Victoria’s largest and most complex protected action secret ballot started Monday with more than 35,000 Australian Nursing Federation (Victoria Branch) members across the state receiving ballot papers in their letterbox.

ANF said the ballot could also be Australia’s largest protected action secret ballot of union members.

The Australian Electoral Commission is conducting the ballot, which will close at 10 a.m. on Friday, 4 November.

The ballot lists a range of industrial actions that nurses, midwives and mental health nurses could take in the future if necessary, including bed closures, elective surgery cancellations, administrative bans and the ability of nurses, midwives and mental health nurses to speak to the media without the usual performance management consequences.

Nurses, midwives and mental health nurses will need to get their vote in the post back to the Australian Electoral Commission by 31 October to be sure they will be counted when the ballot closes.

The outcome of the ballot will be announced at a statewide ANF public sector members meeting on Friday 4 November 2011, 2.30pm at Festival Hall, West Melbourne.

ANF (Victorian Branch) Secretary Lisa Fitzpatrick said: “ANF is recommending its public sector members vote yes to send a strong message to the Baillieu government that they reject its proposals to abolish nurse/midwife patient ratios, replace nurses with health assistants and introduce unlimited short shifts and broken shifts.

“A strong yes vote will send a strong message to the Baillieu government that mental health nurses are serious about improving workloads in inpatient, high dependency, residential and community mental health nursing so that they can provide safer care for their patients and clients,” Fitzpatrick said.

Negotiations began in September despite the union serving its claim on employers in July. There are two more scheduled negotiation days before the public sector nurses and midwives’ agreement expires on 1 November. The public sector mental health nurses’ agreement also expires on 1 November.