In a novel move, unions are seeking to bring forward by 14 weeks the end of the strike-suspending s425 order won by NSW rail employers, arguing that it has failed to achieve its stated purpose of bridging the differences between parties, who they claim have moved further apart during FWC-supervised talks.
The UWU has defeated a federal government attempt to end strikes by Serco employees running immigration detention centres, after the FWC found it not unusual for detainees to climb on roofs, set off fire alarms or endure brief lockdowns, as occurred during the industrial action.
The ETU has lodged an urgent Federal Court bid to challenge FWC orders that suspended industrial action across Sydney's trains network until July, arguing a full bench wrongly treated rail unions as an "undifferentiated whole" and unreasonably advantaged the employers.
A FWC full bench says it suspended industrial action afflicting Sydney's rail network partly to give the RTBU's leadership a chance to "re-establish a greater degree of control" amid suggestions some workers have been going rogue in pushing for a more radical approach.
The FWC has today refused to make a s418 anti-strike order against the RTBU, after finding a "distinct lack of evidence" that it organised a covert campaign to encourage train crew to take sick leave "en masse" that has led to serious disruption of the large parts of the Sydney passenger rail network.
The NSW Government's urgent tandem bid today to pause industrial action that is causing chaos across the Sydney train network will be heard by the FWC in two expedited hearings tomorrow and on Wednesday, while President Adam Hatcher has recommended that unions suspend industrial action to aid a possible resolution.
In a significant judgment on the statutory nature of a "proposed enterprise agreement", a Federal Court has rejected arguments that rail unions lost protection of their industrial action once the bargaining focus changed from a single to a multi-employer deal.
The FWC has refused an employer's application to stop allegedly unprotected action, finding that two off-duty employees' distribution of campaign materials did not amount to industrial action because it did not alter their performance of work, or disrupt other workers.
Rail unions are urgently seeking renewed authorisation for festive season protected action at Sydney Trains and NSW Trains, after the Federal Court last night acceded to the employers' bid to temporarily declare unlawful bans to take effect this morning.
In a breakthrough for NSW fisheries officers seeking to carry capsicum spray while patrolling for poachers, the State IRC has refused to terminate work bans after the Department of Primary Industries failed to convince it they seriously risk depleting fish stocks.
