As a casual academic, getting a bank loan is just one of the things his employment conditions prevents him from doing.

‘‘My 13-year-old asked me the other day when we were going on holidays, because we’ve never been able to take her on a holiday,’’ he said.

‘‘How can I when I have six weeks of no work during the university break?’’

Mr Walton is only employed during the academic semester, meaning he goes unpaid for up to 14 weeks a year in combined university breaks.

In addition to having no paid holidays or sick leave, he never knows, at the end of every year, whether he has a job to return to.

‘‘You are living life permanently on hold because you can’t plan for anything – I can’t guarantee getting work,’’ he said.

Mr Walton has been a tutor at the University of Wollongong since 2008 in the education faculty. In that time he’s received the Vice-Chancellor’s Award for Outstanding Contribution and Learning and has been nominated again by his students this year.

In an ironic twist, he is concerned that completing his PhD in December will decrease his chances of employment because ‘‘the university will have to pay me a higher rate’’.

Earlier in the year Mr Walton co-wrote a textbook for a first-year subject.  But he doesn’t even know if he will get teaching work for the same subject he literally wrote the book on.

‘‘I’ve been fairly lucky but sometimes you don’t get told up until a few days before that you’re teaching,’’ he said. 

Mr Walton said his health suffered as a result of having an insecure income.

‘‘This is my career, not a job. We’re smart people who care about student welfare – we shouldn’t have to go through this.’’

This weekend the Waltons are celebrating their daughter’s 18th birthday. 

‘‘She didn’t want a party, which is good because I don’t how we could have afforded one,’’ he says.