Today in Parliament, Abigail gave notice of a motion standing in solidarity with University of Newcastle NTEU staff taking strike action to defend fair wages, secure work and the future of public higher education.

Abigail said:

I give notice that on the next sitting day I will move: 

(1) That this House notes that:

• the University of Newcastle (UoN) was founded through the persistent community organising led by the trade union movement in the 1940s and 1950s; 
• the fundamental values underpinning UoN are rooted in the worker-led struggle for accessible higher education, and the shared belief that working class people in the Hunter deserve equitable access to higher education and the right to shape their own intellectual lives;
• today, UoN increasingly faces threats to its workforce, particularly those who carry much of the university’s teaching and support responsibilities, with hundreds of casual and fixed-term staff including sessional academics, tutors and long-serving professional staff facing unemployment under university management’s job cuts plan; 
• the National Tertiary Education Union (NTEU) and university staff have been leading the fight against UoN management’s Business Improvement Plan, with staff, students, faculty members and community supporters continuing to voice concern and rally against the job cuts; 
• as reported in the Newcastle Herald, Hunter Workers secretary Leigh Shears said of the job cuts: “the contrast between the founding principles of a university built by the working classes and the current situation could not be starker. When staff are discarded rather than converted to ongoing roles, the university undermines its history and its mission, with an institution built from shillings given in solidarity now dismantling the very human resources that give it substance. A university born from sacrifice and solidarity cannot justify balancing its books by discarding the very people who sustain it. We owe it to our miners, metalworkers, teachers and wharfies, the ones who built UoN, to say clearly: their legacy is not up for sale”; and 
• today, Wednesday 19 November 2025, staff at UoN will strike for 24 hours, with many members rallying outside NSW Parliament. Their log of claims are just and fair, and include: 
  • a 20 percent flat wage increase over the upcoming four-year enterprise bargaining agreement;
  • safer workloads for professional and academic staff and protection from excessive and unpaid work;
  • improved consultation clauses;
  • redundancy as a last resort; and 
  • that no individual be subject to an organisational change process more than once during the life of the Agreement. 

(2) That this House expresses its deep concern at the job cuts increasingly being enforced by universities across the state, including at the University of Newcastle, and recognises the impact these job cuts will undeniably have on the university workforce and the education and learning of students. 

(3) That this House commends the advocacy of NTEU members involved in leading the campaign to protect the founding principles of the University of Newcastle, as well as all those who are participating in strike action, and calls on all Members to join the rally outside NSW Parliament. 

19 November 2025