The PSA is continuing to press the Department of Education to get more members working in schools into permanent roles.

Despite the significant achievement of the PSA Campaign in schools fighting for permanency, there is still not an ongoing and genuine pathway to permanency for School Administrative and Support Staff.

“Over the years there have been large scale conversions, the largest being the Temporary Workforce Transfer in 2023 and 2024,” said Industrial Manager Siobhan Callinan. “But the root cause of the issue has still not been dealt with.”

The PSA is pushing for a new clause in the School Administrative and Support Staff Award that would provide a pathway to permanency that doesn’t rely on one-off projects but ensures that our members are not kept in insecure work for years.

“We have an increasing number of members contacting us who have not had their temporary contracts renewed despite being employed for years,” said Ms Callinan. “Without fixing the root cause this number will grow every year. So far in 2026 we are likely going to have to run more than 15 unfair dismissals for temporary members in the Industrial Relations Commission.

“The mass transfer of members in schools to permanent roles was one of our union’s finest achievements in recent years, but we need to remain vigilant and keep the Department on its toes.”

The transfer of thousands of NSW public school staff from temporary to permanent employment was a pre-election promise by the Minns Labor Government.

Pushed by unions such as the PSA, the initiative addresses the unacceptably high levels of long‑term casualisation in the school workforce, leaving many support staff and teachers without job security for sometimes more than a decade.

In its first year in office, the Minns Government committed to converting more than 16,000 temporary support staff and teachers to permanent roles through a phased rollout across the state.

The conversion process focused on staff who had worked at the same school for at least three years, with priority given to schools experiencing the greatest staffing pressures.

By October 2023, more than 16,000 permanent conversions were finalised.

The PSA had campaigned for years against insecure employment in schools and, ahead of the 2023 state election, successfully lobbied both major parties to commit to large‑scale permanency conversions. Following Labor’s election, the union continued to pressure the Minns Government to broaden eligibility criteria and ensure that long‑term temporary employees were not excluded from the process.