The federal government's biggest department is backing down from a plan to hire more than 1000 workers as casuals while shedding more than 2400 of its permanent staff.
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The Community and Public Sector Union is claiming victory on Wednesday in its fight for job security.
The plan by the Department of the Human Services, which provides frontline services Centrelink, Medicare and the Child Support Agency, was first reported last month by The Canberra Times.
The department was facing a $66 million loss this financial year, blamed on a burgeoning workload, natural disasters and a delayed redundancy program.
Secretary Kathryn Campbell told staff last month the budget allocated $30 million for a "flexible workforce", most of whom would be put to work to improve its customer services.
DHS has been advertising for part-time, casual or permanent workers to fill vacancies from a few days to up to 12 months "depending on [the] business requirement".
The public sector union had said the department's management was trying to quietly casualise some of its workforce while undermining the job security of all 36,000 employees.
The union had accused management of breaking a deal with the union and trying to keep the workforce changes from its staff.
The union said on Wednesday the department had stopped all advertising for casual employment and would offer all affected casual staff "non-ongoing" contracts in coming weeks.
This was confirmed by a spokesman for the department on Wednesday.
CPSU deputy national president Lisa Newman said: "The back-down by DHS management is an important win that will help protect the job security of existing DHS employees.
“If we hadn't challenged this plan, there would be nothing to stop management making employees redundant one day and replacing them with a casual workforce the next.
“Unlike permanent staff or non-ongoing staff, casuals can be dismissed at any time and they don't know whether they'll be working on any given day until they get a text that morning.
“Thanks to our action, this will no longer be the case.
"Many casuals have joined the union to support our continuing campaign for more permanent positions."
She said the non-ongoing contract would provide paid leave and the same entitlements enjoyed by other DHS staff.
