Radio National Background Briefing program

Dear Colleagues

This weekend there will be an ABC radio story about staff wellbeing in astronomy, for which a number of astronomers have been interviewed about CASS. Dave Williams, our Executive Director of Digital, National Facilities and Collections, was also interviewed for the program.

I acknowledge that there have been cases of inappropriate behaviour in CASS. The ABC program will discuss cases going back 5-10 years as well as more recent ones. I'd like to make it clear that any cases of misconduct are unacceptable.

In CSIRO we take these matters very seriously as part of our commitment to a safe, diverse and productive workplace. We now have clear processes for addressing inappropriate staff behaviour, which can include using external impartial investigators reviewing breaches of our Code of Conduct and reporting matters to the police if a staff member has potentially broken the law. These processes are an outcome of the Pearce Report in 2014.

A further recommendation of the Pearce Report was to respect the confidentiality of people making, or the subject of, complaints, so it is inappropriate for me to discuss the details of any specific cases.

Since the Pearce Report we've also set up the CASS Diversity Committee and supported the Australian astronomy community's Pleiades awards.

CSIRO's media statement on this matter is available at this link 'Astronomy and space science staff wellbeing': http://www.csiro.au/en/News/News-releases/2016/Astronomy-and-space-science-staff-wellbeing.

I am committed to a safe and productive workplace and we all need to be committed to this goal through our actions. This is important to us today at CSIRO, to attracting and retaining the best staff and students in the future, and to our astronomy community.

Regards

Douglas

Douglas Bock
Director
CSIRO Astronomy and Space Science

Added by Douglas Bock on 2016-11-18