This notice is published under the requirements of correspondence received by the Branch from the Fair Work Commission on 7 October 2025.

At the meeting of Victorian Branch Council on 18 August 2025, Council passed a motion to reduce the salaries of Branch Secretary Jiselle Hanna, and Branch Assistant Secretary Mitch Vandewerdt-Holman.

Setting the salaries of the Branch Officers is a power granted to Victorian Branch Council under Rule 7.2(c)(xvi) of the Community and Public Sector Union Chapter C rules of the SPSF Group.

During the time of moving, discussion, and debate on the motion, both Jiselle and Mitch were present in the meeting room.

Despite the fact that the motion was made with the intention of fulling Item 11 of the A Voice for Members election platform, and to free up union resources for campaign purposes, it was nonetheless a contravention of Section 293F(1)(a) of the Fair Work (Registered Organisations) Act 2009 which reads:

1. An officer of an organisation who has a material personal interest in a matter that relates to the affairs of the organisation:
   1. must not be present during any deliberation by the organisation on the matter.

Council was unaware of this fact at the time.

Victorian Branch Executive became aware of this fact on 8 September 2025 during a meeting with Fair Work Commission officials and immediately made a verbal voluntary disclosure to those officials.

Their advice was to send a voluntary disclosure by way of correspondence to the Commission. The Branch sent this correspondence on 16 September 2025.

The Commission replied to the voluntary disclosure by way of further correspondence on 7 October 2025 with advice that, should the Branch undertake the following actions, the Commission does not propose to take any further compliance or enforcement action:

1. Seek a Governance-to-You presentation from the Commission for Victorian Branch Council at an early opportunity. Council is arranging for this session to be delivered in early 2026.
2. Publish the correspondence from the FWC dated 7 October 2025 to demonstrate to members of the Branch the steps being taken to ensure a commitment to strong governance and voluntary compliance. This correspondence can be accessed here.
3. Update this section of the Branch website after the Governance-to-You presentation mentioned above has been delivered to Council. This will be done following the aforementioned session in early 2026.

The 39 officials of Victorian Branch Council take the legislative and regulatory obligations incumbent on the Branch very seriously. We look forward to attending the session of the Commission in early 2026 and to continued diligence in fully and faithfully discharging our duties.

Jiselle Hanna
Branch Secretary

20 October 2025