The Commonwealth Bank of Australia (CBA0 has moved to cut about 300 roles across its business, just weeks after announcing a record half-year profit of more than $5 billion — a decision the Finance Sector Union says must be matched with firm guarantees for displaced staff.
In a statement FSU says the job losses will affect teams across retail, business and institutional banking, human resources and, most significantly, technology divisions.
The cuts come as the bank rolls out its newly announced “Future Workforce” program, designed to provide artificial intelligence training and upskilling opportunities to help employees transition into new roles within the organisation.
FSU National Secretary Julia Angrisano said cutting hundreds of positions so soon after posting multi-billion-dollar earnings was “totally unacceptable”.
“At a time when CBA has just posted over $5 billion in half yearly profit, cutting the jobs of 300 workers is totally unacceptable,”
She added, “For years we have seen CBA continue to axe hundreds upon hundreds of jobs while raking in billions in profits.”
“These are the very workers who helped generate CBA’s massive profits. The least the bank can do is retrain and reskill workers, and provide opportunities for them to remain at CBA.”
The FSU says it has long pushed for stronger redeployment, retraining and redundancy protections and had worked with the bank to strengthen these measures through the Future Workforce program. However, it wants the commitments embedded in the next enterprise agreement rather than left to management discretion, saying workforce transition measures must be enforceable.
The debate comes amid broader concerns about automation and artificial intelligence in banking. Last year, 45 CBA employees – including Kathryn Sullivan – were made redundant after training chatbot systems that ultimately replaced their roles. The union says the episode underscored the need for binding job security safeguards as new technology is introduced.
A recent survey of CBA staff found 72 per cent were worried about job security, while 74 per cent reported increased workloads over the past year. Half said they had considered leaving the bank.
Union members are set to launch a campaign titled “A Better Way at CBA” as enterprise agreement negotiations begin, calling for improved pay, secure jobs, stronger redundancy processes, guaranteed retraining pathways, safe staffing levels and clear protections around artificial intelligence and worker data. The outcome of the talks is likely to shape how Australia’s largest bank balances technological change with the expectations of its workforce.
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