The Fair Work Commission has dismissed a multinational contracting company's attempt to bypass its severance obligations in an important decision on the definition of the "ordinary and customary turnover of labour" in the contracting and labour hire industries.
The in-principle agreement covering workers employed by the head contractor for the massive Gorgon LNG project includes paid "bed busts", when their work stint is reduced due to a shortage of accommodation.
A Full Federal Court has found an employer was entitled to relocate its employee's "base" of operations under the terms its enterprise agreement, with the result of reducing travel expenses and overtime.
Employers are likely to maintain their own paid parental leave schemes even if the Abbott Government's proposed Bill to prevent so-called parent "double-dipping" into government and employer-funded schemes becomes law, according to a key employer group.
Unions have given notice of a protected 24-hour strike at Chevron's Gorgon LNG project this Friday, followed by shorter stoppages over two days next week.
The FWC has rejected the CFMEU's claim that the Port Kembla Coat Terminal enterprise agreement allows the "sandwiching" of long service and annual leave and has instead preferred the employer's view that long service leave cannot be broken up and substituted for periods of annual leave for the ultimate benefit of the employee.
Westpac and the FSU have reached an in-principle agreement on a new agreement covering about 30,000 employees across Westpac and its subsidiary banks that will for the first time remove the link between performance targets and fixed pay increases for all staff earning less than $75,000 per annum.
The oil and gas giant Chevron is braced for legally protected strikes at its $US54 billion Gorgon LNG project in Western Australia as construction workers seek "family friendly" fly-in, fly-out rosters.
The NSW Industrial Court has ordered the state's police force to pay partial interest to an officer who was medically discharged after sustaining a psychological injury while on the job.
