The day after union members at ANU voted no confidence in Chancellor Julie Bishop and VC Genevieve Bell, the University’s governing body did the reverse.
“Council maintains full confidence in the leadership,” it stated following a scheduled meeting on Friday.
This followed a National Tertiary Education Union ballot of 800 of its ANU members. The vote was part of a concerted campaign against a management plan to save $250m, in a bid to achieve a net surplus next year.
Management wants to cut $150m from operating outlays and reduce staff costs by $100m. However, the savings plan is off to slow start, with management reducing the number of jobs to go from 53 headcount positions to 13 in the process of winding up the College of Health and Medicine. Last week, the university left further room to question their strategy, announcing that the projected 2024 deficit was 30% lower than anticipated, coming in at $140m rather than the forecast $200m.
Disquiet on campus is compounded by a campaign of leaks to media targeting Professor Bell and Ms Bishop.
However, University Council backed them and their plan, stating it, “continues to believe that the requirement for financial sustainability remains unchanged, and Council commends the Vice-Chancellor and her leadership team for their work to progress this agenda.”
And it called on staff to, “ come together and partner with the university leadership to implement the necessary changes which will enable ANU to continue to deliver on our distinct national mission.”
Which the NTEU leadership makes plain it will not encourage. “The ANU scandals have piled up higher than the Telstra Tower, yet the Council continues to back in a Vice-Chancellor and Chancellor who have both failed to take any responsibility for terrible mismanagement,” Union National President Alison Barnes tweeted after the Council meeting.
ANU Council’s next scheduled meeting is in May and what, if anything, happens before then depends on when management finalises its change plans. But whenever that happens, it will likely be off to the Fair Work Commission, with the union registering a dispute.
For months to come, Council will have to back Chancellor Bishop and Vice-Chancellor Bell again and again and again.
