Submission by the Australian Library and information Association [ALIA]

Queensland Pay Equity Inquiry

December 2000

The Australian Library and Information Association [ALIA] is the professional organization for the Australian library and information services sector. It seeks to empower the profession in the development, promotion and delivery of quality library and information services to the nation, through leadership, advocacy and mutual support. ALIA has more than five thousand individual members and fourteen hundred employer or institutional member organizations. Membership is located in a wide range of industry and cultural sectors in all states and territories.

ALIA was heavily involved in the New South Wales Pay Equity Inquiry and worked closely with the Office of the Director for Equal Opportunity in Public Employment [ODEOPE] and the Premier's Department in development of the Crown case.

In respect of the Queensland Inquiry, ALIA has noted the specific requirement for consideration of the New South Wales judgement. In particular, the Association has been mindful of the fact that this aspect of the Inquiry is being addressed by the Griffith University's School of Industrial Relations. ALIA has therefore made comments to and has had detailed discussions with Associate Professor David Peetz about his consideration of issues arising from the New South Wales case.

Generally, as far as Queensland is concerned, ALIA believes that its membership, in at least some areas, suffers pay disadvantage. We believe this results in large measure from the feminised nature of the profession. It is considered that the following matters should be addressed by the Inquiry as part of its deliberations:

• the extent to which members of feminised groups [including librarians] are concentrated at lower levels of integrated professional employment classification structures, when compared to other professional categories
  
  
• whether the work of female employees is classified at lower levels in such integrated classification structures than those applying to similar work undertaken by non-feminised occupational categories
  
  
• the extent of differences in remuneration between female librarians and library technicians employed in metropolitan Brisbane and those employed in regional and remote Queensland communities, especially as regards employment in local government
  
  
• whether librarians, library technicians and other women workers are afforded reasonable access to professional training and development opportunities when compared with non-feminised employment categories in the Queensland labour market, especially as regards rural and remote locations and local government employment
  
  
• whether there are unreasonable or unexplained differences between women and men engaged in similar level professional duties in respect of total remuneration policies; and, in particular, whether non-cash employment benefits are equally available
  
  
• what methods are used by organizations to define the work value of professional librarians, bearing in mind the finding in New South Wales that such librarians continue to suffer serious pay disadvantage despite their having experienced work value increases of 'the highest order' - or, indeed, whether any clear process of work valuation is used
  
  
• whether there is a need in specific sectors [notably state and local government employment] for a formal process of job evaluation to be established so that judgements about the work value of librarians and library technicians are seen to be consistent with those made about non-feminised categories
  
  
• whether there has been any state-wide attempt to address the work value of Queensland librarians and related staff, or whether - as established by the New South Wales Inquiry - librarians' pay disadvantage has resulted from a refusal or failure to conduct work value analyses in recent years.

More broadly, ALIA strongly supports those parts of the decision by Her Honour Justice Glynn in New South Wales which call for:

1. adoption of a formal pay equity principle in the state's wage fixing principles, and we note that this has now been done in both New South Wales and Tasmania
   
   
2. adoption of Article 1 of International Labour Organisation [ILO] Convention 100 so as to provide a broad definition of remuneration in the context of equal pay
   
   
3. inclusion of pay equity considerations in normal industrial relations processes, rather than their separation from these processes
   
   
4. a comprehensive work value assessment of the work of librarians employed in state government employment.

ALIA urges that each of these recommendations be adopted in the present Queensland Inquiry.