ANU leaders will front a Senate Committee on Friday with news to report on inquiries into management under the leadership of former Vice-Chancellor Genevieve Bell and Chancellor Julie Bishop.
National public sector health and safety regulator ComCare has released its inquiry into management of staff welfare during plans for forced redundancies under the Renew ANU restructure. They were cancelled after Professor Bell resigned in September, following a comprehensive campus campaign against job cuts.
The agency conducted the inquiry in response to 32 complaints, including 11 “via a formatted template” created by the National Tertiary Education Union. Comcare identifies process failings and recommends reviews of psychosocial risk assessment and control measures, “so as to maintain, so far as is reasonably practicable, a work environment that is without risks to health and safety.”
There are specific criticisms of risk management in the College of Arts and Social Sciences, the source of 60 % of staff complaints. However, the principal university-wide finding is that ANU had not complied with the requirement for work health and safety committee meetings to occur at least once every three months.
Comcare’s conclusion follows two previous inquiries into Professor Bell and former Chancellor, Julie Bishop, that accompanied opposition to Renew ANU. Former Deakin U VC Jane den Hollander was commissioned by the university to review allegations against Professor Bell and found they were not substantiated. In a separate matter no grounds were found to refer Ms Bishop to the Commonwealth Ombudsman following accusations of bullying.
Campus critics of Bishop and Bell are now waiting on Vivienne Thom’s inquiry into ANU governance commissioned by regulator TEQSA and an Australian National Audit Office review of the previous restructure.
But information is also imminent on the major ongoing issue for the university, the state of its finances. Interim Vice Chancellor Rebekah Brown told staff Friday there would be a campus meeting “in the coming weeks” on ANU’s 2025 financial results. The core argument against Renew ANU was that the university did not need to make significant savings.