In the survey - to which 30 per cent of union members and non-members replied - staff members were asked whether they believed the quality of education would suffer if current enterprise bargaining resulted in lower salaries

and conditions.

University vice chancellor Kerry Cox questioned the reliability of the research, while union representatives claimed the results indicated widespread dissatisfaction with the draft agreement put forward by the university.

National Tertiary Education Union president Carolyn Allport said the survey showed staff wanted the union to negotiate better conditions.

"The message to the university is that it is losing the support of the staff, which will in turn mean you will lose the support of the community and damage the university's reputation," Dr Allport said.

In Ballarat yesterday, Australian Council of Trade Unions president Sharan Burrow said lower wages and reduced job security would harm living standards of the university's 1200 employees.

"We already know the government's workplace laws will be bad for workers and families," she said.

"What we are seeing here at the University of Ballarat is that the laws will also be bad for higher education students, staff and communities in regional areas," she said.

However, Prof Cox said that if wages were increased more than was proposed in the draft agreement, staff and the community would suffer through redundancies.

"I am not going to get distracted by the notion that unless we pay the highest salaries we will lose the quality of our staff," he said.

"High salaries would more than likely mean redundancies and I don't want Ballarat to be a repeat of Newcastle where one in five staff was made redundant.

"I would question the reliability and validity of the survey and its methodology.

"What I do know is that about 70 per cent of the university employees did not respond, and I think that was the silent majority that is happy with the draft agreement."