Thousands of university staff across Australia have walked off the job this week after years of growing "anger and discontent" over casualisation and wage theft.
University of Melbourne computer science tutor Grady Fitzpatrick is among those taking part in the national strike action to protest insecure work.
After being a casual or contract worker at the university for nine years, she says she is risking her job to speak out about the precarious work that means she cannot plan for the future or obtain a mortgage.
"If I were to apply for a loan, I don't think I would have anything concrete to back up that I had worked without interruption at the university for close to 10 years, nor that I would have a job in 12 months' time," Ms Fitzpatrick said.
Only three in 10 jobs in universities are permanent, according to the National Tertiary Education Union (NTEU), making it one of the most casualised sectors in the country.
"When people are stuck in insecure work it doesn't just hold back their career, it holds back their life," NTEU national president Alison Barnes said.
"It's not too much to expect some economic security so you can tend to the basics of life such as illness, holidays or buying a home.
"University workers are sick of being asked to take the hit.
"We deserve job security, reasonable workloads and secure funding — and we intend to fight for it."
Staff anger has been building since ABC News revealed allegations of wage theft at 13 of Australia's 39 public universities in 2020, leading to three federal inquiries.
They include accusations staff were told to toss a coin to decide who would keep their job, staff being told to skim-read students' essays during marking and staff being fired over Zoom.
Staff at James Cook University in Townsville began a 12-hour strike today while at the University of Queensland staff walked off the job at midday.
Victorian university staff passed a motion late yesterday to continue their industrial action, after a bigger-than-expected turnout saw 1,000 staff and students walk off the job and march on Trades Hall.
They were joined by the National Union of Students (NUS), which called the strike "unprecedented" and vowed to continue supporting staff.
"It's the largest university strike in memory and there's more to come," NUS education officer Xavier Dupé said.
"You could feel the anger in the air. Students are angry because we can see our tutors being ground down every day by huge workloads, job insecurity and pay, which hasn't kept up with the cost-of-living crisis."
Staff at the University of New South Wales, Newcastle University, Federation University and Deakin University joined those from the Melbourne universities, which included G8 members Monash University and the University of Melbourne, in walking off the job this week.
Sector says no-one has a 'right' to an academic job: 'You need to be good'
Universities are represented in industrial negotiations by the Australian Higher Education Industrial Association (AHEIA), which has defended the sector's employment practices.
It cited government figures which put the percentage of permanent staff at universities at 55 per cent with 45 per cent employed casually or on fixed-term contracts.
"The universities would like to offer more permanent roles but cannot while government funding for research is short or medium-term," AHEIA executive director Craig Laughton said.
"If we got more certainty around funding, it's highly likely we'd see more permanent roles."
The ABC understands the difference in the calculations is down to unions including all staff that work at universities, while the figures cited by the AHEIA do not capture workers in landscaping, retail and other areas.
The AHEIA also said unions should also agree to change redundancy provisions if they want more permanent roles so there is not as much "risk" for employers.
"Universities have incredibly generous redundancy provisions which don't pass the pub test and leave universities with significant risk if they make staff permanent and research funding is then not renewed," Mr Laughton said.
He said casual and fixed-term employment works for a significant number of researchers but not for what are called "treadmill academics" — researchers that are stuck on rolling contracts.
"There is some merit in more secure employment for 'treadmill academics' but there's not a right in Australia to have a job as an academic. You have to be good," he said.
'Anger and discontent': Permanent staff decry treatment of colleagues
The NTEU says insecure work and wage theft go hand in hand, estimating university staff have been repaid more than $80 million with the highest figure of $32 million at Melbourne University.
In February this year, the Fair Work Ombudsman took the university to the federal court alleging a "corporate culture" where senior leaders knew casual staff were being underpaid.
"If I were full-time instead of casual, the time I spend would be more accurate to what I'm paid for," Ms Fitzpatrick said.
"Though I got back over $6,000 in the most recent round of wage theft repayments, there are more hours which I would have done in the past that I don't have precise enough historical records to request repayments for."
Law professor Joo-Cheong Tham was among the permanent staff supporting their insecure colleagues at yesterday's march on Trades Hall by University of Melbourne staff.
"For many staff, the insecure workforce model of the university is central to its crisis of working conditions and the accompanying crisis of trust in senior management," Professor Tham said.
"The anger and discontent against senior management is, according to some workers with decades of service to the university, the worst they have experienced in their university careers."
The long-serving professor believes research and teaching are suffering because work which will be ongoing and could be treated as permanent is instead treated as temporary.
"It is not uncommon for ongoing work to be subject to insecure employment and for job insecurity to damage the quality of teaching and research," he said.
"Many casual colleagues have unsurprisingly suffered from wage theft: as the Fair Work Ombudsman has emphasised, insecure work is a clear contributor to underpayment."
In a statement, a University of Melbourne spokesperson said it would continue to work with staff on a new agreement while minimising the impact on students.
"We will work to make sure that students' learning is not adversely affected [by the strikes] by rescheduling classes, advising impacted students to attend another tutorial if available, or finding other ways to cover the content that has been missed," it said.
"As such we anticipate that the impacts of this industrial action on our students and staff will be minimal.
"However, we regret any inconvenience that it may cause to students and any members of the university community."
