Frank, fearless, but not so free-style? Staff survey changes raise eyebrows

Welcome to Brisbane Times’ Queensland public sector column, Public Circus. This week: a Working for Queensland survey prompt, “vacancy management” hits Child Safety, and wage ruling saga lands senior teachers on par with their juniors.

It’s everyone’s favourite time of the year. No, not the seasonal change of spring – Working for Queensland survey month!

By everyone, of course, we mean those with thoughts about their public sector employment they would maybe only dare lay out in the free-text general feedback box of the anonymised questionnaire. This year, however, it seems there could be a catch.

Word has reached the Circus tent from multiple agencies the no-holds-barred rant box has disappeared from some surveys, or been replaced with a more restrictive prompt for others.

Since landing in inboxes from late August, some eager (only about 20 per cent of the 330,0000-strong workforce filled it out in 2025) and eagle-eyed public servants have clocked the curious changes.

But it’s not uniform across the sector, with the separately collected free-text section included at the discretion of each agency and sent directly, unedited, to the boss.

We’ve caught whispers some folks receiving surveys have this year found no open feedback section at the end.

Other departments we’ve had intel from are said to have replaced the general feedback prompt with one asking what you’d tell someone considering a job there, or what is one thing you would change.

“It’s not as open-ended as it has been in previous years,” a department source said, speaking to us on condition of anonymity for perhaps the obvious reason of not being authorised to do so.

They noted it seemed to be an attempt to steer staff away from airing more detailed or specific gripes.

One former agency chief, also granted anonymity, told us they viewed it as one of the most important parts of the surveys because of the freeing, anonymised nature of the comments.

They suggested any removal of or constraining of this would reflect a lack of willingness to “really hear what people think”.

With a couple of weeks left to complete, we imagine more will discover the changes as they open them closer to the due date – a practice Circus members are certainly not immune from on our workplace feedback forms, either.

But what to do if you discover you’re cut off from the trauma dump you were hoping to give, or have already been confronted by such an injustice? We’ve got you covered.

Fill out the form below (on a non-work device and network) and tell us instead. Drop contact details if you’re willing to talk more, anonymously, of course.

We’ll even try and publish what we can in a future segment. Let the frank and fearless feedback flow!

‘Vacancy management’ comes for Child Safety frontline support roles

Fresh on the heels of the state’s first credit rating downgrade in almost 20-years, Circus can add a seventh department to its list of those with various efforts in place to squeeze staffing budgets.

The latest “vacancy management strategy” word (don’t call it a hiring freeze!) is from over at Belinda Drew’s Department of Families, Seniors, Disability Services and Child Safety.

There, the strategy is said to review vacant roles across child safety, disability services and corporate support before they can be filled. Those not deemed “key frontline” require stricter approval.

This includes sign-off by a deputy director-general and a documented rationale. So far, so similar to what we’ve heard from widely across the sector.

But the thing that has some child safety staff, and their union (Together), up in arms? What, exactly, is being classified as a frontline role under the exemption list.

In particular, the lack of an exemption for administration and business officers in child safety service centres – who keep such centres, which support frontline child protection workers, running.

“These roles are critical to frontline child protections, and they should be treated as critical workers when it comes time to fill them,” Together assistant secretary Dee Spink said in a statement.

“The department says this isn’t a recruitment freeze, but for some workers it can feel like one.”

Comment has been sought from the department.

For what it’s worth, we quizzed independent economist Saul Eslake about this vacancy management approach to belt-tightening while chatting to him on Friday about that credit downgrade.

His view? “They’re a lazy way of trying to save money,” Eslake offered. “They’re fairly crude measures and not ones that I would ever support.”

Eslake also reckoned the roughly 3 per cent staff expense growth projected from next financial year in Treasurer David Janetzki’s June budget (this year’s is 5.4 per cent) is only possible with a proper freeze on the size of the public service.

Either that, or that slim surplus pencilled in for after the 2028 election might end up being kicked down the road – something we’re sure the ratings agencies will be watching closely.

Saga leaves senior teachers on same pay as more junior colleagues

The state industrial umpire’s decision to lift awards by 4.75 per cent will see such rises flow through to some workplace agreements with clauses ensuring wages don’t fall below award rates.

But the ruling has caused strife in education, where an interim pay rise of 3 per cent was recently awarded amid drawn-out efforts for a deal to replace the one which expired more than a year ago.

This trouble boils down to a discrepancy between the classifications (specifically, the experienced senior teacher, or ESL, role) in the state school teacher agreement and award, according to an email sent out to Queensland Teachers’ Union members.

The first band of this classification is available to those with two or more years of satisfactory service as a “senior teacher”. The second, EST 2, can be reached after three years at EST 1.

That higher band was created in the 2019 agreement and is not reflected in the award. While EST 1 wages were set to lift through a safety net tied to the state wage case ruling, EST 2 wages were not.

Then acting general secretary Brendan Crotty said the union clocked the issue weeks ago, raising it with Sharon Schimming’s apparently unaware department and Minister John-Paul Langbroek.

Eventually, a departmental directive was issued to allow EST 2 teachers to get the higher award rate.

This temporary fix, however, essentially leaves more senior teachers on an equal pay rate to those on a lower band until the difference can be sorted via the broader ongoing arbitration process. Yikes.

The issue has, as you might imagine, gone down like a tonne of lead pencils for teachers – some of whom have taken to the union’s social media comment sections to give an unfavourable report card of even some of the union process.

“The QTU acknowledges that some members at EST 2 level may understandably feel frustrated that, for the time being, this means being paid at the same, if higher, rate as EST 1,” Crotty wrote to members last week.

That “time being” is likely to still be some time yet, given arbitration hearings before the Queensland Industrial Relations Commission have now been given a start date of… April 6 next year.

Have a curiosity for the Circus tent? Email on m.dennien@nine.com.au. For more security, sing out with a non-work device and network via Signal (mattdennien.15 or here) and mattdennien@protonmail.com.

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