Social Movements are Union Business

No jobs on a dead planet - take action on the climate crisis
Stewardship is a practice of caring for something that we have been trusted to look
after. As public servants and unionists, many of us take this value to heart not just in
the way we do our specific jobs, but in our care for the communities we live in and
the planet we live on.
The precedent for union involvement in environmental issues exists in the history of
Green Bans from the Builders Labourers Federation in the 1970s. A Members United-
led CPSU will honour that tradition and work to advance environmental and climate
issues.
In bargaining, a Members United-led CPSU will push for the expansion of Community
Service Leave from its current limitations to include provisions for a range of pro-
environmental activities such as bush cleanup and regeneration, community farming,
recycling, and other local initiatives.
Further, a Members United-led CPSU will also push within civil society for a broad,
state-led decarbonisation program akin to a Green New Deal in the United States
context with a just transition and equality built in as core principles.

Palestine is union business
Australian unions have a proud history of international solidarity – to support the
fight for freedom for South Africa, Indonesia, Vietnam, Timor-Leste and more. With
Australia recognising the state of Palestine, our union must continue to support
the right of the Palestinian people to self-determination. Peace and justice are
union business! Members United categorically supports the Palestinian people in
their struggle against what we say is a genocide being perpetrated upon them by
the State of Israel. Our position is consistent with the position of the International
Association of Genocide Scholars, the United Nations Independent International
Commission of Inquiry on the Occupied Palestinian Territory, Amnesty International,
and Doctors Without Borders.
Members United opposes antisemitism absolutely, and we also reject attempts to
conflate antisemitism with principled opposition to Zionism or criticism of the State
of Israel. Occupying a public service role must not constrain an individual’s freedom
of expression to be opposed to Israel’s genocide of the Palestinian people. Members
United also supports the position of the ACTU in calling for sanctions on Israel. We
support the ACTU’s call for an end to all military trade with Israel and an end to
the occupation of Palestine. We support the right of the Palestinian people to self-
determination in a free, democratic and independent state. To this end, a Members
United-led CPSU would have a higher engagement in social movements that support
international peace and solidarity, including movements for justice for the Palestinian
people than the current CPSU leadership.

Build an anti-racist, anti-colonial union
The CPSU must always condemn all forms of discrimination and prejudice. Unions
support the struggle by Indigenous people for land rights and against oppression,
recognising that sovereignty was never ceded. We welcome all workers regardless
of background, country of origin, skin colour or religion. We oppose both
Islamophobia and antisemitism.
Members United will promote a union that is anti-racist and anti-colonial in
orientation. It will be engaged with and provide support to anti-racist campaigns
and campaigns for First Nations justice within and outside the workplace. Union
members who are victims of racism must be offered sensitive and strong support.
Following the defeat of the Voice referendum, Members United will redouble the
CPSU’s efforts to support truth telling and treaty processes, engaging widely with
First Nations trade unionists and communities, supporting their decisions and
campaigns made with self-determination.

Champion the rights of working women — cis and trans — and
campaign for LGBTIQA+ liberation
Members United stands squarely against sexism, homophobia and transphobia.
These are not minority issues — 60.5% of workers in the Australian Public Service
are women and in the 2025 APS Employee Census, 9.5% of respondents identified
as LGBTIQA+. We will actively back union and community campaigns to defend and
extend the rights of working women — both cis and trans — queer and non-binary
people.
The average total remuneration gap between men and women in the public service,
while lower than the private sector, still remains too high at 6.4%. As part of our
broader fight for pay rises for all workers in real terms, we will prioritise closing the
pay gaps between agencies that still exist across the APS. These pay gaps, which
see female dominated agencies at the lower end of the pay spectrum, must end.
Achieving a healthy work/life balance is important for all workers and is particularly
vital for women, which is why Members United will ensure flexible working
arrangements and working from home are available for all workers. We will also make
the fight to win a four-day working week a high priority. We will work to extend paid
parental leave and ensure it is available to anyone who is a parent or carer, inclusive
of gender. Winning equal access to the workforce for women with disability and
achieving dedicated affirmation and disability leave is also an important part of
our platform. We support dedicated gender affirmation leave for public servants as
workers and as carers, and reproductive leave for all workers. We support the right
of pregnant people to free safe abortion on demand.
In some instances, for example uncapped family and domestic violence leave,
conditions on paper in the APS exceed the minimum National Employment Standards
set out in the Fair Work Act. Members United will campaign to make access to these
conditions genuinely available to all workers who need to access them. We will push
for the public sector to be a model employer and to extend conditions which benefit
women and sex and gender diverse workers to the private sector. 19
Part of our vision for championing the rights of working women includes resisting
austerity measures. Defending and extending the vital community services that
public sector workers provide is fundamentally important for all working women,
including those covered by the CPSU — 44% of all APS workers report having caring
responsibilities. When public services are inadequately funded or cut back, this
increases the unpaid caring labour which is disproportionately performed by women.

Defend against threats to democracy – including the right to protest,
freedom of expression, and human rights
Members United will defend democratic rights, including the right to protest,
freedom of expression, freedom of association and the protection of human rights.
These rights are not abstract civil liberties separate from unionism. They are the
conditions that allow workers and communities to organise.
A union that depends on collective action cannot be indifferent to attacks on protest
rights, surveillance, restrictions on political speech or the erosion of democratic
accountability. The CPSU should oppose laws, policies and workplace practices that
chill legitimate dissent or restrict members from participating in democratic life.
Public servants occupy a particular position in this debate. We are often incorrectly
told, implicitly or explicitly, that public service employment requires you to be totally
apolitical not just in relation to your work role and on work time but in our personal
lives as we interact with civil society as citizens. Members United notes that public
servants can and should perform their work lawfully and ethically, but they do not
totally surrender their citizenship, conscience or democratic rights by virtue of being
a public servant. We will fight to maintain and advance those human rights.

Oppose AUKUS and invest the money in public services instead
Members United opposes AUKUS. The fact of the matter is that AUKUS represents
an extraordinary misdirection of public money. If the Albanese Labor Government
can find hundreds of billions of dollars for nuclear-powered submarines, then it
can find the money to rebuild the public service, bring back the Commonwealth
Employment Service properly, lift wages, improve retirement incomes, and fund the
services that working people actually rely upon.
We reject the idea that the only way to build serious industrial capacity in this
country is through weapon manufacturing. Australia does need advanced
manufacturing, sovereign technical capability and secure, well-paid jobs. But those
things should be built around social need — housing, climate transition, public
infrastructure, scientific research, disaster resilience, public transport and civilian
industry — not around a submarine program that ties Australia more closely to the
strategic priorities of foreign powers. A stable society can be built by investing in
people’s needs as well as climate transition work, renewable energy infrastructure,
disaster preparedness, public sector capacity, domestic manufacturing, scientific
research, cyber capability and secure supply chains.
Members United supports ongoing public scrutiny of the AUKUS agreement,
including the independent public Inquiry into the AUKUS security partnership,
headed by former Labor Minister Peter Garrett.