Police vote to reject pay offer

 

 

I am writing to inform you that the Board of Directors of the WA Police Union has today resolved to reject your offer of pay dated the Friday 4 November 2022. 

 

I note that your offer includes a total of 14 conditions. In the hope of finding common ground, I will shortly communicate to you which of these conditions we support, oppose or support-in-part.

 

In the interim, I would like to explain to you why we rejected your offer; express to you my disappointment for how long it took us to receive that offer; and inform you of our next steps as far as pay action is concerned.

 

 

The Premier Mark McGowan has suggested that the reason why he cannot offer us a year-on-year pay increase of greater than 3 per cent is because of the need to maintain a strong financial position in the face of a global recession in 2023.

 

However, the reality is that Western Australia’s strong financial situation is due, in large part, to the hard work of police officers and other frontline workers during the COVID-19 pandemic.

 

The Premier may have made the tough decisions, but we implemented them.

 

Do you think that it was easy to barge into people’s homes and check whether they were isolating? Or to turn them around at roadblocks when they were trying to spend time with their loved ones?

 

We haven’t forgotten about how the Premier asked us to police the airports and implement his hard border policy, even though at the time, there was a great deal of legal uncertainty as to whether the states could even pursue such a policy.

 

No, none of these decisions were easy to implement. And yet we implemented them because the Premier asked us to.

 

Meanwhile, the Government – in a completely tone-deaf manner – have provided us with a pay offer that’s practically undisguisable from their existing wages policy: one which we’ve already told them is not good enough.

 

We’re being treated like names and regimental numbers on a spreadsheet, rather than as actual human beings who went above and beyond and now deserve recognition for that hard work.

 

 

I cannot fathom why it took the Government 222 days to provide us with an offer.

 

By way of comparison, on Monday 7 November 2022, I sent an e-mail to over 7,000 police officers and asked that they consider your offer and express their thoughts with one of our 12 directors.

 

By the following Tuesday, and as at the time of publication of this letter, over 6,400 police officers had opened my e-mail, and hundreds had sought to contact one of our 12 directors.

 

I suspect that the reason why it took the Government so long to provide us with an offer is because, unlike other workers, we are not allowed to go on strike. This is foolish because, as our actions will demonstrate, we are not powerless.

 

At our meeting dated Wednesday 9 November 2022, the board also resolved to:

 

1. Continue our ‘Month-of-Action until Friday 18 November 2022;

2. Invite the Government to provide us with a better offer by the time above;

3. Poll our members regarding the features of our existing log-of-claims which are the most important to them; and

4. Reconvene on 21 November 2022 to consider potential further actions.