The ACTU and the Victorian Government in supplementary submissions to the FWC's annual wage review have maintained their requests for real wage increases, while the AiG has fallen into line with ACCI and backed a freeze.
Unions are still in the dark about which NSW public servants would qualify for a $1000 frontline worker 'bonus' in lieu of a pay rise, while a health union has asked the State Treasurer to ditch a 2.5% wages cap before it puts the offer to members.
Unions objecting to a joint employer group bid for coronavirus-driven variations to building awards that would allow hours to be cut to zero have today also questioned its validity, given two of the peak bodies are not registered organisations.
Prime Minister Scott Morrison's plan for a dialogue with unions and employers over changes to workplace laws has sparked a scramble among stakeholders to get a seat at the table.
The Labor Opposition has seized on a warning by Reserve Bank Governor Philip Lowe that the JobKeeper wage subsidy should not be phased out too soon, insisting it identifies the dangers of the government's "snap back" strategy.
The NTEU has declared that a proposed framework to secure higher education jobs during the COVID-19 pandemic is "dead" as a national agreement but might still be voted up at individual universities.
The NSW Government has imposed a 12-month wage freeze on its 408,000-strong public sector workforce, but has provided a job security guarantee for the same period.
Prime Minister Scott Morrison's headland speech on a new approach to IR change extended an olive branch to unions by dropping the "ensuring integrity' legislation, but also raised the prospect of further measures to crack down on unlawful behaviour on construction sites.
The ACTU will head into the Morrison Government's JobMaker policy discussions with the aim of reducing insecure employment and extending paid pandemic leave.
