Tribunal backs ANZ Bank's IT outsourcing

Industrial regulator Fair Work Australia has issued a ruling supporting ANZ Bank's decision to shift some 260 Australian and Indian IT testing staff to employment with outsourcer Capgemini, rejecting union demands that the bank must negotiate with staff over the move, Delimiter reports.

In early June, the bank revealed it would shift 110 Melbourne IT testing staff and a further 250 located in India to employment with outsourcing and consulting company Capgemini, in a bid to deliver what it described as a “step change” in its development operations.

The Financial Services Union met with ANZ last Thursday, seeking to negotiate the terms of this transfer under a new collective agreement specifically for the affected employees, hoping to improve the lot of 50 affected workers who were members of the union, ZDNet writes.

Fair Work Australia deputy president Greg Smith rejected the proposal for a new bargaining agreement late on Friday.

Smith stated there was "no good reason why this particular group of employees would be singled out other than because the function will be outsourced", and outsourcing is already dealt with in an existing provision of the current agreement.

He said the bank negotiating a new collective agreement for just these employees at the same time as consulting and negotiating on moving employees across to Capgemini by September would just add "another layer of uncertainty to the relationship between the employer and the employees".