Why another Council election

John Quessy
Secretary
Regular readers of Newsmonth will be aware that the Union has been in a process of transition for the past 18 months. We operate as two bodies the state organisation (NSW Independent Education Union) and federally as a Branch of the Independent Education Union of Australia (IEUA NSW/ACT Branch).
The vast majority of the work we do is work in the federal industrial relations system governed by the Fair Work Act and we have quite properly been working towards ensuring that our rules, structures and practices reflect that.
One important part of that process is to replicate the structures and forums which existed at the state level, (our 20 branches now called sub branches and our Council now called the Branch Council) within the rules of the IEUA NSW/ACT Branch. This required changes to the rules of both bodies and the new rules which established the Branch Council were approved and certified by the Fair Work Commission on August 19.
The new rules allowed the Council elected earlier this year to remain in place for an interim period but required that elections for the new Branch Council be held within three months. It is nominations for those Branch Council positions which are now open.
The term of Council members is two years with this term expiring in 2018.