UNE management says it is willing to discuss the enterprise bargaining agreement for its staff, saying it was seeking a more flexible system for its academic employees.

But, it claims the union will not engage in discussions about academic workloads.

The union says it wants to continue with negotiations, but its priorities currently lay with other matters. 

The current dispute comes after the union took the matter of university redundancies to the Fair Work Commission for conciliation.

UNE chief operating officer with the university David Cushway said the discussions would allow for an agreement about a more flexible academic workload for staff.

Mr Cushway said the union would not engage in discussion about the issue, something university management said was bewildering.

“At the opening of negotiations on the new enterprise bargaining agreement in 2012, the [union] said workload distribution was their core concern. Now the union will not commit to discussing the matter,” Mr Cushway said.

National Tertiary Education Union branch president Tim Battin said current negotiations had been put on hold and would resume in early February.

Dr Battin said both sides had their own set of priorities.

“Each side has its reasons and order of claims it wants to address.

“We argue the flexibility management is talking about includes teaching only and departs from a tradition of research, which we have serious reservations about.”

He said the union was not trying to hold off from negotiations but was seeking an agreement on other matters first before dealing with workload flexibility, something he said was already relatively flexible.

“We would want negotiations on other matters… and issues our members feel strongly about, like trimesters,” Dr Battin said, “We have given priority to other matters because, otherwise, they would remain in limbo.”  

Mr Cushway said the university was keen to reach a resolution to “move forward with salary negotiations in the New Year.”