Hundreds of public servants have vented their rage over their three-year industrial dispute with the Coalition government as a Senate inquiry into the bargaining debacle prepares to examine witnesses on Friday.
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Several hundred Commonwealth employees have written to the Senate's Standing Committee on Education and Employment to express their anger and frustration at the government's hardline approach to bargaining with its 150,000 public servants.
The committee will hear on Friday from academics, right-wing think-tank the IPA, Public Service Commissioner and former IPA employee John Lloyd, CPSU National Secretary Nadine Flood as well as members of the union's bargaining teams from various departments.
Senior executives from the departments of Immigration and Human Services and the Tax Office, which have all been major flashpoints in the dispute, will also be questioned by the committee.
By Thursday afternoon, the committee had posted 295 submissions on its website but was on receipt of many more that had not yet been processed.
In their submissions, departmental employees have told of staff morale at an all-time-low after three years of industrial stalemate, dragging down the performance of the Australian Public Service.
Many of those making submissions have told of how they have descended into poverty in the three-and-a-half years since their last scheduled pay rise.
Public servant Cara Wright, who did not specify which department she worked in, told of the struggles to make ends meet for her and her daughter.
"My salary used to be considered average in Australia," Ms Wright wrote.
"My salary is now below average.
"We quite often have to go without."
Immigration Department official Alexander Goldie wrote of trying to get by in Canberra on a graduate's wage.
"With rising property prices, cost of living increases and a stagnant pay rate, making-ends-meet is getting harder," he wrote.
"I don't want the world, I just want a fair outcome that reflects the contribution that I and my colleagues make every day.
"The morale in the workplace after 1000 days is, understandably, very low.
Jason Lamb, who did not specify his agency, wrote of the anger he and his colleagues felt toward their departmental bosses.
"The entire bargaining process has left a bitter taste in my mouth, it felt like we were being dragged along the road and at the end we were kicked in the guts," he wrote.
"By the end of it, the nit picking over wording in the Agreement, the notion that we've lost money for not signing it earlier, management and the executive committee not standing by their employees really was a depressing, morale has significantly dropped and it was apparent that colleagues only voted yes because they were on their last legs."
John Chirgwin, of the Department of Human Services, a 29-year public service veteran, told how his previously productive workplace had been turned into a "morgue".
"I have never seen the morale of the people I work with so low," he wrote.
"A combination of never ending changes to the work we do, dwindling staff numbers and forcing our team in to a rostered environment have seen a vibrant constructive workplace turn into a morgue."
Other public servants, including Helen Banks of the Tax Office wrote of their fears for their families if the government's tough public sector bargaining policy were imposed in their workplaces.
"I am a proud public servant with over 30 years of service and do not ever recall it being so difficult to come to an agreement," she wrote.
"I am the primary carer of our disabled adult daughter.
"I am concerned that the implementation of the workplace bargaining policy will impact my ability to access leave, reducing my flexibility to support and care for my daughter when the need arises."
