up to date, the fatigue line in Western Australia runs from Two Rocks to Mandurah and out to the Kalamunda/Mundaring area.

When you cross this line, fatigue no longer exists. This is why only metro officers have been targeted with reduced overtime and country has not. St John then stated this was due to a safety concern raised to WorkSafe that resulted in a ‘Notice’ to St John.

St John stated it was for the entire state, including country officers… but as we know fatigue and safety is greatly overshadowed by doing those calls… makes sense that meal breaks aren’t happening.

St John state that there is a meeting in December about reduced overtime in the country. St John reiterated that there are general concerns with a handful of officers doing excessive overtime. The AEA wanted to know if there was the possibility that one of the many, many, many, many managers within this organisation could…. well, you know…. wait for it… actually manage this issue.

St John hope that the newly proposed 12-12 and DELN roster would assist in the fatigue realm, which would commence no earlier than July 2025. This is a trial vehicle, in which if its anything like the electronic timecard trial, there should be about 15-years of rosters to fill, so chances are you can try it.

Meeting Closed
13:00

Next Meeting
November 25th, 2024 (most likely)

Meeting Chaired By
Brendan Brodie-Hall

Meeting Conducted
09:00 – 14:00.

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

Committee Apologies
Justin Ingrey.

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

The Meeting

On Monday, AEAWA representatives met with St John for the 15th round of EBA negotiations. Few items were up for discussion, including:

• Proposed CP model updates
• Clinical Education Trainers allowance
• Meal breaks
• Night shift allowance
• CCP wage claim
• Parental leave claims
• PSO life insurance updates

The negotiations are grinding to a halt, with St John citing financial hardship at nearly every turn. For every claim raised, St John proposes corresponding cuts to an already inadequate pay offer. Here are a few key points from Monday’s discussions on meal breaks, night shift allowance, and paid parental leave:

St John’s responses have included:

• “The pot of money is only so big.”
• “We could do it, but we’ll have to take the money from elsewhere in the claim.”
• “We can fund the [insert claim], but it will come off the [minimal] pay offer.”
• “We’re already predicting a deficit next year, even with the current pay offer.”
• “The CCP contract is already causing us financial losses.”

Without knowing the exact value of the emergency ambulance contract (estimated at around $205 million), we can’t verify the accuracy of these claims.

However, St John has consistently found funds for:

• A costly Emergency Stream Transformation project involving consultants, focus groups, and surveys that resulted in little more than a rebranded Metro Management Model (MMM)—more managers, better pay, and more time off for management.
• $15 million per annum for the new District management structure.
• Full-time secondment of Kingston Reid lawyers to the ER team.
• Acquiring significant real estate along Great Eastern Highway.
• Funding triple-time pay twice a week (even as an unwanted Overtime Policy denies metro members triple-time opportunities)
• Allocating $4.8 million annually to key management personnel and building a $7 million multi-story car park.
• Purchasing land in O’Connor ($6M), Kelmscott ($3.5M), Ellenbrook ($4.15M), Wangara Hub ($8.1M), and Cowcher Hub (>$13M).

Whereas St John previously obtained discounted land from local authorities, they now choose to play Monopoly along Gt Eastern Highway—leaving less money for frontline staffing.

Further details show St John’s financial position includes:

• $154.9 million in cash and cash equivalents
• $461.9 million in total gross income
• $463.3 million in gross assets
• $16.2 million in net surplus for 2023

Annual surpluses (‘profit’) also tell a compelling story:

• 2022: $8.06 million
• 2021: $31.9 million
• 2020: $14.3 million
• 2019: $19.5 million
• 2018: $19.0 million
• 2017: $17.4 million
• 2016: $20.2 million

Moreover, St John has received substantial public funding, including:

• $28 million in federal funding for bulk-billed Urgent Care Centres (no longer bulk-billed)
• $29 million in JobKeeper during COVID
• $17 million in ramping payments pre-contract overhaul
• Salaries for HLMs funded by WA Health
• Government funding for PSOs
• DFES funding for CCP

St John was reminded during negotiations that they negotiated the current contract with WA Health. If this contract now fails to provide adequate staffing, reasonable breaks, compensation for night shifts, and a fair parental leave wage given inflation and CPI increases, then it reflects a failure in negotiation.

To make the point clear, we even offered to conduct their next negotiation. We’d guarantee a better deal from Amber-Jade Sanderson.

Notably, wages as a percentage of gross income have remained relatively stable—comprising 64%of gross income in 2015, and 67% in 2023. Yet, AEAWA raised concerns during the Parliamentary Inquiry about St John’s “top-heavy” management. A staggering 27.4% of St John employees are in corporate roles, compared to significantly lower figures in other states: NSW (6.2%), VIC (9.2%), QLD (5.7%), SA (11.2%), TAS (6.3%), ACT (6.7%), and NT (11.7%).

St John’s should have rebranded the structure as the ‘More Managers Model’.

While St John may claim limited funds for wage increases, we believe the resources exist within the organisation—they just need to prioritise frontline needs.

Anyway, on to the short summary of negotiations.

Meal Breaks
St John WA responded to feedback relating to the claim for an increased hourly/accruing penalty.

St John has proposed two options in relation to meal breaks:

Option a) is that the meal break window is expanded to 5 hours. However, breaks must be completed within the 5 hours (rather than currently just allocated at any time up to the end of the 4 hour window) and breaks would only be allocated at the nearest depot or suitable location at the crew’s discretion, not the hospital.

Option b) was the model proposed by the AEAWA whereby an employee could not go more than 7 hours without a break. This model would mean St John has the option to place an employee on ONE meal break within a shorter, central 3 hour window, OR TWO meal breaks either side of that window. Under this model, employees are on double time if they do not receive a break within 7 hours.

HOWEVER, St John have rejected the double time component and have instead proposed an accrual system whereby:

• meal break penalty would remain $25 (an increase from the current $18.50)
• for each consecutive normal rostered shift where a meal break is missed, the meal break accrues. For instance, missing a meal break for each of your four shifts would result in penalties of $25 for the first shift, $50 for the second, $75 for the third shift, and $100 for the fourth shift.

St John states that to accommodate the 7-hour meal break proposal, SOC managers will need to exercise greater scrutiny over when and where a crew is ‘on mobile’ to ensure coverage for people on meal breaks. This is simply a veiled threat to damage the morale benefits that go along with a morning coffee.

The AEAWA was not satisfied with either of these proposals. The whole purpose of the 7 hour proposal was double time, if that’s not part of the model, it offers little benefit to staff over the single mid-shift break.

A considerable amount of time was spent discussing this issue. St John is confident that they will be fully staffed in 6-12 months. If that’s the case, they should be confident in offering a REAL penalty system, safe in the knowledge they will not have to pay the penalty.

The reality is that St John knows we have at least half the fleet ramped, propping up the hospital staffing numbers and taking patients to X-ray each shift. They know they won’t stand up to the Health Department, so guaranteed meal breaks are a pipe dream.

We are pushing for a genuine penalty to ensure St John is motivated to put you on a break and has an ongoing motivation to put you on a break, even if your break is broken or missed.

Currently, St John can choose not to give a break to any metro crew, and the maximum cost is a few thousand dollars.

It’s not good enough, and this claim remains open.

Clinical Education Trainer – On Road
St John has reviewed the AEAWA claim for a 10% uplift and indicated today that they are sticking to their offer of 8%.

The claim remains open.

Community Paramedic
St John presented some changes to their CP back-to-back secondment model following feedback from the bargaining groups.

For secondments, the changes included introducing the Working with Volunteers allowance payable when performing a shift with a volunteer.

St John proposed the back-to-back CP model would be composed of a 4X4 roster at 38 hours per week, which would result in 6 weeks of Annual Leave. AEAWA provided feedback that St John should consider 12 hour shifts to ensure employees remain eligible for 8 weeks of annual leave.

The other change is that utilities will be included with housing. Discussion occurred regarding whether this would generate FBT implications.

St john promised to revisit their proposed model and return to negotiations in a fortnight.

Night Shift – Rate for Friday and Saturday Night Shifts 
St John have proposed:
$80 per shift Monday – Thursday
$200 Friday to Sunday

This insult offer incurs a cut to the pay offer of 0.5% (4.5% year one increase)

Rejected outright. The AEAWA will not accept a proposal which affects the already inadequate pay offer.

CCP Wage Claim
At the last session, St John was left in no doubt that the CCP pay rate needs to change dramatically. St John indicated that they would return the drawing board.

Unfortunately, their drawing board must be broken because today’s offer was a slap-in-the-face to the CCP cohort. St John has today offered:

• 8.4% for on-road CCP, which would equal $158,000 annually.
• Helicopter CCP would receive a rolled-in $10,000 allowance, which would equal $168,000
  RFDS flight nurses only attend critically injured or unwell patient groups with a senior doctor on board. They do not perform pre-hospital anaesthesia and are not subject to the same clinical scrutiny as CCP, yet they get paid $180,000.

St John tried to dress the offer up by stating that if CCP performs a tutoring roster, they will attract 8% on top of that roster! How St John can attempt to include a tutoring allowance as part of the sales package is simply astounding. It’s equivalent to suggesting that paramedic wages are okay if you go on secondment in college.

St John states that they will provide bargaining groups with detailed figures around their offer, with index linkage and comparison to other states with a HEMS service.

Parental Leave
St John has refused to consider paying the rolled-up rate for parental leave, arguing that it is industry standard to pay the base. This may be industry standard, but most industries have a salary compromised of a healthy, liveable base wage. Our salary is heavily weighted in favour of shift allowances, and once they are removed, new parents can often face hardship.

It would be nice if St John tried harder to be a family-friendly organisation.

St John claims parental leave at the rolled-up rate would cost several million. Of course, they said it could be done, but it would come off the overall pay offer.

Parental leave claims remain open.

Life Insurance
St John agreed to extend the $500 previously offered to CCP to PSO as their insurance premiums are classed as ‘heavy manual’ if the employee is ‘permanently’ in a PSO role. St John also raised the issue of PSO deployments in relation to allocated positions, as currently, the PSOs can lose their position should they accumulate 2 years out of their allocated position.

This broadened into a wider discussion as to whether CCP should remain exempt from the ‘time out of depot’ clause in relation to holding 4X4 positions. A solution proposed by the AEAWA would be to allow CCPs who have been offered a 4X4 position to accept the hours only of that shift but not hold the actual day van position indefinitely. This will affect relatively few employees but will free up several day van positions while allowing CCP’s to continue their role and avoiding a hard choice between CCP and their day ambulance.

This concludes the summary of Monday’s meeting.

News and updates are available on www.aeawa.com.au, and don’t forget to report issues at https://www.aeawa.com.au/report-issue/

Thanks for your ongoing support. Feedback, comments, and suggestions are welcome.

Meeting Closed
14:00

Next Meeting
November 11th, 2024 (most likely)

Meeting Chaired By
Brendan Brodie-Hall.

Meeting Conducted
09:00 – 14:00.

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

Committee Apologies
Kirsty Roberts and Paul Davies.

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

The Meeting
On Monday, bargaining representatives met for the 14th scheduled EBA negotiations. This was the first meeting for 4 weeks. While some progress was made on several claims, we still have some way to go on several key issues, including the critical pay increase claim. Please be advised that St John showcased a PowerPoint presentation at this meeting highlighting the alleged status of various claims.

This slideshow looked suspiciously like it was written for the wider workforce rather than bargaining groups. Many claims were lists as ‘accepted’ or ‘agreed’, which from our perspective they are NOT. When challenged on this, St John stated that it simply means to convey the St John agreed or accepted position, not what all the bargaining parties have agreed or accepted. Please be mindful of this fact when the propaganda undoubtedly lands in your inbox in the coming days.

Below is a summary of the topics discussed:

Meal Breaks
St John provided a response to AEAWA’s proposal at the last meeting.

Under the AEAWA proposal:
Employees could go no more than 7 hours without a break incurring a break. St John would not be able to allocate a break during the first hour of the shift. St John would have the choice to give an officer one break in a shorter window in the middle of this shift or; Two breaks on either side of that window. Failure to provide a break within 7 hours would result in an employee being on double time until the break was completed.

Today, St John responded to this meal break proposal. They indicated they could agree to the proposal, but with the caveat that they could not accept the double time component. Instead, St John proposes increasing the broken meal break penalty to $25. The AEAWA believes that there must a sizeable penalty for a failure to provide a break. Ideally, there would be an element of accrual in the penalty system; otherwise, once a meal break is missed, or broken, St John has no ongoing incentive to put an employee back on a break.

St John’s leadership claims they do not need a financial incentive, as they believe it is the ‘right thing to do’ from a welfare and fatigue management perspective to put officers on breaks. Sadly, this is not the experience of on-road staff. The only time breaks are allocated is during rare quiet periods. During busy periods (which is when a break is most needed) crews simply don’t get breaks at all.

Some ideas put forward for consideration where:
Financial penalty for missed/broken breaks AND crew finishes shift 30 minutes early.
Financial penalty for missed/broken breaks AND 30 minutes paid into special leave.

St John are ‘going back to the drawing board’ to look at how this claim could be satisfactorily settled.

New Clause to address Overtime SOP
Members will recall that St John has ploughed ahead with their unfair and inequitable Overtime SOP, despite the AEAWA providing damning feedback in relation to the unfairness of overtime limits for select employees only. As mentioned, we will not accept a policy which causes such a disparity between employees, in terms of access to overtime. In our view, it is patently unfair that employees on the urban fringes now have hard limits to work overtime on annual leave and each fortnight, while an employee 50km further from the CBD under the same certified agreement can work unlimited overtime.

St John has deliberately applied this policy only in the metro area because it knows that other parts of the service (such as country locations and CCP) would collapse if it was applied there, too. This makes a mockery of the ‘fatigue management’ argument St John has pushed to introduce this policy. Fatigue, if that is the issue, doesn’t cease to exist based on your location. As discussed and as repeatedly highlighted to St John, we will not accept this.

If St John insists on continuing with this policy (which they have; the policy will be in effect in metro), we will insist that it goes into the Agreement…verbatim. As such, it will apply equally to all employees in all areas, including the places they do not want to apply to because it’s ‘too difficult’. We know that St John could not cope with this. With the introduction of this new claim, St John has a choice: they can revisit the feedback we provided to this SOP during the alleged ‘consultation phase’ and make appropriate changes to the SOP to ensure it is fair and consistent and can be equally applied, or they can deal with the implications of the SOP as an enforceable term of the EBA. A clause which will apply regardless of REAP level. After all, if fatigue is the real motivation, the St John REAP level and triple time activation doesn’t suddenly make it safe to work ‘excessive’ overtime.

The bargaining group has never requested a rewritten Overtime SOP and is opposed to hard overtime limits. For decades, we’ve had a multitude of SOPs governing overtime, and St John has always decided unilaterally when and if it wants to enforce them.

We asked for a fair, open and transparent system that allocates overtime consistently and fairly. The data to do this is readily available. It’s on every employee’s payslip how much OT they have worked for the previous fortnight, and YTD. It’s even broken down into the type of OT (sport, EXT, full shift, admin). St John knows how much overtime an employee has worked and could quickly develop a self-policing electronic system. Such a system could allocate overtime preferentially to staff who have expressed interest in working and have, on average, worked less overtime. Shift extension OT can be excluded. Such a system is flexible enough to manage different REAP levels and allows employees to manage their own fatigue.

This claim remains open. Importantly, such a system could apply equally to metro and country employees and would satisfactorily resolve this claim.

The next claim continues to highlight the double standards this OT policy creates. Again, why should limits introduced in the name of fatigue apply only to career staff?

New clause to be inserted in the EA
“Where Employees are required to work with volunteers, St John will, as far as practicable, ensure that a volunteer who holds full-time employment works at most two (2) volunteer shifts per fortnight, including during periods of Annual Leave. ”St John have rejected this claim, stating that most hybrid centres are pretty good at managing their own fatigue, and the fatigue of the volunteers, so they “wouldn’t want to introduce a blanket rule like this”.

Ironically, volunteers can manage their own fatigue, but metro paramedics need a ‘blanket rule’ on overtime limits to manage theirs. To address the overtime fairness claim, we insist on the below clause:

New clause to be inserted into EA
31.1(h) St John commits to the development of an electronic system for the booking of overtime during the first 12 months of the Agreement coming into force. The electronic system will allocate overtime fairly based on previous overtime worked, and have the following attributes:
I. Live, real-time visibility of rostering vacancies/overtime shifts for at least the next 14 days.
II. Live visibility of the proposed hours, location and work partner (if known)
III. Ability to accept overtime shifts in accordance with the rules set out in 31.1(g) directly through the electronic system.
IV. Ability to cancel a previously accepted overtime shift directly through the electronic system

St John do not believe they have the necessary IT infrastructure in place to do this. Apparently, the Excel spreadsheet will not connect to an App.

New clause to be inserted into EA
Members will remember that on 1st September, St John changed the overtime increments to avoid paying both 15 minutes overtime, and the SCA, f you accepted a job 0-5 minutes before shift commencement.
What St John has done is circumvent the Fair Work decision which upheld the payment of the SCA for pre-shift activations. St John has forgotten that it is the largely unpaid work which keeps the wheels on this service at shift changeover. As a result, we have introduced the following clause which seeks to introduce the SCA for each shift, regardless of whether you are dispatched to a call or not. After all, our members are all at work before their shift starts, performing this unpaid work regardless.

Amend Clause 21 Shift Commencement Checks
An allowance is payable for each shift worked. The payment trigger is no longer linked to ‘accepting and deploying’.
Trigger amended to:
a) crew log in to AmbiCAD within the first 5 minutes of shift commencement (signalling shift commencement checks have been completed).
b) crew accept and deploy to any call prior to shift commencement (signalling shift commencement checks have been completed). Employees not satisfying 21(a) or 21(b) above will be given 15 minutes after the commencement of the shift to complete mandatory checks. Naturally, St John have immediately rejected this claim.

Regional Support Allowance (RSA)
The RSA is the proposed new method of providing incentives and support for country paramedics, which more accurately tracks the various expenses and quality of life considerations of various country areas, with a view to attracting more staff to these areas, with less reliance on relief and postings. One of the most significant sticking points was the NW allowance. During this meeting, St John indicated that, after consulting with both bargaining groups, they have agreed to one of the proposals put forward by AEAWA delegates in the Northwest. This means all Northwest officers will receive the same pay, with an NW allowance of $101,731 for all subcentres in that region.

Clin Ed Trainer – On Road
St John has proposed a flat 8% uplift for all clinical training roles. CPHC secondments and On-Road Tutors would all receive an 8% uplift. While the AEAWA negotiators agree in principle to this mechanism, we prefer an uplift of 10%.

The claim remains open.

Progression from AP1 – AP2
The proposal is that an employee should complete 336 ambulance-based, on-road shifts over three years to achieve the rank of Ambulance Paramedic 2. Overtime shifts would not be included. This is an easily achievable figure. It would allow employees to undertake secondments and take periods of leave without adversely affecting progression while still ensuring the employee receives sufficient exposure to their core role. It should also allow officers who focus purely on their on-road career to accelerate their progression to AP2 in less than the current three years.

This appeared to be accepted by all parties.

Night Shift Penalty– rate for Friday and Saturday nights
In response to our claims for a fair night shift allowance, St John has ‘offered’ to increase the night shift penalty to $150 per Friday and Saturday night and $100 per night Sunday through Thursday night.
However, St John believes they can only afford this by decreasing the first-year pay offer from 5% to 4.5%. This is entirely unacceptable to the bargaining group.

St John insists they are ‘haemorrhaging money’ and that the ‘pot of money is finite’… While 224 employees who turn up to EVERY shift may be very slightly better under this proposal, it does not account for the negative impact a subtraction of 0.5% would have on all other allowances, not just base salary.

This is a firm, unequivocal NO from the bargaining team. The 5% offered in year one is ALREADY unacceptable, so there is no chance this proposal would be acceptable. Despite being reminded countless times during bargaining, St John remains blissfully unaware that there is no incentive to work night shifts. Night shifts have become intolerable in recent years, with our previous managerial regime insisting that ‘our night shift coverage is fine’ despite our warnings and stacking resources into days only.

Employees are increasingly opting to work part-time hours to avoid nights, and the financial reward for a night shift OT shift is essentially the same as a late day shift OT with an (inevitable) extension. St John is now forced to rely on triple time to staff nights, yet they cannot seem to connect the dots. Instead, they offer a probably insufficient increase to the night shift allowance penalty while simultaneously suggesting they take money off the base pay to fund it. Madness.

Community Paramedics
St John agreed to the AEAWA proposal to introduce a compulsory 9-hour break for CPs after they finish a job which is undertaken after their regular hours until they start their next shift. If a CP finishes a job at midnight, they do not come in on shift again until 9am. St John also outlined the proposed new benefits/incentives for CP postings in order to attract and retain people to these roles.

The AEAWA believes that, while these measures will help attract staff to work in the CP role, some permanent officers may be at a disadvantage compared to officers on a posting, and St John should examine whether permanent CP officers can be given the opportunity to accept posting conditions while remaining permanent. The AEAWA also proposed increasing the on-call allowance to the equivalent of the hourly CP allowance, which would make the allowance distribution more equitable between the various types of CP roles being proposed.

CCP Wage Claim
St John proposed increasing the CCP salary to $149,000. Frankly, this insulted the group and was a far cry from the $180,000 sought to put our CCP cohort on a similar footing to their interstate colleagues.
The CCP group has the highest clinical scope in the organisation. Its members undergo rigorous training and ongoing skills maintenance. They perform very high-risk procedures in the most challenging environments and are exposed to extreme levels of clinical risk and scrutiny.

Under the new management model, the district clinical lead (DCL) will be paid approximately $162,000, While this is undoubtedly an important and highly skilled role, the training for this role is significantly shorter and less intense, and ironically, the CCP group have been asked to help develop a training course for the DCL, who St John propose to pay more. The bargaining representatives roundly rejected the CCP pay offer of $149,000.

St John are going back to their spreadsheet.

Introduction of a Rescue Crewperson Allowance to be rolled into the proposed CCP3/4 Rate.
The claim here was for $15,000 per annum. St John proposed to increase this to $100 per shift.

This remains an open negotiation.

Life Insurance
Due to the high-risk helicopter and rescue component of the role, CCPs face significant challenges in obtaining affordable life insurance. After several rounds of discussion, St John returned with an offer of $500 per annum to offset the difference in typical insurance premiums between on-road paramedics and helicopter paramedics.

Parental Leave
Sadly, St John shows no interest in being a model employer regarding parental leave. St John refused to increase primary caregiver parental leave from 12 weeks base to 12 weeks of rolled-up salary, citing the industry standard practice of parental leave being base only, with no allowances. St John cited nursing as an example where staff also receive no allowances. However, AEAWA delegates countered that employees of WA Health at least get 14 weeks at the base rate in nursing, not 12.

Seeing as we spend most of our shift working for WA Health inside their ED’s, perhaps we should get 14 weeks paid parental leave also? In relation to non-primary caregiver parental leave, St John will provide 12 shifts, again at the base rate.

That concludes the summery.
Another meeting is scheduled for roughly two weeks away, but the date has not been confirmed. As always, we welcome feedback. Please keep an eye on our website at www.aeawa.com.au and remember to make use of our Report an Issue feature if you have concerns you would like us to look in to https://www.aeawa.com.au/report-issue

Meeting Closed
16:00

Next Meeting
Monday 28th October 2024

Meeting Chaired By
Brendan Brodie-Hall.

Meeting Conducted
09:00 – 14:00.

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

Committee Apologies
Kirsty Roberts and Paul Davies.

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

Below is a summary of the topics discussed at the 13th EBA meeting, which was held on Monday, September 16th. As you will see, there was only limited movement on the important topics.

We will take a short detour to comment on the email you have received from the Ambulance Operations General Manager – Urban & Coastal on Friday.

The email states:
“Fatigue and overtime issues have been raised by both on-road team members and by delegates within the EA discussions. Along with several other actions, the Fatigue Working Group and members of Metro Operations and State Control Centre have reviewed all current published SOPs related to overtime provision. The new SOP replaces existing SOPs, providing team members with a higher clarity on eligibility to work overtime and reinforce an equitable allocation process. The SOP seeks to deliver a balance between providing team members the opportunity to complete overtime whilst also considering the risk of fatigue. SOPP-1009 will come into effect from the start of the next roster on 13 October 2024.”

First, any discussions of fatigue during the EA negotiations have been related to out-of-control shift extensions and a failure to grant breaks, frequently given to less than 40% of crews, with many fewer completed.

Second, St John is keen to use a fatigue argument to introduce this SOP but refuses to apply the principles equally across the workforce. This is unacceptable. If fatigue is the issue, it should apply universally, and it should not be ignored at the discretion of St John when they are ‘a bit busy’.

Third, the Overtime SOP introduced by email on Friday was NOT approved or endorsed by the AEAWA. Members will recall that we wrote to St John on 1 August rejecting the policy and outlining a number of concerns around fairness and equity that it creates. Despite our objections, St John has ploughed ahead regardless, as is their way.

Fourth, the AEAWA have not requested a ‘review of all current published SOPs’’. What we wanted was a system to book overtime online directly so that the allocation was fair and equitable. This policy does not achieve that, and in fact creates further disparity and inequity in the allocation.

We have written to St John again in response to this SOP, this time to force the issue out of an SOP (which St John can unilaterally ignore when it suits them) and into the EA. If St John ignores our feedback and wishes to continue to introduce a flawed policy, we will make sure they understand the implications fully, at the bargaining table.

On to the EBA summary.

Country Recruitment Process
St John proposes reintroducing a list system to expedite appointments in certain country areas.

The proposed area proposed to utilise a list system is Urban & Coastal, this is because this area shares a single management model. The Urban and Coastal areas include Metro, Southern Coast, Peel, and Southern Forrest, Psychometric testing remains., Rural and remote will remain interview-based.

Progression
A lengthy discussion took place regarding the minimum shifts required to be completed to be eligible for roles that St John has defined as ‘minimum AP2’. The current Agreement is silent on the issue. The AEAWA are proposing a very achievable position of 112 patient-facing shifts per year. This would allow officers to undertake secondments in non-patient-facing roles without delaying progression but ensure a minimum clinical exposure is attained.

Also, under discussion was whether an officer who completes their total required patient-facing shifts earlier should receive the AP2 pay increase immediately and the definition of ‘patient-facing’ shift.

(St John) Create a higher duties allowance for Clinical Education Trainers to ensure equitable rates of pay across this classification.
St John had previously proposed a standardised pay increase for all CPHC secondments and PTO of 10% of base rate of pay. The AEAWA has argued that On-Road Tutors should be included in this pay increase as this role is very challenging and attracts a higher clinical risk. St John has returned with a proposal to pay an increase of 8% on base rate for any CHPC trainers or secondments and 8% for On-Road Tutors, with 10% of base rate Training Officer roles.

This remains an ongoing discussion.

(St John) Amend subclause (d) to remove the 20% restriction on non-clinical training, due to the increased need for mandatory training that is non-clinical in nature.
This was roundly rejected.

It was highlighted to St John that employee representatives have historically shown a high degree of reasonableness in recent years in the application of this rule. Employment representatives have allowed several non-clinical topics in recent years to consume more than 20% of CEP time when they have been considered important topics (i.e. aggression and violence training), and we do not feel it necessary or appropriate to extend the allowed non-clinical component.

Managers On Road
Define manager within the clause to include any officer in a pool (active or otherwise). Managers in pools and appointed roles need to be visible on the roster. St John initially rejected this claim but has since reconsidered their position and agreed to include pool DOMs and DOLs in the managers on road clause. St John rejected including the DCL role in the definition of on-road manager. We argue that because this role sits outside of the Agreement, it is clear that St John aims to have this role closely aligned with management.

This claim will not prohibit pool DOLs and DOMs from working on the road. It just means the paramedic must be consulted first. While the clause is unlikely to need triggering in most day-to-day operations, the reasons for this claim being needed are obvious. Without the protection of this clause, an officer could be undergoing a performance management process or clinical investigation while potentially be required to work with their direct line manager while on shift.

Change all secondment time-periods from 3 years to 2 years/ Add in the Equity of Opportunity clause.
St John wants the ability to have secondments of up to 5 years in length. They are particularly interested in extending Community Paramedic secondments. Our survey results on this issue were clear: our members did not want more extended secondments. Our members voiced concern that the few opportunities which exist to work in different areas are often occupied by a handful of people for a long time, thereby limiting their chance to apply.

The discussion remains ongoing.

Travel Allowance
Change to double time per minute of excess km from home to station if greater than 60km. St John rejected this claim as they state they do not want to incentivize or encourage lengthy drives to/from work, considering it not in alignment with their fatigue management goals.

Meal (Crib) Breaks
In the event a crew is not allocated a crib break, the crew will be paid at a rate of 200% until completion of a meal break or the end of their shift

St John rejected this claim.

Instead, St John proposes increasing the meal break window to 5 hours. They believe this should be acceptable, given that the 5-hour window would include the travel time to the nearest depot and that meal breaks would be scheduled. St John argues their proposal would mean breaks would no longer be given at the hospital, breaks would be completed within the 5-hour window, and the broken meal break penalty would increase to $25.

The AEAWA feel that this proposal is unacceptable and fails to understand the strength of feeling on the road in relation to meal breaks.

St John feels that the biggest challenge in achieving meal breaks is the short window in the middle of the shift. We have proposed an alternative which would allow St John to schedule a single break in a short window in the middle of the shift, OR to schedule two separate breaks either side of this window. Failure to achieve breaks would result in double time until the break is complete.

St John agreed to consider our proposal and provide feedback.

Define a Country Crew
St John agrees to set the minimum qualification level for EMA in hybrid locations. Paramedics in these locations may be requested to work with an EMR in exceptional circumstances, but this is by agreement between parties. While this is progress in the right direction, it does leave the door open for St John to change the scope of an EMA at a later date. We prefer a minimum clinical scope to be outlined in the Agreement, rather than simply a role title which is subject to change via policy.

CCP Life Insurance
This claim is for monetary assistance for the helicopter CCPs equivalent to the difference between a paramedic quote for salary continuation, TPD, and life insurance based on the same age, health gender, etc. When comparing a quote for an on-road paramedic to a helicopter CCP, SJA will make up the difference or provide cover if the employee is uninsurable due to their role within the organisation.

St John argues that REST offers insurance to a generic ‘paramedic’ role and does not specify or request information on ‘higher risk’ helicopter-based roles.
The AEAWA are examining this claim as the insurance seems to exclude other helicopter-based roles from their standard cover.

Night Shift Allowance for CCP/PSO/ECP
There is currently no CCP/PSO/ECP classification for night shift allowance. St John agreed to include one in the new Agreement.

The quantum suggested by St John is:
$106.99 for ECP and CCP
$94.39 for PSO

The discussion devolved into a more comprehensive discussion of St John’s proposal for last fortnight’s night shift: to pay $150 for Friday and Sunday night while leaving the Night Shift Allowance unchanged for Sunday – Thursday.

St John negotiators do seem to understand that it may be more cost-effective to compensate all night shifts better than continue to rely on triple-time overtime. However, they are concerned that increasing the Night Shift Allowance will not solve the issues, and they will pay more triple-time and more night shift payments.

Discussions remain ongoing.

Backpay
At the end of the meeting AEAWA delegates raised the issue of back pay. We have insisted that St John commit to back pay, as our members are now overdue a pay raise by 3 months.

St John stated they would only commit to back pay for the 5%/5%/4% offer they have tabled and insist they have ‘nothing held back’ in making this offer.
St John was advised that this offer would in no way be acceptable to our members.
Silence followed.

The next meeting has yet to be scheduled as St John requests a four-week break to consolidate and cost claims.

Meeting Closed
14:00

Next Meeting
TBA

Meeting Chaired By
Brendan Brodie-Hall.

Meeting Conducted
09:00 – 14:00.

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

Committee Apologies
Kirsty Roberts and Paul Davies.

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

The AEAWA negotiation team met with St John on Monday for the 12th Paramedic EBA bargaining meeting.

You will find a recap of what was discussed at this meeting below. Firstly, we have a couple of general updates to discuss.

AUSMED
We have received several emails from members concerned that Monday’s email from AUSMED was an elaborate St John ’phishing’ exercise. We would be grateful if Facebook members could spread the word to colleagues wise enough not to have a Facebook account that the AUSMED email is legit and links are safe.

We hope all members are enjoying this new ongoing benefit.

Sick Leave
The AEAWA would like to quickly address some thoughts regarding sick leave that were shared in the fortnightly Metropolitan Ambulance Update.

The St John’s email stated:
“line managers are actively monitoring and discussing sick leave trends with team members, particularly those who have either taken regular leave or called to book off close to their shift commencement time”. These conversations not only help to gain an understanding of leave patterns, they also enable line managers to provide greater assistance to team members who may be experiencing challenges in maintaining scheduled shifts. “

These emails occur periodically (generally when St John’s response times suffer due to winter pressures).

The AEAWA would prefer if St John managers would re-direct their discussions to WA Health, with a view to reducing ramping and increasing ambulance standby capacity through greater funding. This would be preferable to targeting individual workers who have fallen ill or who have carer responsibilities. At some point, we need to recognise that this problem cannot be solved by clamping down on sick leave and taking ever more time from employees in the form of shift extensions.

Personal Leave (sick or carer leave) is an entitlement under the Fair Work Act 2009.

It is also covered by ’general protection’. Law. This means that St John cannot take adverse action for a reason that is against you because you used a workplace rights (such as taking personal leave) or because you are away from work sick or injured.

While a St John manager can attempt to talk with an employee regarding sick leave, unless that manager is also your GP or specialist, you do not need to enter into a discussion or divulge any details regarding the reasons for your absence. Regarding the ‘booking off close to the shift commencement time’ aspect of this email. While St John currently has a clause in the EBA which suggests an employee should provide notice:

(i) at least 2 hours prior to the shift, if it is a Day Shift; or
(ii) at least 4 hours prior to the shift, if it is a Night Shift.

Fair Work has a much more realistic view of the nature of ‘unplanned leave’ and the notice that is required. Unplanned leave is for the most part, ‘unplanned’, and so it can be very challenging to schedule a notice period for it. Fair Work believes notice of intention to take sick leave:

‘must be done as soon as practicable, and may even be after the leave has started on occasion (for example, in an emergency situation where an employee (or their immediate family member or household member) is in hospital).’

Personal / Carers leave entitlements require justification through a Statutory Declaration or Medical Certificate and the AEAWA advises that no further discussion should be entered into.

The AEAWA would also like to advise members that, unfortunately, an ‘informal chat’ is often documented in a formal report.

EBA BARGAINING UPDATE

Country Recruitment Process
St John claim that for any recruitment and selection process, the Safety and wellbeing of paramedics is the priority. As such, they still want an interview-style process to retain a veto in relation to selection criteria, and to retain the psychometric testing.

Discussions revealed that St John have heard of a number of paramedics who have received negative feedback during their time on relief. They concede that this is often undocumented and unofficial feedback from volunteers.

It is clear that St John wish to ‘veto’ applicants on the basis of this feedback, and so they reject the reintroduction of a list system alone. They do however, agree to remove assessment centres.

The AEAWA highlighted that if concerns are raised about the performance of a paramedic on country relief, that information must be communicated to the paramedic to allow them an opportunity to address the concern, or improve their performance. It should not be held secretly and used against them at a later point. It is exactly this kind of system.

If the concerns are ongoing, we agree the applicant may not be eligible for permanent appointment. Still, the reason should be identified as related to their performance and feedback on relief. An applicant should not be vetoed based on undocumented information or because there is another more favoured applicant.

Amend clause to restrict CEP delivery method to in-person (no online component unless by Agreement by employment representative groups).

Rejected.

St John wishes to retain the ability to deliver the training in regional areas locally via LMS.

Amend clause to reiterate all mandatory LMS / CPG and practice updates to be completed during CEP (not ‘on the ramp’).

St John agreed that training should never be expected to be completed while ramped, though they believe that because the majority of crews are ‘on the mobile’ for an hour or two each morning, there is generally time to complete training during shift.

We disagree and resent the implication that occasional downtime during the early hours is proof that employees are swimming in free time to complete LMS training packages.

Create a higher duties allowance for Clinical Education Trainers to ensure equitable rates of pay across this classification.
St John has suggested disbanding the current CPHC trainer rate and instead proposed paying a percentage on top of rolled-up salary for CPHC salary. This would incentivise a broader range of paramedics to apply to undertake college secondments.

The AEAWA are considering this claim from St John and the impact on members. Insert number of shifts required per year to achieve progression milestones as per (similar SAO/Intern progression – Progression Policy) to ensure classification matches clinical experience.

This claim intends to extend the current annual minimum clinical shift requirements, which apply to AO progression/Intern progression, to include progression from AP1 to AP2. St John typically uses AP2 to apply a level of clinical experience to needed for certain positions, for instance, country postings, CCP, CSP etc. This focuses on clinician safety and recognises that certain positions can expose officers to increase workplace stress and pressure. As the EBA currently stands, an AP1 could take 3 years Leave Without Pay and progress to AP2, therefore becoming eligible to apply for CCP, without having undertaken any clinical shifts on road as AP1.

Bargaining groups are currently discussing how this may apply, and considering any implications which may not be apparent at first pass.

Insert an AP4 and SM4 Classification (5 years at AP3). Progression aligns to the current time frame. The calculation of shifts to be 142 per year.
Rejected.

Night Shift Payment to be paid to officers completing full night shift overtime.
This is proposed to incentivise employees to complete night shift overtime, as there is a diminishing monetary differential between day and night shift overtime.

St John indicated that they are still considering this.

Night Shift Payment increased by 2x for full night shifts worked Monday-Thursday
Rejected.

St John propose to keep this payment at current rates for Monday-Thursday (subject to any agreed annual salary increase). However…

Night Shift Payment increased by 2.5x increase for full night shift worked Friday/Saturday/Sunday.
Rejected.

St John proposed to increase the night shift payment instead to $150 payment per Friday/Saturday night shift. There would be no increase on Sunday night under the St John proposal.

While this does improve the current allowance, we do not believe it adequately compensates employees for night shifts that have become increasingly punishing and pineapple-shaped. Naturally, a lengthy discussion followed regarding the unseen benefit to the organisation of decreasing unplanned leave through incentivising people to work the night shift.

Night Shift Payment for shifts of 11 hour or 12-hours that extend past 24:00 hrs then the employee will receive the prescribed overtime and the Night Shift penalty as described in Appendix 2.
Agreed.

New ‘Unsocial Hours’ 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.

St John believes the cost of this claim would be more than $500,000 annually.

On-Road Tutor allowance to be at base rate of CPHC trainer
St John rejected this claim, but after some discussion highlighting that working an On-Road Tutor is significantly more challenging than working as a CPHC trainer, they agreed to ‘go away and think about this further’.

Clarify wording – break to be completed within the window
St John rejected this claim, unless bargaining groups agree to extend the meal break window to 6 hours. Our members have communicated this clearly: the meal break window cannot return to a 6-hour span. St John was advised that, in all honesty, further discussion of a 6-hour window was wasting everyone’s time.

Increase broken crib break penalty to the equivalent 1 hour of the employee’s base rate of pay
St John offered instead 1.5x base hourly rate for the 30-minute missed break (equivilent to 45 minutes at base rate). However, further discussion showed that perhaps this was not what was meant. St John seemed unsure and will return with some clarification.

If this is what they meant, it would mean a broken meal break penalty at current rates of pay would be:
Paramedic Intern 1: $23.70
Paramedic Intern 2: $26.19
Paramedic AP1: $30.88
Paramedic AP2: $32.51
Paramedic AP3: $34.14
Station Manager 2: $35.55
Station Manager 3: $36.24
CSP: $39.72
CCP: $40.97

The AEAWA believe this needs to be increased. We also note that the current value of a broken crib break is uniform across all ranks, and it seems difficult to justify why the amount would vary so much between, for instance, Interns and CSP. Food costs are the same irrespective. With this in mind, we would prefer (along with a much more substantial penalty) a uniform penalty across all ranks.

St John was advised of our concerns and suggested they would reconsider and return with an improved position.

Triple time for any shift extension over 1 hour until the completion of the shift extension
St John rejected this claim and offered to pay double-time and a half (x2.5 rate) on base rate after a 2-hour shift extension.

Our view is that, while we appreciate the attempt at a compromise position, any penalty needs to occur after one hour of shift extension. The two-hour grace period sends a message a 2-hour shift extension is ‘reasonable’, which it is most certainly not.

Minimum 9 consecutive hours off work between shifts to become a minimum of 11 consecutive hours between shifts.
St John rejected this claim, instead offering: For 11/13 hour shift length pattern (224), the minimum time between shifts increases to 9.5 hours For 12 hours, the minimum time between shifts would change to a 10-hour break.

We believe a larger minimum shift is required to compel St John to manage fatigue and shift extensions better.

Increase available Special Leave slots from 7% to 9%. And 4×4 and 224 positions to be calculated separately (so as not to fill night shift Special Leave slots with late day van)
St John agreed to this, but it was highlighted that due to fewer staff numbers on 4X4, moving from 7%-9% does not generate any new Special Leave positions for this cohort (but will do for 224).

This varies depending on breakdown:

• Current system at 7% = 18.76 spots, currently shared between 224 and 4×4
• Proposed system at 7% = 14 x 224 spots & 5 x 4X4 spots
• Current system at 8% = 21.44 spots currently shared between 224 and 4X4
• Proposed system at 8% = 16x 224 spots & 5.5 x 4X4 spots (rounded up to 6)
• Current system at 9% = 24.12 spots, currently shared between 224 and 4×4
• Proposed system at 9% = 18x 224 spots and 6.12 x 4X4 spots (rounded down to 6)
• St John Agreed to split available positions by shift type (DAY/LATE/NIGHT) instead of the current (DAY / (LATE+NIGHT)).

The parties are thinking if a mechanism can achieve the desired increase in Special Leave positions across the board.

Paid time off if dealing with AHPRA or an Inquiry at work, or 200% base rate over time.
Initially, St John rejected this claim, but after some explanatory discussions, St John indicated agreement under certain conditions, such as not in cases where allegations of serious misconduct have been substantiated and/or the employee has been dismissed. The AHPRA issue must also arise from a job attended at work.

Allowance when PSOs are deployed without facilities. Parity sought with DEFS, USAR i.e. Camping Allowance.
St John offered $99.15 allowance per night where no facilities are available (i.e. required to sleep in a swag, for instance)

AEAWA representatives will examine and consider this offer.

ECP Unreasonable Overtime.
Due to the extended nature of ECP investigations and the inability to get a takeover crew for their taskings, we are seeking greater shift extension protections against unreasonable overtime for our ECP members.

St John indicated they would prefer to extend and align the blackout periods and protocols offered to all Paramedics (no P1/P2 in the last hour) to the ECP cohort.

We do not believe this will be sufficient. As stated above, it is possible for paramedic crews to get a takeover crew, and ECPs are also spread very thin in the metro area. With this in mind, we believe there needs to be additional safeguards in place to protect ECPs against unreasonable overtime.

We will continue discussions with our ECP members on this issue.

Meeting Closed
14:00

Next Meeting
Monday September 9th, 2024

Meeting Chaired By
Brendan Brodie-Hall

Meeting Conducted
09:00 – 16:00.

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

Committee Apologies
Rick Candy.

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

Previous Meeting Undertakings

St Johns came back with the break downs of volunteers in the county which was in relation to the AEAWA’s EMA/EMR Clause.
– VAO 297
– EMR 653
– EMA 565
– EMT 1,111

Pre-Bargaining Business

OT Allocation SOP
St John requested feedback on this SOP, which we outlined last week, was intended to appease some of the claims relating to equitable, fair and transparent overtime allocation.

We have recently rejected this policy proposal in writing, as posted here on Facebook. We believe this policy would disadvantage our members significantly and serve only to benefit St John.

You will recall that this is the proposed policy, under which officers would only be permitted to work 1 overtime shift per set of days off and 1 overtime shift per week when on annual leave. While we support the alleged principle underpinning this policy (safety), we argue that it will be abandoned as soon as St John wants it to (i.e. when they are busy). They have admitted as much, stating that they need to keep this out of the EBA and ignore the policy due to surges in demand.

If safety is the concern, the policy should apply regardless, and therefore, it should be enforceable through being included in the EBA. This will prevent SJA from unilaterally choosing to ignore their policy every Saturday night shift.

Our gut feeling is that this is not truly about safety; it is about exercising complete control over overtime allocation and placating WorkSafe through a policy they do not intend to follow. Why should our members be restricted in their ability to work overtime only when it suits St John, and all those restrictions miraculously disappear when standby capacity drops? St John would retain the exclusive ability to ignore this policy as and when it suits them.

It is also proposed that it be applied only in Metro. This is even though two recent accidents involving ambulances in South Australia and Victoria were directly related to fatigue. The paramedics involved were working in regional areas in these jurisdictions. If fatigue is the claim, we reject the assertion that it only exists in Metro.

However, St John reject outright this policy being extended to Country areas. They know full well that such areas rely enormously on the willingness and availability of country paramedics to work overtime. The policy would be unworkable in country locations, so they propose it only applies in Metro.

It is of concern that St John also seems to show complete disregard for shift extensions when discussing fatigue. We believe that unplanned overtime (shift extensions and the resulting small gap between rostered shifts) can contribute much more to fatigue than planned, pre-arranged overtime for which an officer can prepare and rest prior.

Again, we do not support the introduction of this policy and will take all steps to prevent its implementation.

Backfill an allocated position with the next on the list if the holder of the allocated position is (UWU):
– Returning from country to take up the allocated position.
– On secondment.
– On any form of leave longer than [6] months.
– Go through the list until someone says yes.
– Only for rotating officers.
– Unless a permanent officer had a position at the top of the list.

In the interests of fairness, we don’t usually discuss UWU claims unless we believe they have the potential to significantly impact our members.

The reason is that UWU cannot defend or expand upon its position in this forum, and we do not wish to misrepresent them. However, the above claim is one that the AEAWA has previously tabled and offered in principle support, and so it warrants discussion and feedback from members as it has pros and cons.

The AEAWA believes this claim to have merit superficially, and we support the general idea that the claim tries to address. As mentioned above, we have proposed mechanisms similar to those in previous EBAs.

However, the AEAWA delegation also understands that this issue is more complex than it first appears.

On the one hand, filling a position with the next person on the list is the simplest and most fair way to manage vacancies created by secondments and posting. After all, when a vacancy arises, it has to be filled by someone, so it may as well be the next person on the list. But like many claims, the devil is in the detail and wording.

Imagine a vacancy in a 4X4 position due to the holder of this position taking a 2-year secondment. In such a circumstance, the next ‘rotational’ officer on the list (as per the UWU claim) may occupy a 4X4 position continuously, for 24 months.

That would mean:

1. Another officer at the top of the list who occupies a 224 position (not rotational) is ineligible to fill this 4X4 position, even though they may have worked 224 continuously for 10+ years.

2. 5.5 rosters per year of potential respite from 224 are now unavailable for all other officers, as this role is filled by the first rotational officer near the top of the list for the whole 24 months.

To avoid this, one might imagine we could allow the absolute next person on this list to occupy this position, not just the next ‘rotational’ officer. However, this would mean:

1. The next person on the list may hold an allocated 4X4 position but randomly choose to accept this 24-month 4X4 position because it is (for instance) closer to their home or it involves working with a friend. Assuming they do accept the newly available 4X4 position, we’ve created another 4X4 vacancy which needs to be backfilled for 24 months by the next person on THAT list…. this creates a chain of movement which becomes increasingly complex and difficult to manage.

2. The same would occur for an officer who is ‘next on the list’ and who holds an allocated 224 position. We assume their newly vacated 224 position may also be required to be filled in the same manner, and soon, one secondment vacancy may result in a chain of 4-6 movements. When you consider the number of secondments and postings that occur, the scale of the operation becomes enormous.

3. Of course, St John could automate this process…but let’s face it, that isn’t going to happen any time soon.

One solution, and potentially our preferred solution about this claim, might be for the NEXT officer on the list holding an allocated 224 person to be permitted to fill the 4X4 position for the duration of the secondment, and that their 224 position still needs to be backfilled. Officers next on the list holding 4X4 would be ineligible.

This would mean that an officer who had (most likely) worked a significant period on the 224 role would be afforded respite on 4X4 for the duration of the secondment. This would reward hardworking and long-serving 224 officers with a longer stint on 4X4, and also offer a consistent work partner for both parties on this vehicle.

However, it would still deplete the total number of individual 4X4 rosters available for others to have either a full or half roster of respite. These are the issues that need to be weighed and balanced.

We would like member feedback on whether another approach or just keeping the status quo would best and most fairly serve the majority of members.

Amend: minimum 9 consecutive hours off work between shifts to minimum 11 consecutive hours between shifts (AEAWA).
The AEAWA understand that controlling unreasonable overtime through the constraint of unnecessary shift extensions is a major priority for our members. You would be forgiven for assuming St John had contracted a custom version of ProQA, in which all jobs are randomly assigned a Priority 1 or Priority 2. While this may be annoying in the middle of a shift, it becomes frustrating and demoralising when, at 25 minutes to the end of your shift, you are despatched to a Priority 2 swollen leg ‘potentially dangerous body area’.

Shift extensions contribute to fatigue, damage morale, and negatively impact family life, social commitments, and carer responsibilities. We all knew there would be occasions when we would not finish on time. It is part of the job and nobody resents a late finish for a genuine emergency.

The problem is the cause of late finishes is rarely an emergency. Shift extensions should not occur daily.

While some may argue that ramping is a burden outside of St John’s control, we would argue that it has become so institutionalised and routine that it should form part of St John’s assessment of daily resource demand. It must be part of planning, such as call volume and unplanned staff absences.

In other words, St John should fully account for ramping and the associated impact it’s staff being able to finish their shift on time.

If 40-50% of the fleet can be ramped each day, St John needs to factor this in and not rely on the goodwill of our members working daily shift extensions and the oncoming night shift to temporarily double the fleet size and manage the outstanding calls.

After 20 years of worsening ramping, ignoring it in resourcing and planning amounts to burying your head in the sand.

The AEAWA have tabled a number of mechanisms to curtail the volume and length of shift extensions, including triple time after the first hour, and raising the minimum break between shifts, and we are revisiting the ‘reasonable overtime’ debate.

However, St John is reluctant to pay triple time, stating that it would encourage staff to ‘drag out’ or prolong shift extensions for financial gain, contributing to fatigue. Today, they indicated they are only willing to commit to a minimum break between shifts equal to the ‘scheduled break’ length minus 2 hours.

This proposal would result in an 11-hour minimum break between day shifts and a 9-hour minimum break between nights. 9 hours between shifts is what the current EBA affords us.
By proposing this, St John is arguing that a two-hour shift extension is ‘acceptable’.

We disagree.

A two-hour extension is unacceptable and should be a very infrequent occurrence. St John then indicated that if the workforce was willing to move to 12-hour shifts, they would offer a 10-hour minimum break between shifts, letting slip that WorkSafe had informed them shifts should never extend over 15 hours. Again, this implies that a 2-hour shift extension is acceptable.

For the AEAWA, if 12-hour shifts were acceptable to the membership, a minimum 11-hour break would be required. St John’s response to this was nothing short of emotional blackmail. St John suggests that if a crew overran their shift and required a minimum 11-hour break, they would ‘not be available to take over from the off-going night shift’.

Let’s be frank. St John is making it YOUR responsibility for your colleagues to finish on time. St John has shown its true colours. It refuses to adequately resource the service, instead preferring to exploit and rely upon the loyalty and camaraderie of on-road colleagues to compensate for the resourcing shortfalls.

We’re all used to it now, but it should not be necessary for each employee to arrive at work 30 minutes early, unpaid for every single shift, to help their colleagues finish on time. We do this because St John do not put measures in place to help. But it is not your role or responsibility to ensure a reasonable finish time; it’s St John as the employer.

This matter is far from settled and remains a core claim for the AEAWA.

An Employee recalled for duty outside normal rostered hours will be paid at overtime rates for a minimum of 4 hours (AEAWA).
St John indicated that they would keep the ICB minimum hours at 3 hours but would be willing to confirm within the EBA that an officer would not need to remain available for the full 3 hours, if the job can be completed sooner (i.e. country RFDS airport transfer).

St John proposes to split out the ICB clause to better differentiate between short notice overtime shift (which is typical in metro and relates to a full shift of overtime), and a true ‘ICB’ (which relates for to being recalled for a specific job, and is more common on country)

Delete 33.9(m) ‘Long service leave shall be taken at a time convenient to St John’ (AEAWA).
The LSL Act (WA) supersedes the EA in this regard and this wording is contradictory to legislation. Our EBA is covered by Federal Legislation, yet its introductory paragraphs explicitly state that it does not override the LSL Act (WA).

The LSL Act (WA) allows leave to be taken by mutual agreement between employer and employee within the first 12 months of becoming due and, failing that, at a time suitable to the employee after 12 months.

Out EBA states LSL “shall be taken at a time convenient to St John.” Full stop.

St John has consulted their lawyers at Kingston Reid and thinks that, because we are entitled to 13 weeks LSL, as opposed to the 8.6 weeks LSL afforded by the LSL Act 1958 (WA), we are Better Off Overall. Therefore, they can ignore all other provisions of the LSL legislation.

The AEAWA is still determining whether the additional weeks of LSL outweigh entirely an employee’s right to schedule LSL. There must be a better balance. 13 weeks sounds significant compared to the LSL Act (WA), but it is the standard in South Australia, Northern Territory and Commonwealth public servants.

13 weeks also dates back to the Ambulance Service Employees Award 1969, governed by the Western Australian Industrial Relations Commission, and so long pre-dates the Federal Fair Work Act system.

The AEAWA await further legal opinion on this matter.

Include Personal Leave balances over 336 hours can be exchanged for special leave hours at a rate of two accumulated personal leave hours for one special leave hour. Balance not allowed to fall below the 336 hour threshold. (8 weeks x 42 hours) (AEAWA).
St John Agreed to 12 weeks (1.5 rosters) as a minimum to account for, for instance, sporting injuries. We think balances above 8 weeks Personal Leave may be sufficient, and we remain in negotiations.

33.15(b)(i) increase Special Leave available positions from 7% to 9% (AEAWA).
4×4 and 224 Special Leave positions to be calculated separately. Following on from the AEAWA’s successful increase in Special Leave available shifts at the last EBA, whereby we negotiated an increase of 5% to 7% of total Special Leave positions available, we are now pleased to announce St John has agreed to increase available Special Leave positions to:
• 8% 1st July 2025
• 9% 1st July 2026

They have also agreed to split 4X4 calculations from 224 (as a late day is currently included in the night’s calculation, meaning fewer people could use special leave on the night shift).

This is a critical win for flexibility at work. Again, St John needed to be reminded that permitting staff to schedule absences legitimately is far more manageable than unplanned leave. Still, this time around, St John saw the logic and agreed fairly quickly.

However, transparency is critical. What special Leave vacancies are currently available must be visible. If staff can see what shifts are available for Special Leave, they can plan commitments accordingly. This will result in less unplanned leave and, therefore, better standby capacity at night and (hopefully) a resultant increase in morale.

Also, AEAWA delegates highlighted that 8% equals 5.5 vacancies. We have successfully encouraged SJA to round up to 6 vacancies on such shifts.

Available special leave positions to be made available on the intranet (AEAWA)
Agreed.

33.18 (a) Special Leave Exchange – remove the reference to ‘If all Special Leave positions have been exhausted’ (AEAWA)
Under the current agreement, all special leave positions need to be exhausted before an officer can transfer a positive special leave balance to another officer to work a shift for them.

We are pleased to announce that St John, fresh from winning their ‘workplace flexibility award’, has agreed to this claim. Officers will soon be able to arrange cover for their shifts using special leave transfers to another officer, irrespective of Special Leave position availability.
Agreed.

Add two non-accruable Mental Health shifts to Personal Leave that can be taken outside of block-out periods (AEAWA)
Declined. St John state that this would allegedly cost $2.2m.

Death Benefit: St John to provide death cover of five years average gross salary of an employee who dies whilst performing their role at work (AEAWA).
Declined.

St John struggled to find words to argue why they would not agree to such a payment for a thankfully infrequent event. This claim remains open.

Country Related Claims:

Introduce an annual bonus payment for areas that are generally difficult to fill (AEAWA)
Introduce retention bonus payable after each 12 months continuous service (excl annual leave) (difficult to fill county locations only.)

St John has indicated in-principle agreement to this proposal in general. St John believes this is partly addressed in the new regional proposal, but further work is underway to finalise how this would work. St John is also considering the list of difficult-to-fill locations.
St John has recently launched a retention bonus model in Kalgoorlie, which included:
1. Accommodation provided
2. Proximity Allowance paid for secondees (normally only for permanent officers)
3. Accommodation provided for the secondees
4. A $5000 retention bonus to be paid at 7 months or $10,000 at the end of 12 months

St John is taking the feedback on board and re-examining the larger proposal document to ensure it addresses the root issues of the claims.

Family – facilitating family visiting and facilitating employees returning home to visit family (AEAWA)
This is a claim for immediate family to visit employees on posting or secondment (i.e. flights for family to Kununurra to encourage uptake of country positions)

Agreed.

‘Country Crew Formation’ to be defined within the Agreement (AEAWA)
This claim relates to the minimum scope and training acceptable for volunteers in hybrid stations. St John claims it is too challenging to adopt a blanket approach to minimum skill sets for volunteers in hybrid locations, arguing that some paramedics support the EMR-level volunteer in their locations.

This claim is essential for both patient safety and the safety of our members. St John should not be permitted to continue relying on the EMR qualification simply because it is ‘easy’ and ‘fills vehicles’. This role was introduced as an emergency measure during COVID. It is unsuitable for long-term use. Volunteers in hybrid centres (or any centre, really) should be able to take basic vital signs, and the EMR cannot.

For members who might be unfamiliar, it will be interesting to look at the Skill Matrix for EMR, which consists of just four skills:
1. RAT testing (a clue as to the reason this role was introduced during COVID-19)
2. Lateral Position (under supervision)
3. BVM (under supervision)
4. Chest compressions

The EMR skill doesn’t include such basic skills as taking a pulse, counting respirations, or using a pulse oximeter. This level of training is inadequate, and this is especially true in busy hybrid centres.

The claim remains open.

ECP CLAIMS

Introduce new classification -ECP- Appendix 1 (AEAWA)
Agreed.

Define Extended Care Paramedic within the Agreement (AEAWA)
1. Has completed and maintains the minimum training requirements as determined by St John and;
2. Had completed postgraduate diploma university components and;
3. Has completed the ECP Intern programme and;
4. Been appointed as a designated ECP by St John.

St John has agreed to include this definition.

Extended Care Paramedic (ECP) –ECP’s Working in Country Locations (AEAWA)
1. Any appointment to a country location will be by agreement between both parties.
2. Any appointment to a country location will require a minimum of 4 weeks notice unless by agreement between parties.
3. Extended Care Paramedics appointed to a country location will receive allowances in accordance with clause 19.
4. An appointment at a country location will be determined by St John and will be categorised as either:
• permanent – if the Employee is appointed to a country location on an ongoing basis, subject to St John holding the contract to provide Extended Care Paramedic services at that country location; or
• posting; or
• relief.
• In the event that St John no longer provide Extended Care Paramedic at that country location, they will return to their Primary Position in the Metropolitan Region.

Deployment to a country location with less than 4 weeks notice will incur a Short Notice Deployment allowance.

Working at disaster or special events [if required – parties to discuss circumstances and allowances (e.g. overnight allowances, negotiated etc.) and with mutual agreement] St John propose to mirror the CCP clause 16.2 in relation to country locations. We will consult with our ECP delegates and formulate a response.

ECP – Rostering (AEAWA)
The roster for Extended Care Paramedic service requirements will be a 4×4 roster in accordance with clause 30.5. Each ECP will be allocated a Home Depot according to their geographical location (home depot). If rostered away from their Home Depot, ECP will attract travel allowances as a result. Extended Care Paramedics will be allocated a permanent shift. Movement to another shift will be by agreement between parties. Given the limited number of Extended Care Paramedics and large geographical area, ECP’s will not be expected to commence travel to their allocated depot more than 60 minutes prior to shift commencement.

Extended Care Paramedics cannot be tasked to work in as part of an operational ambulance crew or surge capacity resource without agreement and are not considered part of the metropolitan ambulance resource capacity numbers.

St John proposes mirroring the CCP clause in the Agreement but rejects the 60-minute component, arguing that this type of mechanism is not in place for any other classification. St John states they cannot agree to ECPs not being included in the metropolitan ambulance capacity resource reporting, as this will depend on contractual reporting requirements with WA Health.

Extended Care Paramedic – Reasonable Overtime (AEAWA)
Due to the prolonged nature of the clinical assessment and to ensure safe delivery of clinical care, the Extended Care Paramedic may decline any medium or low acuity tasking (Priority 2 or Priority 3) within the last 90 minutes of the shift. Due to the additional documentation and specialist equipment required for the role, Extended Care Paramedics require greater autonomy of movement and may be required to return to the depot as deemed necessary (ECP consumables are not available at all depots).

This claim is due to the low current number of ECPs and the large geographical area covered. With only 3 ECPs, being dispatched to a case that is a considerable distance from the ECP can result in unreasonable shift extensions, especially given the complex nature of these patient groups.

St John indicated an in-principle agreement; however, they do not believe the EBA is the correct place to put this restriction and that it should be handled at a local level within the team or perhaps an SOP.

Extended Care Paramedic – Maintenance of skill and training (AEAWA)
ECPs will be required to maintain their currency of skill annually through ongoing training in addition to CEP. Training will be scheduled during regular rostered hours where possible. The parties recognise this may only sometimes be possible, in which case overtime rates will apply. Due to the specialised nature of the role and expectations of the requirements to maintain knowledge and skill, each ECP roster shall have at least one day per four-week period to be utilised as a paid continual education day.

St John rejected this, preferring a model similar to PSO and CCP, which typically involves additional training being covered on shift or, more usually, on overtime.

Extended Care Paramedics – Rates of pay and allowances (AEAWA)
Qualified ECPs will attract the same rate as qualified CCPs and rates of increase will be congruent. ECP interns will attract the same rate as CCP interns (default to CSP if the intern rate is not agreed upon), and rates of increase will be congruent.

ECPs undergoing training at ECU and prior to on-road duties will be paid their respective AP rate until they complete the required units and commence on-road duties.

Employees appointed and employed in the classifications of ECP will be paid the weekly base rate for that position, even when working on the road as ambulance paramedics. If undertaking overtime, even as ambulance paramedics, the ECP will attract overtime rates as per double the relevant ECP rate. All allowances afforded to ambulance paramedics will be afforded to ECPs.

St John agree to this pay and allowances claim
An employee appointed as an extended care paramedic cannot be required to perform the following tasks while being rostered to work as an extended care paramedic (AEAWA):
1. Inter-hospital transfers;
2. Solo response, other than for the purposes of Priority 0 cases;
3. Lift assist (unless as part of ECP assessment post fall, where the patient has been recovered from the fall.)

ECPs may be required to attend scheduled committees as part of their specialised role (e.g., peer review committee, antibiotic stewardship, quality improvement, etc.). When required to perform these roles, the ECP will be paid at least 3 hours at the overtime rate. Should the committee last past 4 hours, the ECP will be paid per hour spent.

ECP may be required to work in STT as determined by St John. Any tasking to work within STT will be rostered in 4 week blocks.

St John initially rejected to put such restrictions into the EBA, until reminded that similar restrictions were entered for Single Officer restrictions relating to paramedics, on grounds of safety. They declined to include the reference to 4-week blocks as this is accepted custom and practice of rostering anyway.

St John agreed to include these restrictions for ECPs.

St John will look into this as they were unaware that ECPs were not being paid overtime for attending committee meetings which are part of their role.

Meeting Closed
14:60

Next Meeting
September 2nd 2024

Meeting Chaired By
Brendan Brodie-Hall

Meeting Conducted
13:00 – 16:00.

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

Committee Apologies
Rick Candy.

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

Project Edison
This meeting began with a presentation by Wil White (General Manager of State Control & Logistics) titled ‘Project Edison’.

Project Edison is a project created to improve workforce deployment systems and processes. This program was initiated in response to many claims regarding overtime transparency, meal breaks, shift extensions, being spare, and rostering.

St John hoped that by showcasing the project, delegates would be reassured that many of the concerns which underpin various claims will be resolved. While we respect the sentiment, the AEAWA negotiation team were underwhelmed by the scope and ambition of the project. Many of the targets of this project revolve around ‘consolidating existing policy’. The problem is that we already have policies which cover many of our issues at EBA, and these policies have never been followed. This is why these issues are now at the EBA table. As we said last week, for our critical claims, a policy substitution will not suffice.

One of the things this project promises is to explore ‘ways in how we can publish our overtime allocation, and…set up regular meetings to report on how we allocated OT’. This aspect was aimed at addressing our claim for equitable and fair overtime allocation. However, there is no concrete evidence that exploring systems will lead to anything being developed, or even if it would resolve the issues if developed.

When grilled on the subject, St John seemed unsure on many details, offering vague descriptions of a possible future system. It was not as reassuring as anyone had hoped, with most delegates feeling that any improved systems are even further into the future than first feared.

For any system such as one envisaged by the AEAWA to distribute overtime fairly and equitably, St John claims Project Lighthouse must first be completed. Project Lighthouse relates to upgrading the core HR system that will enable a move away from MS Excel for rostering, we think. We are told this is at least another 3 or 4 years away, though in fairness, nobody seems to know. For over 10 years, there have been promises of an impending ‘revised rostering system’, so we remain sceptical.

Project Edison was named after Thomas Edison, famous inventor of the lightbulb. Perhaps St John took inspiration from one of Edison’s famous quotes “I have not failed. I’ve just found 10,000 ways that won’t work”.

Roster to District
Joel Moore (GM of Ambulance Operations Urban & Coastal) also presented a plan to see St John implement ‘district rostering’. St John believes this may resolve some of the EBA claims, such as excessive travel time, spare rostering, and inconsistent rostering amongst colleagues who reside in similar areas.

The PowerPoint slides for the Roster to District can be viewed here. The model would mainly affect rotational officers, and not those holding an allocated position.
Each district would be divided into sub-districts. For example, Victoria Park, Kensington, and Kewdale would form a sub-district within the Urban and Coastal Central district. Each sub-district would have a catchment (home address) under which rotational officers would fall.

The district proposal would, St John claim, permit rosters to restrict travel time for employees to less than 45 minutes. The 45-minute travel time is considered reasonable according to the Melius Fatigue Diagnostic Report. Travel time was calculated based on a typical Google Maps journey on Tuesday morning at 0645 am, which is the preferred methodology used by DoT.

However, the district proposal would mean that an employee may not work at their closest depot. For instance, an employee may live very close to Joondalup, but their postcode for the purposes of the district would mean they are rostered to the Wangara sub-district because there are many people living further north than them. The idea is that long-distance rostering is mostly eliminated, but average travel may increase for other rotational staff. Travel, it is argued, would be more equitable.

The model is said to clarify where an employee would need to live to be guaranteed rostered to particular depots, as the sub-districts allocated would be based on an employee’s residential postcode.

The AEAWA negotiation team welcome feedback.

Outstanding Actions

Country Related claims

Add minimum EMA standard.
The AEAWA has long argued that the EMA role was never intended to be a long-term role for a volunteer to assume. The role was introduced during COVID to allow prospective volunteers to ‘observe’ as a third person and to experience volunteering with a view to progressing toward EMA / EMT. It was, in effect, to get volunteers through the door as quickly as possible with the least amount of commitment. Since it’s introduction, it has become the default minimum standard accepted by St John.

They have permitted EMR to become an acceptable long-term role. While this role can work in some smaller sub-centres, it is unsustainable in busier regional areas such as Bunbury.

For paramedics in those areas, working long-term with volunteers with the most basic possible training increases stress and exposes members (and patients) to hazards related to driving, lifting, and clinical management of patients. While we respect the commitment of volunteers, our career staff deserve to work with capable and competent volunteers. This issue is non-negotiable for us.

St John has agreed to consider implementing local arrangements where EMR would not be suitable for crew formation. We await more detail.

Country Recruitment Process
The AEAWA believe that for many country locations, the current recruitment process is cumbersome and unnecessarily lengthy and convoluted. It also frequently does not find a suitable candidate or appoints candidates who vacate their position shortly after. There is also the perception that appointments are frequently personality-based and often decided before the recruitment process even begins.

Over several years, the AEAWA have met with St John in an attempt to simplify and refine the country recruitment process to make it easier to fill country positions. Following several ‘working groups’ and committees, the system is no better.

The AEAWA suggest introducing a list system, similar to metro, which includes minimum eligibility criteria. We know that some very remote country locations might require a stringent process, but the difference in how permanent positions operate in Metro vs Country is stark. A regular ‘metro’ list system operates in Mandurah, but to work 17km further south in Dawesville, an employee is required to complete multiple rounds of interviews, assessment centres, psychometric testing, reference checks, and manager feedback. Yet both roles are essentially ‘Paramedic’.

St John rejected the full reintroduction of a list system, and they indicated they want to retain certain minimum requirements for country positions. We need to agree on the set of minimum requirements. They have proposed removing assessment centres and the structured panel interview; however, they want to retain a ‘small discussion’ interview with a DOM.

We believe this would still leave the door open to personality-based appointments by a manager. This typically results in vague feedback to an ‘unsuccessful’ candidate and allows St John to continue to ‘hand-pick’ the candidate they wanted at the outset.

They also wish to keep psychometric testing, despite St John’s claim that they have never rejected an applicant on the basis of psychometric testing (though they could easily reject the applicant for other vague reasons rather than mention the poor psychometric test results).

The AEAWA also asked why metro officers can work regular overtime and/or country relief in country locations when they have not met the minimum criteria. Often, relief can be extended for many, many months.

St John argues that relief is different because it is ‘short term’, despite many periods of country relief ongoing for many months and with some metro officers continually moving from country relief position to country relief position, barely returning to metro. These officers can do this, seemingly successfully, without ever having performed a psychometric test, or attended an assessment centre.

Meal Break Related Claims
St John have pushed back against many of the meal break claims and are now insisting they can only accommodate improvements to the terms of the meal break clause if the meal break window is widened back to 6-hour span.

Should employees agree to a wider 6-hour span, St John believe they can offer a break ‘without interruption’…. except for P1’s. St John were informed that there is simply no way a 6-hour window would be acceptable. In the event a crew is not allocated a crib break, the crew will be paid at a rate of 200% until completion of a meal break or the end of their shift.

Rejected.

Change 24(f)(i) remove hospital and insert rostered (or if > 10km, nearest depot)
Many of our members have indicated they do not believe hospitals have consistent amenities for a meal (crib) break. St John have rejected allowing crews to return to their rostered depot to take a crib break but will consider the ‘nearest’ only. Our view is that should a rostered depot be within 10km, a crew should be permitted to travel to that depot, otherwise the nearest.

Again though, St John seemed to imply this would only be manageable on a 6-hour window. Also, the crew should still be able to opt to use their crib break to travel toward their depot, or to another place, if preferred.

Clarify wording – break to be completed within window
Rejected…unless we accept a 6-hour meal break window.

Increase broken crib break penalty to equivalent 1 hour of employee’s base rate of pay.
St John indicated they are looking at what they think the value of a Meal Break Penalty should be, but they have not yet committed to a figure. It was unclear, but again this may be linked to an increase in the meal break window, which we reject…

Overtime Allocation
Add: Incorporate the overtime distribution policy into the EBA.

Rejected.

As mentioned late last week. St John have not followed their own overtime allocation policy for years, despite delegates raising this time and again at JCCs. If the policy is not included in the Agreement, your delegates are powerless to hold St John to account. This claim remains very open.

Add: St John will offer overtime equitably to all employees where the employee has the skill/scope to perform that duty in an overtime capacity, in accordance with allocation process

Accepted in principle.

Rostering

Employees should not be expected to travel > 45km to commence work. Any further travel time should be completed from a depot.
Accepted in principal and tied to the Roster to District plan (attached) but with the restriction being 55km, and a time period being 45 minutes. Amend clause so that changes to shift will be provided preferentially during working hours in the shift worked immediately prior, or at least 24 hours prior to the proposed shift change.

Agreed. Probably because they know the ‘Right to Disconnect’ legislation is coming. Speaking of which…

Employees right not to be contacted outside of regular hours of work, unless by Agreement
St John have agreed to include the Fair Work model term which was announced recently. While the term will not restrict St John from contacting your, the term should mean that you no longer need to act upon that contact i.e. should you receive a text message before you shift requesting go somewhere other than where rostered, you should be able to ignore this safely, should you wish.

Change to double time per minute of excess km from home to station if greater than 60 km from residence to station. Rationale more incentive for staff to take further away stations on an ICB.
i.e if 90 km then employee paid 90 min @ double time plus the km travelled.

Rejected.

Shift Extensions

New clause restricting dynamic deployment locations to depots only.
While at the moment it is rare to be dynamically deployed to street corners or random specific suburbs, rest assured this happens frequently in other services worldwide. This claim aims to prevent this from occurring in future, by limiting the possible dynamic deployment location to another depot.

St John agreed to this, then threw in a term you will read throughout this document… ‘agreed, but for us to manage this you will need to go to 12-hour shifts’. Basically, numerous claims will be responded to in this manner going forward.

Crews who are dynamically deployed must be returned to shift start location, by end of rostered shift.
St John agreed to this, then threw in a term you will read throughout this document… ‘agreed, but for us to manage this you will need to go to 12-hour shifts’. Basically, numerous claims will be responded to in this manner going forward..

Amend: minimum 9 consecutive hours off work between shifts to minimum 11 consecutive hours between shifts.

Rejected.

St John have indicated that 10 hours minimum may be appropriate, but it would likely be dependent on… the workforce being willing to move to 12-hour shifts.

Clear parameters defining reasonable overtime must be included:
– P3 calls will not be allocated in last 60 minutes of shift, unless by agreement.
– P2 calls will not 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.

St John accepted no P3 in the last 60 minutes, and no P2 in the last 30 minutes, but rejected other restrictions. In addition, the acceptances seem to be restricted to shifts length and staggered shifts… Crew may travel from hospital towards depot in last 15 minutes. Available for P0 only.

Rejected.

No P2 inter-hospital patient transfer in the final 90 minutes, unless by agreement.
Rejected, as ‘it might depend on the severity of the P2’. St John were reminded that the vast majority of P2 transfers the patient has been in the ED for 3 days, and the clerks haven’t even finished photocopying the paperwork.

This claim is still wide open from our perspective!

Spare Officers

Delete 19.1(e) “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.”
St John indicated agreement to delete this clause as it will contradict with future ‘Right to Disconnect’ legislation.

Add: No officer to be spare for more than 16-weeks in a calendar year.
St John agrees to limit a spare officer to 16 weeks per calendar year, unless an employee has requested to be spare.

There are no exceptions to this, expect for periods where an employee requests to be spare.
St John also proposes to create six ‘Spare hubs’ across the metro, where all Spare Officers would start and finish their shifts. This would mean Spare’s arrive at the hub each shift, at their rostered start time. If deployed, travel would occur during paid shift time.

This is an interesting solution, similar to the 27 crews that ran several years ago, resulting in less fatiguing shifts/rosters and reducing book-offs. St John also commits to getting spare officers back to their start location as close to the end of their shift as possible.

Add in a Preparation Allowance equivalent to the officer’s hourly rate per shift. Increase the break between shifts to minimum 12-hours.
Rejected. This again is dependent on 12-hour shifts. Regarding the allowance, further costings will occur to see what this looks like for the St John budget.

Miscellaneous items

Codify longstanding custom and practice of Health & Wellbeing Allowance.
Agreed

Increase allowance to $600
Rejected. St John argue this is a organization wide benefit and they are unable to finance such an increase.

Testing regime to occur on shift or days off on OT, if required for role.
To occur on days off or on overtime. With the new types of ‘invasive’ clinical skills offered within our scope of practice, each year through AHPRA we tick that box. This effectively means we are required to annually obtain blood tests. As this is a St John skill used for our employment the AEAWA do not want to see members having to pay for these procedures and going for blood tests on their days off and not being compensated.

St John will now pay for these procedures and will pay the employee overtime rates to facilitate these procedures. If required for role – St John consider this acceptable if an employee is directed to have this testing. Employees right not to be contacted outside of regular hours of work, unless by Agreement St John will incorporate the Right to Disconnect clause into the Agreement.

An Employee recalled for duty outside normal rostered hours will be paid at overtime rates for a minimum of 4 hours.
Rejected.

AHPRA Registration fee to be reimbursed by Employer.
Rejected. St John argue only one State service currently covers the cost of registration.
We could be the second, but NO.

Meeting Closed
16:05

Next Meeting
Monday 19 August 2024

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.