PRESS RELEASE

EMBARGO: 5 p.m. on 11 September 1972

REVIEW OF ACADEMIC SALARIES IN UNIVERSITIES

The Minister for Education and Science (the Hon.

Malcolm Fraser, M.P.) announced last night that the Commonwealth \

Government had appointed Mr. Justice W.B. Campbell of the Supreme

Court of Queensland to conduct an enquiry into academic salaries

in universities. Mr. Justice Campbell will be assisted by

Professor R.L. Mathews, Professor of Accounting and Public

Finance of the Australian National University, and Mr.. M.C. Timbs,

Executive Member of the Australian Atomic Energy Commission as

assessors. .  \

Mr. Fraser said that academic salaries had not been

reviewed since 1 January 1970 and that the Commonwealth

Government, after consultation with State Governments, had

concluded‘that the time was appropriate for such a review. It

was intended that the enquiry should involve a careful

investigation ..into appropriate salaries for the various grades

of academic staff in universities,

Ã¢ÂÂ   The terms of reference of the enquiry are as follows :

(a) To advise governments on the salaries or salary ranges

for full-time members of the teaching staff of

universities which the Enquiry considers should be

adopted by the Australian Universities Commission for

the purpose of recommending grants to be made to

Ã¢ÂÂ¢universities, including the Australian National

University,, for recurrent expenditure. The Enquiry

shall make its recommendations with respect to the

grade of lecturer, senior lecturer, reader or associate

professor and professor. In coming to its conclusions,

the Enquiry shall have regard to :

(i) the rates of salary in other occupations in

Australia which have previously been taken into

consideration, or may be regarded as relevant,

in the determination of academic salaries;

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(ii) the requirement to attract and retain a

sufficient number of persons of the needed quality;

(iii) the qualifications, functions, responsibilities

and other attributes or factors required in the .

performance of the various levels of academic work;

(iv) the desirability or otherwise of establishing

several salary levels for professors to take account

of special merit, responsibility or the requirements

of particular disciplines.

(b) To advise governments on the percentage increases which

the Enquiry considers appropriate in the salary ranges

for full-time members of the teaching staff of

universities in sub-lecturer grades.

(c) To advise governments on the establishment of permanent

machinery for future reviews of salaries for full-time

members of the academic staffs of universities and

colleges of advanced education and on the nature of

such machinery, its powers and its procedures.

Mr. Eraser said that the Commonwealth Government would

be ready to contribute towards supplementary grants to universities

in accordance with the usual Commonwealth/State formula to cover

any increases in salaries that might be recommended by the

enquiry with effect from 1 January 1973Â» which was the beginning

of the next university triennium. '

The terms of reference of the enquiry did not include

reference to academic salaries at colleges of advanced education.

The Commonwealth was adhering to the principles of the Sweeney

Report that the salaries of lecturers and senior lecturers in

colleges of advanced education should be broadly the same as

those in universities. When the recommendations of the enquiry

into university salaries were known, further consideration would

be given by Commonwealth and State Governments to the question

of academic salaries for colleges of advanced education.

